Mid-Level Software Engineer [SW2] at Intuit

I'm in the onboarding phase. I was assigned a starter task and have been working on it. I haven’t done the work of asking questions on design choices (that part is pending).

I want to be ramped up after a week and am wondering how to spend the time. Should I go in-depth on overall architecture? Or spend time working on the codebase? Or is there something else I should do?

I'm on the earlier side of mid-level with around ~2 years of experience. I just wanted to get some overall thoughts from senior engineers that are more seasoned than me: What are the main things to grow from mid-level to senior?

What's some good high-level advice to start progressing to senior engineer?

I feel like everyone's talking about getting into FAANG all the time, and I've been thinking about it as well since I haven't worked at a FAANG company yet. I see people with really short stints on their resume - Is that really okay? Overall, it's all a lot to take in and I'm just wondering how to best think about my career and get away from all this job switching noise.

How can I deal with all the anxiety thinking about job switching?

Intuit Inc. is an American business software company that specializes in financial software. Intuit's products include TurboTax, Mint, QuickBooks, Credit Karma, and Mailchimp.

Intuit

Mid-level Engineer [SW2]

Good question! Here's 3 great resources to check out IMHO:
- [Developing The Technical Proficiency Of A Senior SWE - Q&A From An Amazon SDE2](https://link.jointaro.com/jYQd7X2RjKBXN5Na7)
- [Leading Turbulent Projects - Q&A From A Meta E4](https://link.jointaro.com/9MCbH5bzLS5T6Kn7A)
- [Finding A Multi-Million $$$ IG Bug - Story Around Creating Senior SWE Scope](https://link.jointaro.com/z95VVUdpLq4db7dXA)

I think the big mindset shift for most mid-level engineers growing to senior is that they need to expand their world view, viewing projects and teams more holistically. Most earlier mid-level engineers I've worked with only really focus on their part of the stack for their product (e.g. "I own the Android part of the ads CTA button in Instagram."). Once you start breaking out of that mental bubble, you'll find yourself influencing others and leading entire projects.

Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero, PayPal

Alex Chiou

Senior engineers have proven themselves to be extremely capable at shipping high-quality, complex software efficiently. This collection breaks down how they operate and how you can get to this level too.

What's some good high-level advice to start progressing to senior engineer?

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Intuit