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

Our manager assigned a colleague and me both of us junior developers to a repository we have no experience working on, with no help or prior knowledge provided. We asked our senior for guidance, and she told us we need to reach out to two other teams to get a knowledge transfer. We have 10 days to complete the task, but there’s already been a delay due to code reviews. Our manager refuses to understand the situation and told us that our jobs and especially our performance reviews are on the line. Should I consider switching to a different org, or is it time to leave the company? (I really don't like posting question like this)

I wanted to ask you how do you normally break up doing vs study when learning something new in software development. In general I want to be better coder and learn to how better apply my learning and I wanted to make sure I'm not going down a rabbit hole when doing either and most importanly making sure I'm not stagnant.

Hello everyone! I recently started my journey as a software engineer at Meta, and I’m eager to continue growing and excelling in my role. To help me navigate this exciting new chapter, I’m looking for a mentor—preferably a senior software engineer at Meta—who can provide guidance, share insights, and help me develop both technically and professionally. I’m particularly interested in mentorship around: Building scalable and impactful solutions. Navigating the culture and expectations at Meta. Accelerating my growth as a software engineer. I deeply value mentorship and understand the time commitment it requires, so I’m open to a paid arrangement to ensure the partnership is mutually beneficial. If you’re interested or know someone who might be, please feel free to reach out or share this post. I would be grateful for any recommendations or advice! Thank you!

Hi team, I currently work as a Software Engineer (5 months in the role) at a mid-sized firm. I recently received an offer for the new grad SDE role at AWS with a start date in first week of December. I also just heard back from Meta that they would like to proceed with virtual loop for their new grad SDE role. Given I clear the virtual loop, I am guessing the team matching phase takes a few weeks. Would you recommend I join AWS meanwhile or push the start date at AWS and complete my virtual loop with Meta? I am excited about the work at AWS based off of what I learnt from my hiring manager!

Hi Taro. I have two offers for contract roles through agencies. First I got a 6 month role at Amazon. I previously worked at Amazon for a couple of years before I got laid off. I signed the offer. Then I got a 12 month contract role at Meta. I decided that I would renege on Amazon and take Meta because it is longer. So I signed for Meta. Meta starts in a month and Amazon starts in a week. There is a chance that after reneging Amazon, I could lose Meta. Meta can rescind the offer for example. How should I handle this situation while minimizing damage to my reputation at Amazon because I may return there one day for a full time role? I am planning to ask Meta if I can start earlier, but I doubt it will be possible. Thanks

I've been working for around a year now, and I feel like there's a big gap between where I am now and where I should be in terms of skill level. I'm getting good feedback at work, but there's just such a huge gap between the senior engineers on my team and me - It all feels really daunting. How do I know if I'm good enough, and what can I do to feel better here?

What are some good 2 week, 1 month, and 3 month onboarding milestones for a new grad engineer at a FAANG company? I will discuss these with my manager as well, but I want to first come up with realistic expectations that will set me up for success.

I worked in a tech company as an SWE intern summer last year, and have returned to the same workplace in the capacity of a full-time engineer now. My intern-time project was on a completely different line (included ML based libraries and skills such as time-series forecasting that I picked up) while my present work is totally Python-based tooling development. Should I list these two experiences separately in my resume, given the time-periods are different as well?

Hi Tarodactyls. I finally landed a temporary job after getting laid off from Big Tech in April. It's a 6 month contract with a startup. I have some interviews lined up for permanent positions. I am not sure if I should tell the interviewers if I found a new job, but I am still looking for something more permanent. I haven't been there long enough yet to claim that I gained significant experience. If I tell them, it might make me look like a job hopper. If I don't, I might lose the chance to end concerns about my long employment gap. Not sure on this one :/

I know that we have to draft the answer in such a way that they have to have LPs imbibed in them. But how can we get to know if the story is good enough for passing the interview round? I am struggling to draft these stories for SDE2 interview loop. Any help will be helpful

This is a follow up to this post I decided to keep both roles open for as long as possible, so both are open right now. Meta postponed once and will now start in 3 weeks. Amazon postponed multiple times but it seems that they will finally send the laptop this week. I am expected to start at Amazon on Monday. There is a 2 weeks gap between Amazon's start date and Meta's start date. I don't want to burn the bridge too much with Amazon but I have a large resume gap and I can't afford to lose both roles. So far, I don't see any reason that Meta would rescind the offer, but in this environment anything can happen. When should I tell Amazon that I am taking a different role? I am leaning towards doing it this week, but I am scared to do it before Meta is 100% secure. Honestly, I can't afford anymore resume gap.

I've noticed that one of the themes here is gaining depth in a specific field and striving to become the 'go-to person' for a particular subject matter. Does this apply to areas beyond languages and frameworks? In my current role, I'm focusing on deepening my expertise in API integrations and developing end-to-end developer tools. Is this a worthwhile area to specialize in? Additionally, should specialization be more abstract, or can focusing on something this specific/niche be beneficial?

