Big Tech Q&A and Videos

How is secrets management done in big tech? What does engineering excellence look like in this part of DevOps?

While onboarding to my first Big Tech company which represents a huge boost for me in terms of comp, learning, and company prestige, does it make sense to put my social life on pause for a few months?

I'm single and have few other responsibilities.

The logic here is to put myself in the best position to succeed by working extra on weeknights and weekends and not getting distracted.

The argument against doing this it could lead to burnout and be counterproductive.

I figure there's a balance here. Maybe focus hard on my job for 3 - 6 months and after that relax a little? I.e. be more proactive about having fun on weekends and dating.

I'm a Database Administrator and I'm looking how I should proceed further as I see many companies especially big tech don't have a DBA role but Data engineer or Data Scientist or Data Architect. I tried talking to interview kickstart about what roles I can apply to and I'm told to choose one of the above mentioned Data * roles. Can you guide me here on what will be a better approach here?

Thanks

If I talk about the following weaknesses:

• My sometimes I prematurely propose pocs in my code that didn’t yield the right benefits

• I optimized for code cleanliness in a complex problem w multiple edge cases and got pointed out in pair programming to make control flow explicit but repeated

Could I do well with those sorts of examples? It turns out I have a bunch of these examples. I’m tryna make sure these don’t make me look incompetent for my mid level target level for a big tech interview.

If they are good the theory is I have a lot of stories to do some real interviewing practice and refinement to make it better over time.

I'm currently studying for software engineering interviews, but I'm having a hard time deciding how to divide up my time between doing LC problems and going over system design concepts. It can feel overwhelming since both categories have so much to cover. I also have a family, so most of my studying gets done after my kid goes to sleep at around 7 PM. Since my team is in the west coast and I'm in the east coast, I do get some extra time in the morning to work out at the gym and go through some LC problems. I'm currently going through Neetcode's course as a refresher. For those of you who have aced your interviews, how did you divide up your time on different topics? Did you mostly spend your time on LeetCode? I'd be happy to hear any recommendations.

My main goal: I want to be interview-ready no matter what. I currently work at a big tech company and I've been there for 4 years now, but I haven't seen much growth and now I'm seeing that I could have negotiated more when I first got my offer. I was asked 2 LC-type problems, and I feel I got lucky with them because I hadn't extensively gone through all the different patterns and data structures. It was my first time getting RSUs and I wish I had known more about negotiation tactics as well. I feel that if I be ready for interviews, I can apply and definitely increase my comp by a lot. The motivation is for me to overcome the fear of DS&A problems and not stop myself from applying to positions just because I'd be asked LC-type questions. I also know that I can double my comp with the right negotiation tactics and with my years of experience.

As I consider switching to a Front End Engineer role at a major tech company, I'm curious about the differences, if any, between the interview process for frontend roles and traditional Software Development Engineer (SDE) interviews. Could you explain the various interview rounds and the key topics typically covered in frontend interviews at these companies?

Hi!

I had mic issues in the OH and couldn't ask live. How would you recommend I prepare for System Design interview questions, especially since I feel my experience at my previous company didn't prepare me well for these?

I have 2.5 years of experience at a big tech company and was recently laid off. Ideally, I’m aiming for an ~L4 level position as I was L3 in my past role and was nearing promotion. I’m getting more interviews at start-ups now, and they typically focus on system design rather than leetcode questions. At my past company, the tools were so powerful that I didn’t get the same breadth of experience a new grad might get at a smaller company. For example, I never touched or thought about our database or considered scalability for our services. In hindsight, I should have taken the initiative to find projects outside of my team with more scope, but now I know better!

My current plan is to read "System Design Interview" by Alex Xu and go through the Taro System Design Masterclass. Do you have any feedback on this plan? I recently had my first system design interviews and have more coming up. I want to prepare as best as I can with the time I have. I’ve accepted that I may not excel at first, but any feedback to improve my preparation plan and mindset would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

I happened to stumble across a YouTube video of Rahul Pandey (), and then I was encouraged to get a subscription on and try their test.

Everything went really well, I passed the DSA section and Selena got in touch with me. Unfortunatly, she gently tell me that we cannot proceed further as I am lacking the American working permits.

From asking around, it turns out that for the US government to give you a work permit, the company must certify that the skills for which the work visas are going to be issued does not exist in the country.

I think we can all agree that in area of computer science, the US has everything it needs :'). So Based on that:

• What will be the criteria for FAANG companies (or their equivalent) that will make them recruite a stranger?
• What kind of roadmap do I need to fill the gap, if it exists one?

And yes, I did hear that FAANG only hires top 1% engineers:

• What does that even mean?
• Where would we even find out about our rank on such a list, or things we need to improve and get there?

