Senior Engineer Career Development Videos, Forum, and Q&A

What the title says...Im getting to hiring manager calls but not advancing (only passed 1 out of 5 calls).

Only feedback I've gotten from one of them is that I didn't seem to have enough experience at scale. I've gone through all the relevant courses on taro and I can't find where the real problem is.

Any advice?

My manager has 3 pods reporting to them, and my pod is pretty small at just a couple engineers. Because of this, I'm not entirely sure what I can take on to start making progress towards Staff. What projects can I work to fill in this gap? For additional context, I work on the back-end, but I can do full-stack if needed.

I had an interview with a Big Tech company last week. The Hiring Manager told me that he had 2 spots open on his team, one mid L4 and one senior L5. He then asked me what role I wanted to be in. I waffled a bit, but then said the L4 role. I genuinely believe I'd rather be in the L4 role since I've never worked in Big Tech before.

I'm assuming I made a mistake in answering the question though. Similar to how you should never give the first number when asked about comp expectations, I'm assuming the right answer to a levelling question is something like "I'm looking to contribute at the highest level I can".

I imagine this response is the better response for 2 reasons:

1. I might be able to get an L5 role and operate at that level, even if I don't feel that way

2. If they think I'm going for L5, they might give me L4 as consolation, whereas if they think I'm going for L4, I might end up with nothing. This is the "shoot for the moon, land among the stars" strategy.

Can people confirm my thinking is accurate?

I'm more of an extrovert, while my tech lead is more of an introvert. I feel like our relationship isn't as open and honest as it should be, particularly around sharing feedback. They often times have major feedback for me, but it will come too late, either deep into project execution or as late as performance review.

How can I make this relationship more fluid, so I can get feedback to improve earlier?

I'm pushing for E6, and I'm having trouble doing this in my current org. I'm considering an org switch, and I want to make sure I don't end up in a similar situation - How can I properly evaluate an org for availability of scope and mentorship?

Put on an exciting Staff level project for the last 6 months. Now, asked to make a tough choice - move out of Org or stay in current Org and give up scope.

Pros of moving:

• Scope: getting multiple jr level engineers to carry out the scope I created.
• Exciting product.

Cons of moving:

• Current manager turned down the scope expansion.
• Have built relationships within current team. Enjoy working with them (more familiar)
• Less depth AI/ML work but more product heavy (which is high impact as well but slightly less interesting from ML standpoint)
• Lots of unknowns with new team - unknowns beyond staff scope IMO

TLDR; What would others in the same situation recommend? From taro courses, Option 1 seems better. But there are unknowns especially with current manager refusing the offer.

DoorDash has a tradition where your manager sends a "Dashiversary" email to the entire company on your work anniversaries. The manager creates a Google doc and collects notes & photos from your colleagues and cross-functional partners, then adds his/her own note at the top of the email. Given the impact of Deep Thanks, what should I write in these notes to leverage these opportunities to build relationships?

In our operational workflows, business users aim to update rules in a SharePoint-stored spreadsheet. This sheet influences diverse data processing workflows. I'm contemplating to do it on a version-controlled repository like Git.

The dilemma is whether granting users editing freedom enhances usability or if control via Git ensures thorough tracking and review of changes.

How do I delineate between business processes open to user modification and those mandating Git control for optimal balance?

I have a lot of expectations on my plate, and it can be hard to handle. I'm being put on a project soon, but I do have some spare time here and there. How can I make effective use of this time, and is there anything I should focus on during onboarding in general?

How many days a week do you work in the office (hybrid - as in, the expectation of coming in-person) for FAANGMULA companies (Silicon Valley specifically but ok if other regions) as a ratio to work from home/remote?

How many hours a week for actual work on product vs attending meetings are in-person vs. Zoom or remote?

I'm looking at interviewing at different positions at FAANGMULA companies and tech startups in Silicon Valley (from SF to South Bay) and trying to compare against my commute if I work 2-3 days out of the week from home vs work from home/remote and want to know what the standard expectation is.

I ask since I had a friend (director level) who works in analytics/data science that worked remotely from Hawai'i most of the pandemic at a L5-L7 level depending on how folks define that and was able to work 20 hours a week. Their new job they work remotely from Silicon Valley and commute to another state once a quarter for meetings.

