Amazon Career Development Videos, Forum, and Q&A

Context Of Company

This is a really well funded company (Bank) that underwent a large scale leadership change. The company's primary source of revenue was never it's tech capabilities, however with the new leadership change they're looking for a large scale revamp on how the existing systems work and are working on setting upto a FAANG equivalent engineering environment. This is vision is consistent across the leadership upto the CEO. This org currently consists of multiple Staff engineers from Twitter, Meta, Amzn and Google leading big initiatives.

Personal Context

I'll be soon taking up an offer in this company and will be joining this freshly created Org, where I've opportunity to be among the first 10-15 engineers to join with potential of the org to grow over 100+ engineers. There are lot of existing tech that have been already deemed unscalable due to previous decisions and have been a known business blockers, these tech require either re-write or a large refactor or a completely different viewpoint on tackling this problem. This will involve me working with Engineers who've built this system (Not part of this new Tech Org, rather the old existing infra), I've been already given a heads up from my potential manager that there can be potential hesitancy that the existing engineers may feel and wouldn't be too open to provide all information necessary as our systems will be replacing their soon (Have been reported that this has happened). There isn't a concept of internal wiki similar to Amazon or other Big Tech, hence lot of this is just domain knowledge etc. Fortunately the leadership is aware of this and is taking steps to answer this, and takes into consideration when scoping for projects and setting up right expectations.

The following are certain concerns that I've, and wanted to understand what is the best course of action I can take up to make my onboarding successful.

This is my Current plan, given i'll be among first engineers to join this team.

1. Understand domain, reach out to multiple PMs and document all pain points, problems we are solving in long term & Short term.

2. Go through code base of relevant packages and start adding their UMLs, HLD etc to best of my abilities to a document to move towards creating a Knowledge base.

3. Socialize with engineers from the related org and try to gain their confidence, and potentially get few KT sessions (Not sure how i'll go about this as the team is situated in different city).

4. Work with manager to setup boy-scout rule, such that everyone onboarding will incrementally add more to the existing knowledge base.

Follow Up Questions :

• I still haven't taken up the offer yet and still have a week before I can respond. The increase in pay and the growth opportunity in the new company is significantly big, I can see myself reaching Sr.SDE in < 2 years and Staff in < 4 years there due to the problem space being so fresh and getting a really early head start. However, I'm slightly concerned if the lack of co-operation from other org and lack of documentation, and the fact that the entire org is being setup fully freshly could be a concern. What's the best course of action i could take to minimize this risk?
• Second, one would view moving out from FAANG to a not well known company as a downgrade, would this still hold true if the problem space and opportunities in the new company is more complex?

Hi Taro. I got laid off in April from AWS. I interned at NASA JPL and I am considering going back fulltime and continuing to apply to tech companies. I don't have an offer but I am hopeful I would be able to connect with a team since I interned there one year and have 1.5 YOE at AWS. I have some concerns about joining JPL, because they are prototype and research focused.

• They don't have many production systems or serve customer traffic.
• They also operate mostly in small and independent groups so the engineering standards can differ a lot. The research group I interned at had poor engineering and code quality compared to AWS.
• The engineering environment is different than corporate. Some technologies and experiences missing at JPL that are common in tech are pipelines (CI/CD), TPS, tickets, oncall, debugging large and distributed systems, customer traffic, metrics, operational reviews.
• JPL pays poorly and has slow growth. You can be there 10 years and make less than an SDE-1 in FAANG.

I don't have any visa issues. Finances are not a problem. Currently I have very low expenses and good savings because I didn't RTO and I am living with my parents. I have 1.5 YOE at AWS and 3 years of internships before that. I see the market picking up so I am tempted to keep trying for a tech company.

Another thing to consider is that there is a lot of inertia when you join a job. I will have little time to look for other jobs in the first few months because I will be busy onboarding. I will also have less time to look for jobs and study for interviews.

Please give advice :)

Definitions:

Backend: Distributed Systems, scalable applications, fault tolerant systems, control plane applications, API development, uses higher-level languages like Java/Python.

Low-Level: Database Internals (Query Optimization, Transaction processing, Data/Storage engines), Compilers, GPUs, latency sensitive software, accelerators. Usually C/C++.

Which is better for long-term career growth and compensation?

My manager made it clear that my org is not offering return FT offers, but that he would put "incline return" for an internship position if I stayed another year in school (or somehow delayed graduation until 2025).

I could just take random classes or another major to extend my time in school. I also could do a 1-year Masters program which I have already been admitted into. But I am an older student and would rather not stay another year in school. I also feel like I am learning very little in school (I go to a small state school). Compared to the ridiculous amount I learned this summer in the industry, I feel like staying in school for another year would be a huge waste of money and time.

I could potentially work Fall/Spring internships for the next year (so basically a gap year) to artifically delay graduation by a year as well.

