Senior Roles

Entry-Level Software Engineer at Taro Community2 months ago

I'm currently an L4 at a FAANG-tier public company (was promoted this cycle) with ~1.5 YOE. Compensation seems to be close to top of band at this level compared to other companies, so switching at my level wouldn't make sense.

Ideally, I'd like to stay at my current team / company for the next 1-1.5 years, as I feel that there's a lot I can ship and have the opportunity to learn.

I see myself progressing to smaller companies over time. The next logical step would be finding a late stage tech startup (series B and after - some examples of interesting ones in my head would like Anysphere, Notion, etc.) once I'm done with my current role.

Would it be realistic to apply for senior years at that point (~3 YOE) or is that too ambitious?

I also realize that it's a bit early to be thinking about this, but I would like to consider how / when I should think about switching to late stage startups. Realistically, it would take 2-3 years (2.5 would be a decent target) to get a senior SWE role at my current company. That's also reasonable (would be ~4 YOE), but I do want to try my hand at smaller companies.

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Discussion

(4 comments)

1
Alex Chiou
•Tech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero
2 months ago
3 YOE to get senior will be tough, especially at a top-tier company like Notion that will use FAANG standards for leveling. You can certainly try but keep expectations low. The cutoff for senior is usually 5 years, sometimes 4, as I talk about in my mid-level to senior course here: https://www.jointaro.com/course/grow-from-mid-level-to-senior-senior-l4-to-l5/how-this-course-works/

In terms of when to leave, I would actually try to leave earlier rather than later. The failure mode here is that you don't want to get 50%+ of the way to senior (very doable within 1 to 1.5 years) and then struggle to leave as you don't want to lose that progress. I think you can even start applying right now (it'll take you minimum 3 months to start a new job anyways, especially in this market).

Here's the job searching learning path: Land Your Dream Job In Tech

Lastly, congrats on the promo!
- 0
  Mid Level Engineer [L4]
  •Taro Community
  2 months ago
  Thank you for the thoughts. With this all in mind, would you recommend that I leave at all? Or would staying be better at this point?
- 0
  Alex Chiou
  •Tech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero
  2 months ago
  
  Thank you for the thoughts. With this all in mind, would you recommend that I leave at all? Or would staying be better at this point?
  
  Totally depends on you! The market is rough right now, so a job search would definitely be very stressful. So if you have the patience for that and want to take some risk, by all means, go for it.
  
  But if you're looking to take it easy for a bit after a hard-fought promotion, just chilling (well, as much as you can in this economy) and waiting 6 months to see where your head is at then is also totally a valid option.
  
  In general, if you are happy with your current team (good pay, supportive manager + teammates, fulfilling work), I recommend that people stay and squeeze as much juice from that fruit as possible. It's a bit grim, but 90%+ of teams get worse over time (awesome manager leaves, weird reorg, layoffs, etc). It is very, very, very rare for teams to get better over a long-term horizon.
0
Elliot Kang
•AI/ML Eng @ Series C startup
2 months ago
Just apply. Let the company decide leveling at the offer stage. But if you're not applying, you have no chance anyways.

"You miss 100% of the shots you don't take"

Wayne Gretzky