I wonder how common this is, it's a pattern I see with a lot of friends, all CTO, founder, investor type of folks (fractional, etc.) who are "full time" on paper (1099 contract paid an equivalent of what I would have previously expected a W-2 working 40 hours a week would pay). I am having issues explaining to my family and my partner who work the traditional 9-5 job, 40 hours a week in old school Silicon Valley (publicly traded companies, biotech etc.), where they are expected to come in the office 3-5 days a week and work on a W-2 so cannot seem to fathom how I see these examples as possible and how it could be a possibility for me have a better work-life balance, working lesser hours, commuting 2 or 3 days a week ideally and remote.

I've been at my current company for many years, and I'm looking for a change of pace. I'm unsure how to bring this up properly with my manager in particular: How do I frame the conversation and when do I have it?

For context, I have a really good relationship with my manager. They were initially an engineer at the company like myself, and they've been with me since I've started.

Historically, my managers have never been willing to commit to a set of performance criteria (i.e. what it looks like to meet criteria, exceed criteria, or be promoted). They usually defer to company guidelines without specifying what I can do on my project that would meet their bar. I get it, as they want to hedge their bets and motivate me without committing to anything. My career has gone well anyway and I ultimately get good enough reviews and periodic promotions. However, I often get feedback that high performance or promotions require me to do things that I am already doing and including in my review. I do not know what else to do to get stellar reviews.

I have been asked to lead a large, risky, technically challenging project with a scope and time horizon significantly beyond my level. The project sounds interesting but like a huge amount of work and stress. If I take on the role, I would like to be rewarded for it. Whether successful delivery leads to a promotion is a big factor in my decision. My manager will not commit to what succeeding in this project means for my career.

In general, is there a way to get more concrete criteria and commitments from managers? In this case specifically, what should I do?

I have been making progress towards meeting senior level competencies. My manager is aligned and wants to put me up for promo at the end of the year. However, I’m looking for a third project in Q4 to really nail down my case. Additionally, I want to provide more impact and learn how to define new initiatives. I love creating “swim lanes” for my teammates and leading projects that grow their scope. How would you recommend:

1. Coming up with a project idea
2. Vetting the project to make sure it has enough scope for a senior level (or staff! I would love to provide more impact)
3. Vetting the project to make sure it has enough impact for a senior level

I have a lot of ideas for step 1, but am struggling to choose which are appropriate to pursue. Previously, I built a reusable web component at a company wide scale, and am working with a cross org team who wants to use it. I am also working on a technically complex web authentication project that has potential to be used by other teams. Both of these project were scoped by me (with some guidance from my staff mentor) and my manager has communicated they are senior level projects. I have built good relationships with my teammates, our direct stakeholders, and several cross-org engineers. I’m also exceeding expectations at my current level, so there isn’t anything to worry about there. However, I feel like I’m hitting a wall and need to figure out the next project that will turn my promo case into a slam dunk. Any advice? I’m a frontend web engineer if that helps. :)

I spoke to my manager about putting a promo packet up this half for an E5 promotion. I didn't rush into this. I've watched Taro's E5 promo crash course, have listened to my manager's feedback and consistently improved myself each time.

Now I feel ready. The Staff Engineer (TL) I work with has also vouched for me and said on the engineering excellence axis I'm performing way better than the other E5s on the team and he's not concerned about the other axes either. I've shared this with my manager. I've been performing at this level for about 2-3 months now and will continue to do so for another 2 months before perf season.

For some additional context, I joined Meta in Feb as an E4 and was aiming to get to E5 in 1 year. I know this seems aggressive, but that's because Meta down leveled me.

My manager said that I need to continue doing this for another half. Is this usually the case? Maybe I set my expectations too high by reading Alex's Linkedin Posts about mentoring engineers to E5 so quick :)

FYI on the internal career pages it says "1-2 quarters (or more)" which could mean absolutely anything

Just watched this short course before work today, and found it very relevant. I'm a veteran developer. I'd like more content and wisdom on how to have the confidence to ask questions so I can onboard effectively when there is a steep power imbalance. I'm feeling pretty exposed in a new position as the information I need to get a solid foundation is not readily available, and my leaders technical writing is so brief as to be unusable for new starters (its expert writing for experts, not expert writing for the less knowledgable).

I know you said if you went into more detail it would be 20 hours, but seriously, that would be extremely valuable content for me.

The difference between a great place to work and a mediocre place to work is often the quality and willingness to of colleagues both senior and junior to communicate and share. The worst places are when colleagues on the same team don't really work together on problems and only communicate through PRs. Such feedback is too late IMHO and leads to waste and low motivation.

I'm new to commercial Generative AI. I am onboarding and I believe one of my tasks through end of quarter will be to audit the business and look for use cases where we can improve efficiency or reduce cost.

