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Mastercard Inc. is a payment processing company offering a range of financial services. Its principal business is to process payments between the banks of merchants and the card-issuing banks or credit unions of the purchasers who use Mastercard-brand cards.

How do I prep for Frontend job interviews? Do I apply for Fullstack?

Mid-Level Software Engineer at Mastercard profile pic
Mid-Level Software Engineer at Mastercard

Hello!

So, my job's getting outsourced this summer, and I'm deep into figuring out my game plan for interviews. I'm mostly a frontend engineer, working with Angular, SCSS, and ngRX for our app. I've dabbled in backend too, even went full-stack in my team, but my backend skills aren't great. My manager supports me marketing myself as a full stack person, but I'm wondering if going all-in on full stack jobs is worth the effort during the interview prep, especially since I'm not a big fan of backend work.

Then I wonder if the downside of applying for frontend jobs is that there are not that many and the barrier for frontend is lower (maybe because of coding bootcamps and it can be self-learned) so competition will be higher.

Now, I'm drowning in prep work - data structures, algorithms, frontend know-how, and system design. Recently got hit with a surprise system design coding round in an interview (an internal position I arrogantly thought I had in the bag) I thought was all about frontend and DSA. Did okay, but not stellar, and now I'm feeling unprepared for every interview. I feel crippled to even apply to positions. It's a bit of a mess.

So questions:

  1. Any tips on tackling system design questions, especially the coding part? Most online resources seem to focus more on design rather than coding specifics.
  2. How should I balance DSA, system design, frontend prep? What topics and how much time should I commit to each of them?
  3. Also, am I on the right track leaning towards applying for just frontend roles?

Appreciate any & all feedback!!

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Posted 10 months ago
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2 Comments

How do I advance from Software Engineering to Product?

Mid-Level Software Engineer at Mastercard profile pic
Mid-Level Software Engineer at Mastercard

Hello,

This platform is awesome and I've been looking at a bunch of resources for career advancement. One aspect that strikes me is to play into my strength. While I do enjoy coding (only if it's front-end or mobile -- visual stuff!), it's not my strength or something I will really do outside my job. I do love being in any conversations that involve innovative features for our customers, making our product more modern aesthetically, or questioning the features we do have. The idea of being a staff/lead/principle engineer keeping up with latest angular features or being on call outside job hours to fix some server or UI issues come up isn't really appealing. But I do want to grow. I want the chance to mentor people, influence a project, be in cahoots with people who make decisions about what we want to create, be close with customers, etc. I love the design (UX) aspect as well.

If I stay as I am, I know I will slowly grow linearly in this software engineer role. I do think I will get the senior developer role next year. But most folks who have a C-suite role in product or beyond seem to have an MBA but I am not sure if that's a valid move nowadays. I am taking a couple of tiny PM projects but outside that, what can I do to have the best chance of landing a C-suite role later in my career and making an impact beyond coding?

Looking forward to your replies!

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Posted a year ago
1.5K Views
5 Comments