I've noticed that Alex/Rahul can communicate very fast and a lot. This includes Answering questions on Taro Creating content (especially on Linkedin) In the workplace (Alex at Meta was a top code reviewer in addition to being senior/staff) My question is how. I struggle to write an email without overthinking everything. Usually, what goes through my head in communication involves Taro: What if my advice is wrong or becomes outdated? Taro: What if the requester did not give enough information for me to provide an answer (I notice that Alex/Rahul rarely ask follow-up questions on Taro)? Content: How do I post so much content without recycling the same concepts over and over again Workplace communication: I don't want to offend anyone in this email/slack message Workplace communication: I don't want to come across as self-promotional when posting status updates on work/meeting notes/etc Everything: What if people just don't like what I have to say and bash it (this is very common on social media) OR if people lose respect for what I say because it reveals how dumb I am I want to become someone who can communicate fast without overthinking since I believe it's holding me back from working much faster.

I graduated college in 2022 with a degree in Political Science and am currently working at a minor cloud provider in a sales role. I primarily sell the LLM platform and Cloud Software. I have realized that my goal is to transition to a technical role, and have spent the last few months recruiting both internally and externally. I also think I might be interested in trying out AI research and going for a PhD/Research scientist role if I really like it. I completed a few Statistics/ML courses in undergrad and have most math prerequisites (Calculus, Linear Algebra). I also have been completing CS courses at online universities at night (Data Structures & Algorithms, will start Discrete Math shortly). I do have Data Science and Python skills from coursework and assisting the Sales Engineering org with technical projects, but I admit that I am not a SWE and my entire job is not focused on coding. I also lack technical depth outside of the Data Science/ML domain. Unfortunately, I interviewed with about 5/6 companies and it failed to prove fruitful. I haven’t been able to pass technical interviews externally. When I interviewed for internal switches, I wasn’t selected due to lack of development experience. I wanted to get opinions on how a second bachelor’s degree would be perceived in the industry? My mother is an employee of an Ivy League University, where I have the option to take classes part or full time this Fall semester. I could have a Bachelor’s in CS by the end of the Spring/Summer 2025, and a masters by Dec 2025 or May 2026 depending on how many credits I take each semester/if I take summers off for internships. The bachelor’s and half the master's would be completely paid for by tuition benefits. I wanted to ask about recruiting for either SWE/ML/Research internships at FAANG/other tech companies. Would this be viewed as cheating since I already have work experience? I would be enrolled full time in a CS program, but I want to ensure that I am not violating any rules. I see the pros as being able to more easily transition into technical roles and get more time to prepare for interviews without having to stress about my normal job. I would also compete with students for entry level internships instead of experienced hires. I could also try AI research and see if I’m really interested in an AI PhD. I see the main cons as losing out on salary, and the job market potentially still being bad when I get out.

In my earlier experience as an intern, I haven't had much previous experience where I had significant influence over the projects I get to be allocated into; it was typically out of my control as to the sort of projects I got to work on. I've had opportunities to work on incredible projects where I grew a lot and also projects where it didn't quite align with what I wanted to do and also had limited opportunity to grow (e.g. working on some proprietary language or a lower impact project designed to be assigned to interns). As I start my job as a junior engineer, I'd like to play more of an active role (wherever possible) to influence the direction as to the sort of project I work on and my growth direction. In my experience and from my understanding, I think there are several factors when evaluating a project: Your own personal technical background and experience (Zone of Proximal Development) Your own personal career goals and skills you're trying to develop Growth & business impact potential (if your goal is promotion) Do these factors make sense when evaluating a project, and are there any others I'm missing? Also, how can I figure out #3 more in-depth for any project?

Hello, Taro community, Hope everyone is well! I have been working at a mid-size company as a backend SWE for a little more than 2 years post-grad. I graduated with a BS in CogSci with a specialization in ML and a minor in computer science. My company has announced layoffs for Q4, so I want to prepare myself for starting the job hunt. My current goals are to build 1 or 2 side projects, as my resume seems a little sparse with 1 post-grad experience and 1 internship where I don't remember much from the actual project tech-wise. I will also be working on my resume and technical interview prep. In the current market conditions, would my education be a hindrance and would it be better to go for an MSCS as a non-CS degree holder? I understand the skills are most important, but I am worried about getting past the ATS for most jobs. I do see most job postings require a degree in engineering or equivalent experience, but the equivalent experience is expected to be quite high now.