Becuase I go to a small state school, getting interviews from Big Tech is extremely hard. We send about 1-3 kids to each FAANG+ company each year and I was only able to get 2 FAANG+ interviews even with refferals to every top company, a 4.0 GPA and relevent experience. Even getting actual SWE engineering jobs is really hard with most CS grads getting jobs labeled "SWE" but that involve very little coding.

Because of that, my worry is this might be my only chance to break into Big Tech for a long time (if ever).

So is it worth delaying my graduation for a shot at big tech? Or should I just graduate and start my career, even if its at a non-tech company (with potentially very little actual engineering work)?

I like my team and management. I would like to stay here and yet address the comp concerns. Promos are too difficult.

So I would like to learn from Alex, Rahul and community members here on how I should go about the retention offer.

What are the things I should do in order to increase my chances. I want to plan it thoroughly and execute it without getting burnt out.

Hi Taro. When choosing a team, we also have to choose their specialization and tools. If the specialization is niche and the team uses exclusively internal tools I won't gain any transferable skills. I got laid off from AWS and I am realizing that I have little transferable skills. I used mostly internal tools. Believe it or not, many AWS teams do not use AWS extensively.

How can I choose a team or focus area for transferable skills? I was considering pivoting into Android and IOS development because I see many job openings for these.

Hey folks, I recently got promoted to L5 (Mid Level). Looking for any advice in general on how should I approach my work, what to look for etc. Any words of wisdom that people would like to share?

TIA

PS: Apologies if this sounds too generic. My intention is just to learn from other people's experiences. Any advice is welcomed.

Hi all. I joined AWS after university and recently got laid off. I have 2YOE at AWS and a 1 year internship at NASA.

During undergrad the only thing I stood out for was having multiple publications. I suspect really talented undergrads in CS programs where targetting FAANG so there wasn't much competition. Maybe I was good at research though.

I am a US Citizen and I went to a medium tier university for undergrad. The name is recognizable but it's not impressive. What kinds of doors does attending a top university for MS CS open for me? I might be able to get into a top school like PHYMS.

Most people tell me that top schools are not useful after getting a couple YOE. I remember I was talking with someone that went to MIT for undergrad and they told me that there is a company that will basically give students $100,000 to do a startup and all they needed was an idea. They told me that it was pretty easy to get and many people got that at MIT. That's not something that would ever happen at my university.

I have some concerns:

1. I am not interested in doing research. I want to stay a backend SWE. MS CS is getting away from that.
2. I don't need a visa. Graduate programs in my experience are usually for international students that need a visa.
3. The opportunity cost and tuition cost of doing a masters is huge.

I'm a support engineer in big data profile working in Amazon web services, and I'm looking to transition into a SDE role within the teams like Spark, Hadoop, Yarn EMR infrastructure, etc

At the same time I have been working hard on my promotion from L4 support engineer to L5 support engineer.

Given a scenario if I get promoted to L5 support engineer and later, down the line I also get L4 software engineer role within Amazon, should I take the SDE role at a downgraded level, should I look outside or what should be the best route?

Somebody I know has been working in Amazon BA and related positions for seven years, however they switched to SDE intern positions within Amazon. Do you think it is a wise move?

I have just joined a new team, and have my first coding task. I am currently terrified about taking the first step and writing some code and testing it.

I have spent a lot of time researching solutions, but have found myself bit in the past because of a lack of testing and research, and also am just terrified of breaking things.

What are some suggestions for getting over this fear, and how can I be more confident that the testing and implementation cover all edge cases and won't have bugs?

When working on a new task, I often find myself asked to estimate how long a task may take. Luckily, my team is pretty forgiving, but a critical step will be to start more accurately estimating tasks.

How do you get better at breaking down tasks to understand what needs to get done, and then giving proper estimations for how long those tasks will take?

Hi Team,

My team has a really great manager who I've been working under for past 3~ years who has aided me in fast tracking my career growth, however there will be change in structure, and our team will be led by a new Manager. As a result, I'll be required to build up the relationship with the new manager, earn trust, etc.

However, at the same time I'm worried that all the progress I've put forwards to build a good case for my promotion might get lost as I've been doing a lot of work that doesn't directly reflect in overall Team's Yearly planning such as drastic improvements in OE (Saving multiple SDE weeks yearly), many architectural upgrades to existing systems (as a clean up activity while working on my main project) etc.

I feel these data points might get lost: How can I ensure that the transition between managers will not end up affecting my long term growth plan? I still have 3-4 weeks till the transition is complete.

Not a manager here but I strongly feel like understanding my manager's perspective is essential for me to successfully navigate my tech career.

I understand that if a software engineer wants to become promoted, they need to complete projects with increasing scope involving increased technical depth, ambiguity, impact, etc in addition to many other things.