During interview, the company indicated that it would like to build this capability with an internal focus at first before thinking about consumer-facing use case as early as next year.

I believe it's common for engineers to help with development. What are some other common internal use cases in tech companies? This is a fintech FWIW.

I work on a pretty planning intensive team. Sometimes we'll spend several weeks planning out our next project, but since planning takes so long, not much time is left for execution after we're done planning. This leads to us having to sprint to deliver, and after we go that, we go back to planning and the cycle starts all over again. This is all pretty hectic, so I was wondering if anybody had any ideas on how to improve this process?

Hi Taro staff,

I wanted to know if there are any other study groups running? The ones I have seen with system design seemed more passive as of late and prior had some really good ones for DSA/technical interview prep. Wondering who will run the next round of events, has this just rotated with volunteer members organizing this?

I'm in the first few weeks of onboarding and I'm hearing I'm expected to lead a new project initiative because the lead engineer decided to leave the company.

The project is barely off the ground lacking resources, technical design, requirements etc. and I'm afraid I have to produce something meaningful within a tight deadline over the course of the next few months.

What do I do? On one hand, this seems like a good opportunity to deliver. But on the other hand, it doesn't seem like a successful onboarding path. I'm extremely new to the company, and executing on a multi team / scope initiative like this seems like a big ask.

Should I ask to be placed somewhere where I'll have more support?

These are questions for Rahul since he put together a great negotiation course that I completed the other day.

I recently skimmed the Design Guru's course on negotiation, and two questions came up

1. How/when do you negotiate? - Live on a phone call/in-person right after the interview, after the interview via email or via phone? What is the most ideal? Design Gurus said email is the best mode.
2. What do you do if they explicitly ask you what your salary # amount is? - They actually asked via email (hiring manager at Meta) before my phone screen what companies I was interviewing at (to name them). Is there a script to be able to not disclose this?

In AWS clusters, there are numerous instances, and multiple teams deploy new data workflows every week.

We once had a situation where a team member added numerous nodes to a cluster for a backfill operation, resulting in an unexpectedly high bill that shocked us.

To prevent such instances in the future, we're exploring ways to streamline monitoring and accurately calculate the costs of each instance. However, this can be time-consuming.

How does your company establish guardrails to prevent unexpectedly high costs from the use of expensive machines?

When evaluating folks for promotion or in general developer experience in terms of measuring productivity of an engineer (junior, mid-level all the way up to tech lead), how is this measured when building any one particular project for 3 months?

I see Alex talk a lot about # of commits when evaluating the work of a code machine and watched the course he had on code quality, but can we give a more concrete example of what would be considered a single commit in a day/week that is substantial enough to satisfy at as such for a responsive web app, or a native (Android/iOS) app on any particular project?

I am thinking of scope since a lot of the time I can build a prototype from scratch - everything sans deploying fully into production (for an AI project or some other responsive web / native iOS app) within two days (think hackathon style) but not completely sloppy or super polished, but something working/basic functionality (and that has a number of commits), but I think I'm having trouble grasping what number of commits on any particular stack is considered substantial in a single day/week and expectation wise per month or quarter on a intermediate vs. long-term project for two quarters or a year? I think I lack clarity and wonder if I will be as performative or hyper-perform compared to my peers (like I can code fast and even without using a CoPilot, but I wonder about code quality and depth rather than simply throwing something together or fluff commits - a bunch of installfest does not count, obviously).

I'm in the interview loop with few companies, while working on my current job where it's becoming difficult to manage the interview schedules. A recent recruiter scheduled rounds with 5 one-hour slots spread across 1 to 3pm on 2 consecutive days, as the interviews need to happen during working hours of interviewers. Recruiter also asked me to manage the slots provided as there are many candidates and they are looking to fill the open position soon.

While I already politely communicated to the HR that it's difficult for me to take out this amount of time from my work day and provided with alternative options for early mornings or evenings, I was wondering whether the current job market expect candidates to comply with such scheduling requests, even if it creates friction with their current job?

I recently read an existing question "Do FAANG...ever hire M1 from outside?"

I am aware that M1 is usually filled internally. The part that shocked me is that the questioner stated they are a Sr EM with 10 years of management experience. I would expect they would interview for Tier 1 as a Sr EM with that background.

This relates to my own career strategy as well: I plan to move from Sr IC to EM at my current company, gain 2-5 years of experience, and consider interviewing out for promo if I can't achieve internal promo in that frame.

Am I thinking about this the wrong way? We know promo to senior for engineers by interviewing is often easier than internal promo, but is that a poor mental model for EM?