Editor's Choice Q&A and Videos

I have unlimited PTO at my company, but I'm not sure how much I can/should reasonably take. Any advice on this? How much do you take?

I'm currently interviewing with several quant firms for a software engineering position. From a college student's perspective, the general perception seems to be that quant firms are more prestigious than big tech since the pay is so high (and how much harder it is to get into). However, I'm wondering how people in the tech industry view quant firms? Do tech recruiters even know what Citadel, Jane Street or Hudson River Trading are (and what about the smaller firms)? If so, what do tech recruiters think of them?

I'm also in the process with startups that'd be considered rocket ship startups. Think of companies like Databricks, Applied Intuition and Scale AI. Fingers crossed that I'll get offers from both quant firms and these startups. Supposing that I get offers from both, which one should I choose? What factors should I consider?

I'm still in school, but I will be graduating in a couple months. My goal is to get promoted as quickly as possible at a reputable company like Google. However, there are so many ways to get better as a software engineer, and I'm unsure how to prioritize all of this information. What should I focus on since I'm earlier-in-career to really unlock that fast career progression?

I am a mid-level software engineer and expecting layoff in the coming month. As the market situation is very tight right now, I am thinking to take a break to give myself enough time to prepare and land a good opportunity instead of just accepting something which is below my calibre. I have 10+ years of experience and never had a career gap in my resume. How much gap in a resume is acceptable and not questioned (or frowned upon) by recruiters or hiring managers? Blind posts tell me that it is taking some people 6 months or even 8 months to land into a new role.

I am looking for some good books or detailed courses on system design which are targeted for Mobile engineers specifically.

I started working at Shopify in the product side. It's backend API development focused with some full stack elements. However with AI popping up everywhere, I get the feeling that to be employable in the future, I need to get a job as an AI engineer or work on a team that focuses on it. With Shopify heavily relying on rails as well which is seen as an older framework, I don't know if I'll have a competitive edge in the future.

In July, I received a mid-year evaluation indicating room for improvement, with a rating of 2 out of 5 on the scale. My goal is to achieve an outstanding rating by this time next year. Here are the areas my manager provided feedback on for improvement:

He is a college hire, so he is a very junior developer.  He is an enthusiastic member of the team and seems eager to make contributions. He has struggled to learn the fundamental skills required for the job (programming, database, web development).  He will need to improve upon these skills in order to make contributions to the team with little assistance from his peers.

How do you assess the Financial Health and market stability of a startup before applying for a job there?

I am getting overwhelmed with my work, in this team for about 1 year. How should I optimize to squeeze time to help others?

Helping others gives me more joy than doing my own work :) . that is not my core work though.

Even being a Taro premium user, I'm unable to participate in all the events, though I heavily need mentorship, seems like a roadblock for me because on LinkedIn I see so many posts, it's very difficult to catch up.