Also my experience is mainly focused around the creation of the backends for the web app, primarily built using python or java spring boot, and those backend has not been as much volumetric as we encounter for instance in the system design interview.

• Is such experience deemed sufficient for the job?

Thank you.

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?

How common is it that folks self-sabotage their interviews? I think I might have during one of them unintentionally. I had interviewed at a FAANGMULA company and mentioned a competitor. The pay was low compared to my level, but also, I felt like it was more junior and I tended to go very long winded (lack of practice) for various questions. It seems I am a bit out of practice for soft skill interview screens, though usually I kick butt on these and spend way more time on DSA than anything (my weakest area since I'm rusty and system design and behavioral interviews don't scare me at all).

Thoughts?

If I fail an interview for a big tech company, how long should I wait until re-applying to the same company for a different role? I'm worried that if I interview and get rejected by a company I won't be able to re-apply 3/6/9 months later. A quick lookup in their performance tool will show that I failed an interview earlier. Is this concern overblown?

PS: I would imagine at startups it is almost impossible to re-apply since the company is small enough that they would easily recognize you. Is this accurate?

I am at a legacy telecommunications company (one of the big 3). I currently work on relatively modern tech stack with SpringBoot, Java 21, and Angular 14. I have 2 years of experience as a professional developer and graduated this year.

At this stage of my career, my goal is to become as technically proficient as possible, so that I can have more money and options in the future.

My team consists of many developers that have been at this company their entire careers and that don't want to implement things like automated testing, or CI/CD pipelines. I fear this lack of enthusiasm for engineering growth will stunt my technical abilities, as I am the only one suggesting these kinds of upgrades.

We support an application with ~500,000 monthly users, but I have never had a discussion about building more "scalable" code. I rarely get any feedback on my PRs and our team doesn't have any clear guidance about great vs bad code.

My concern is whether getting better at this job in this role, while helpful to be promoted, may not be pushing me in the most "industry-standard" direction, leaving me behind my peers in technical ability. I worry that without team feedback and focus on "great code", then 3 years from now I am going to vastly under leveled compared to a developer with strong tech leads that have been giving code-reviews that entire span.

Would you recommend I focus on interviewing/job hunting to get into a MAANG company, so that I am surrounded by top-tier talent, or on staying put and using the techniques taught here to individually improve my abilities and our codebase? Or, perhaps there is another option you would recommend.

I would love to hear your thoughts, thanks!

Is it considered a red flag and unprofessional by big tech staff to use emojis on Linkedin? Emojis like:

- "🎓 Graduated from x"
- "💻 over 10 years of experience building..."
- "🚀 Reduced page loading time by x second and..."

Hi all. I am considering starting my own development consulting company in Jordan. People are well educated there but wages are low. You can hire great engineers there for the same that a restaurant worker gets paid in California. I don't have any problem finding and hiring good developers because I know the language and I have family there. I can find developers that are fluent in English but it's harder.

I am not sure how to start getting contracts in the U.S. I see that iOS and Android development are popular so I was considering to specialize in iOS development.

I only have about 2 YOE in the U.S. at FAANG so I could also run into a problem where I am not experienced enough to lead a team or company.

Legal stuff in Jordan is no problem. I have a relative that's a lawyer in Jordan and he explained what I need to do.

Any advice is appreciated. Thanks.

I have a background in making innovative games for mostly entertainment. Like the startup scene of the Game Industry. I made 2 games. There if someone would duplicate someone's idea they'd get roasted by the community.

Is there something like this in the Tech Software Industry as well? Not just with Big Tech, but Tech startups in general
The adage from the Indie Game Industry that I was thought was to be as public with your idea as possible most people don't care. And I've always been.

But with the Tech Industry it seems to me like people can just copy every company and there's no rules at all. Like in the Game Industry the Big "Game" companies can't just copy your innovative game, since it's usually a thing of it's own, not necessarily solving business problems smarter/ better. And also they usually have this big triple A title that they just make new iterations of like Call of Duty 1, 2, 3 etc. Not being able to take too much risks.

But in the Tech Industry the Big "Tech" companies can copy your things and it seems like they intend to "Eat" most startups to protect their own market share. There doesn't to be much honor involved or rules that prevent this.

@Alex, @Rahul

Is there some sort of Code of Honor among Innovative Tech Software Engineers?

I know from the course it says they give hards if you bomb the first question to "save" the candidate

But assuming you dont bomb the question is it common to get LC hards?

If I'm able to crack most mediums in under 30 minutes is that a decent place to be?

I've heard stories that people just bypass this all the time at earlier stage tech-startups and this eliminates a 6 month interview process of like 8 rounds of interviews and usually you can close within a month or right way.