How is this scope defined for engineering managers? Does it work the same way where engineering managers are rewarded for leading a team that develops highly ambitious products in terms of users, features, etc? Does the number of engineers on the team matter? If so, how does an organization prevent empire building from happening?

Hi all,
I entered the company as an L4 Frontend Engineer and it is my first tech job, so I started with 0 experience. Our team has a lot of frontend tasks, but also has a lot of backend work as well. As a result, I have been doing a lot of backend work when it is necessary and there isn't much difference betwee an SDE and FEE in our team in terms of the work we do.

My manager knows that I had 0 experience prior to coming here and recognizes that that I'm able to do both backend and frontend work. He mentions that I could always transition into the SDE role if I wanted to.

My question is, would there be any huge benefits of changing my role to be an SDE for my career? At this point, I wouldn't say that my skillset is more geared towards Frontend since I'm doing both and this is my first job.

My original intention was to stay a Frontend Engineer as I find frontend work more fun and it was what I studied the most for when preparing for interviews. But my friends were telling me that SDE would probably give me more opportunities in the future, so I've been thinking about this lately.

I have worked as a software consultant for 4 years at companies like Amazon, Hitachi, etc.

I'm an incoming SDE intern and will be joining the team at the end of this month. I'm eager to get started and make the most of this opportunity. Last summer, I feel like I didn't perform up to my own expectations and left some room for improvement. I was fortunately to have a return offer but I think I don't really deserve it. This summer, I am committed to learning from my past experiences and striving to do my best. As part of my preparation, I'm planning to have a meeting with our manager to discuss my goals for this summer.

1. Are there any key topics or questions you recommend I should raise in this initial meeting?
2. How can I best communicate my summer goals to our manager?
3. Is there anything you wish you had known or asked when you first joined the team?

I was recently laid off from AWS. I see few open roles for SDE-1s but descent number for SDE-2 roles.

Should I study system design and apply for SDE-2 roles or focus on SDE-1 roles?

I have not studied for system design interviews. I estimate that I will need 2-3 months of studying before I can pass the interviews. My YOE is low for SDE2 and I might be wasting my time applying for SDE2.

Here is a breakdown of my experience:

• SDE-1 at AWS: 1 year 9 months (not including 2 months for WARN)
• SDE intern at NASA JPL: 1 year
• Undergraduate Researcher: 3 years. Co-author on 3 papers. First-author on 1 paper. All reputable journals.

My manager at AWS was telling me that I should apply for promo in the next few months (after finishing a project). I got laid off before I could apply.

Is there anything I can do now to make me stand out as an SDE2? For example, contributing to open source. I want to try being an entreprenuer but I know few ventures make more money than working at FAANG so maybe it's not a good idea.

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

I am an SDE1 that was recently laid off from AWS (~2 YOE total). Lately, I have been reflecting on what I wanted to do/what really excites me. I really enjoy software development and while I do want to get another job one day, I wanted to use this opportunity to scratch my entrepreneurial itch and create apps/websites/side-projects for fun or for many small business owners I know that need someone to create software for their business. I'm not sure how long this "break" will be but I would say ~2 to 3 months time. Part of this is inspired by Alex Chiou's love for side projects.

I understand that finding a job will take some time as well, so the total gap on my resume that will be filled by this freelance work/applying might be ~6 months total. I understand that there are other posts on Taro that talk about the impact of a career break but this won't necessarily be a break per se. On my resume I will put this down as freelance work I completed for clients and will be prepared to show potential employers a portfolio of what I did.

I was wondering if this would negatively reflect on my application when applying for SDE jobs again/will make it harder for me to land a job. Alternatively, I could begin applying and interview prep now and only work on these projects on the side. Thanks.

Heard a lot about Bar Raiser round during Amazon interviews but I also see some people posting it as an award. Would like to know more about this and the kind of mindset needed for it.

I had an internship with Amazon last summer and was lucky enough to have the return internship offer for this summer. I am quite nervous because my tech stack skills are so weak. I am just good at technical interview because I do competitive programming and leetcode a lot, thats why I land my internship offer with Amz.

I forgot almost everything from my last internship. I have to admit that I was a very bad intern, not to say the worst intern. My mentor and the senior engineer of my team did the most of my last project so I got the return offer.

Please suggest me any sources to improve my tech stack skills, projects, open sources, ... so I can perform well at this summer. My team last year used Kotlin for backend codebase.

I see many experienced developers finding flaws in the existing architecture and also refactoring them to make it much better. I don't think I have yet gained the ability to identify loop holes in complex projects. However, I am able to fix issues if someone else calls them out pretty quickly.

How can I improve on this? What are some good resources to develop this skill?

I have a SDE 3 mentor who is very nice and helpful. I started working with them a while ago because I am trying to get promoted to SDE 3 but I don't always have great questions to ask. I also want to be respectful of their time.

What are some questions that will be most beneficial to ask? How can I make the most of this mentorship?