Today I fumbled a technical interview. I was told by the company I interned at previously to apply for a job posting. The person who knew the role is my manager from my internship there. That same manager I knew in there is now one position under the CTO. He told me it was a role that uses Spring Boot, Docker, and GraphQL. He said there’s a big effort to get GraphQL into the company’s architecture. It said “5+ years experience”, and didn't mention GraphQL, so I didn’t take it seriously. After I applied, the posting disappeared. My manager said the job posting I applied for was “probably just one of those ghost postings”. I had the behavioral where I spoke with the manager: I aced that. Today was the technical. The recruiter I was talking to was telling me this was an interview where I could show off projects, so I took the “prep some projects” approach. Did 3 projects. One using mern and GraphQL, one using typescript and express with rest architecture, and one using spring boot. So I do that. I also prepped a Google doc with a list of common interview questions for all that I’m expecting. When I get into the interview, I get asked about my prior role. They said that showing projects wouldn’t be necessary: and that GraphQL wasn’t in the role. The first 20 minutes went well. I was asked about API stuff. I hear them say “good” sometimes, so I know something is right. Then I start getting asked simple questions I didn’t think to prep for. One was literally “what’s the difference between JDK and JRE”, and I knew what JDK was, but not JRE, and the difference between @override and @overload. I was then asked what Node is, so I tell them it’s a runtime environment (idk how I didn’t piece together what JRE was at this point), but I made a mistake because I should of delved into themes that made node.js incredible, like its event loop. Although I knew the basics of a microservice, it was only the basics. The interviewers were kind, and told me that although I articulated myself well, they’re looking for someone who knew more about microservices, and can code right now. Luckily, the company told me prior to this that even if this doesn’t work out, they’d still want to hire me. There'll be another chance, but I realized I need mock interview help. I know I’ll need to review the Taro course on getting into and succeeding in interviews, but I also want to find people to do mock interviews with. How can I do that with Taro? Thanks, ~Evan

In a recent behavioral mock interview, I was asked the question "Tell me about a time you worked on a team." From my understanding, the question's focus appears to be on teamwork and collaboration (i.e. do you work well in a team setting?). A story I had was when I was working on a call history feature. The call was managed by the call center team, and I needed to integrate their API into our backend code to pull this data in real time. When I was trying to test the integration, I noticed the data that was being returned was incomplete, leading to difficulties with integration process. I first analyzed the structure of the data returned as the API response. This analysis revealed that the API was lacking key fields such as agent name and call duration necessary for our dashboard. I recognized solving this issue would require action from the call center team, so I scheduled a meeting with the lead engineer from the call center team and worked together with him to extend the API design to return the missing fields in real time. After the meeting, I maintained close communication with the call center engineer to make sure the changes worked as expected. I also scheduled joint testing sessions where we verified over zoom calls that the changes worked seamlessly and did not disrupt existing systems. In the end, I successfully integrated the API, enabling the call history feature to function smoothly in real time. My collaboration also improved the call center API, making it more robust and easier to implement for other developers on our team in future projects. The project taught me the importance of proactive communication when it comes to working across teams. Do you think this answer is on the right track? I would gladly appreciate any thoughts or feedback on this answer. Big thanks for reading through all of this - I know it is a very long post and I really appreciate your time!

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!

Hey folks, have a question to those who know or have used Pramp before: I was exploring the platform and it said that if you get a membership - they have a priority job referral feature. Has anyone tried this before? Is their membership ($134/year) worth it? Thanks much! Appreciate all kinds of advice

I pretty much interact with everyone else through text-based means, which is all really pronounced in this remote covid era. However, I like to learn from other people directly, talking with them. For example, I'm currently working with a senior full-stack engineer doing things like pair programming and that has been helpful. What can I do to get more of this deeper learning instead of trying to learn almost entirely through text?

Context: I started at Meta last year. I'm trying to get to the next level, but my mentor doesn't have time for me anymore and he is also focused on getting his own promotion. Whenever I ask some questions which are not noob questions, he usually just tells me to figure it out myself. Most times, I feel like I don't even have a mentor. I really feel like I need another mentor, but I don't want it to feel weird if I tell my manager I want another mentor. Question: I want to have another mentor. How can I get a new mentor within the company or the same org?

Thanks a lot for the great content, Alex and Rahul! Your courses to understand the expectations of various levels is really helpful. AI is continuously increasing the productivity of software developers. AI can now write test cases, automatically fill the code given just high-level description, automatically write a summary in the PRs, add comments to the code, etc. This increases the code quality as well. So, will the current L4 role be the expectation out of an entry-level programmer in the upcoming years? Also, due to AI, do you think the demand for non-AI software developers will keep decreasing over the years, and the job market might move towards other fields such as space engineering, robotics, nanotechnology, dna editing, etc.? As the supply of engineers is increasing with fresh grads coming out every year, and the demand is decreasing due to increasing layoffs, do you expect the trend of reduction in software salaries continuing over the long-term? Or are you expecting a recovery in demand and salaries for software developers?

I am currently working on a project where I work as a frontend developer but aim to transition into backend development. Since there are a lot of senior and mid engineers working in backend at my current organization, I have less opportunity to work in backend in my current project, I have also talked with my manger but told me to focus on frontend development as per team requirement. Here's my questions: What strategies or steps would you recommend for making this transition? How can I effectively increase my skills in backend technologies and architecture while balancing my current workload? Should I concentrate on any particular projects, frameworks, or technologies in order to develop a solid backend profile?