I am currently an entry level engineer at a big tech company and started 3 months ago. I am looking to move to a company with more fast paced work and a better engineering culture after a year. Right now, the market seems tough for junior level engineers. What advice would you give towards landing new opportunities in this position? 

How is project risk management done in big tech? Do they have a standard risk management process that defines how to identify risks, the levels of impact and probability to categorize risks, RACI matrix for risks, how to report risks...etc... Or is that left to each project manager to do on their own?

Is there any good risk management process that you can describe?

Thanks

I have couple of interviews lined up with Meta, DataStax and couple more. But, I did not get any interview call from my other desired SW companies like Google/Netflix/Microsoft/DataBricks/AirBnb. I am confident that I will receive call for interview after I improve my resume, polish LinkedIn, reach out via DMs on LinkedIn (already doing that but no luck so far). Also, I can not wait indefinitely for other companies call (already waiting since November).

So my question is,

1. Is it fine if I join a company such as A and quit within a month or two provided I have a job offer from B (which is obviously more lucrative).
2. Are there any downsides of switching too soon in tech. I feel changing employers quickly will help me to boost my overall compensation.

Note: I am currently on work visa and working for AWS US as senior backend engineer.

Hello everyone, I’m a mid level SWE with 2+ YOE and I recently moved to an AI startup. I’m thinking ahead to my next job hunt (probably in about a year), and I’d really like to aim for a top-tier tech company—FAANG or FAANG-adjacent.

I know Alex often says that impactful side projects with real users are one of the best ways to get noticed by recruiters, but honestly, with the startup grind, I just don’t have the time or creative energy to commit to building something good (and I don’t have a project idea I’m super passionate about anyway).

Instead, I recently started spending time contributing to open source. It feels more manageable since the work is bite-sized, and even though it can be technically challenging, it doesn’t require as much creative overhead.

My question is: will consistent open source contributions over the next 6–12 months actually help my resume stand out when applying to top-tier companies?

What else can I do to strengthen my profile? My startup is YC-backed but not one of the “popular” ones. I’ve been learning a ton and the environment is nurturing. But I feel that’s not enough on its own. Would love any advice!

I have heard anecdotally that for google you either have 2+ yoe and go for mid level or you get in as a new grad. They dont hire 0-2 yoe

1. Is this true for all FAANGs/Big Tech?
2. Does having an MS change this? (I have a BS+MS in CS, between 1-2 yoe). I dont qualify for ng or mid level in pure yoe)

I am also trying to get referrals, and I want to make a reasonable ask when asking for referrals and not roles im totally unqualified for. I can definitely ask the referrer themselves, but I want to make their life as easy as possible to refer me

In other words at FAANG can I use my MS to count as 2 YOE when applying to jobs?

I'm a well paid software engineer at a big tech company but I'm based in Canada. The US market is much more lucrative, and my company allows internal transfers to the US and is willing to adjust pay accordingly. However I'm concerned my RSU grant will still be the same, so is my only option to switch companies or perhaps boomerang back in the US? I'm relatively new to the company, so I wouldn't consider moving to the US till I hit the 18 month mark.

Thoughts?

I received an offer from a Big Tech company for a contract Data Eng role. Whoot!

While I'm happy to have gotten the offer, I'm nervous about it being a contract role and in particular I'm nervous about the nature of the team.

My mentor told me to reverse-interview the hiring manager:

His message to me was:

Ask: I’d like to get a better sense of what I’ll be working on and how that work fits in with the rest of the team - I’m curious what lead to the need to open up this role?
Then based on what they say, you usually follow up with where do you see this position and work fit in after the initial 6 months.

So he says to ask the hiring manager about:

1. what work I'll be doing
2. how the role opened up
3. possibility of extending or converting to FTE

I'll add my own question which is how much am I working solo vs. with others? In my convo with the hiring manager, he indicated that this role is to maintain Paid Marketing Pipelines which the team he manages is not focusing on. He said there's a lot of work to be done cleaning up tech debt, which involves migrating SQL pipelines scheduled with Airflow to dbt. That sounds like bread and butter Data Engineering, although it's definitely not the cool and shiny work.

I have 5 questions, 2 here and 3 in the first comment because of the character limit:

1. Any other quick thoughts about what to ask about? There are lot of great questions , , and questions like and . I plan on going through those, but if there's anything I should def ask about, it'd be great to know!
2. In talking to the Hiring Manager, should I negotiate before or after Reverse Interviewing? My mentor says to negotiate after learning more about the role which seems intuitive to me as I want to make sure I want to accept it before negotiating. But Gergely Orosz says very much the opposite . What gives?