Software Engineering Intern Career Development Videos, Forum, and Q&A

Hello everyone,

I'm preparing for a potential career transition as I join the MS CS program at Georgia Tech this fall, while also working full-time. Given the uncertain job security at my current company, I am proactively looking to strengthen my position in the job market in the United States. Here is a brief overview of my background:

1. Current Role: 2 years in a distributed systems role utilizing TypeScript and Rust.
2. Education: Joining Georgia Tech for an MS in Computer Science; previous non-CS engineering degree in a tier 1 university in India.
3. Internships: Completed two internships with local town US companies ( didn't learn much there).
4. Publications: Co-authored an Android Dev (Kotlin) + AI/ML-based paper published in an ACM journal and presented at a conference.
5. Research: Collaborated with professors on projects related to security, networking, and HCI.
6. Side Projects:
   • Pet Marketplace and Grocery eCommerce Android App - Java
   • Multi-threaded mathematical solver and Sudoku helper in C/C++
   • DDQN-based AI game for an RL course project - Python
7. Programming Proficiency: TypeScript (Node.js), Rust (p2p Networking), C/C++ (Operating Systems & DSA), Java (Android Development)

I had earlier applied to lots of companies in 2022 & 2023 when I was looking for jobs in the States. I had applied to around 300 companies each for internships and jobs. Only 10 reached out, I could only convert one then which is my current job. I had a really poor profile then with a non-CS degree outside of the United States. I had cold applied then. I do not want to end up in that same situation again. I have tried my best to improve my profile since then.

I'm seeking advice on how best to approach internship applications now with an improved profile. Specifically, I am wondering:

• Is it more effective to reach out directly to hiring managers rather than recruiters, especially for internships?
• What strategies can I employ to increase my visibility and chances of getting hired, beyond cold-applying and asking for referrals on LinkedIn?
• What can I do beyond brushing up my DSA skills and Dev skills in the tech stack I am proficient in? [ My degree will also help me catch up on my basic CS foundation. ]

Any insights or advice beyond the scope of the questions would be greatly appreciated too!

My brother is very worried about getting a return offer at Meta - he'll be interning there this summer. He reviewed the videos on , but is still confused on who he would assign to review diffs/vouch for his performance other than his EM.

I'm an intern and I have around 3 weeks left in my internship. I'm not too sure what to do with this because I'm aware that maybe I didn't leave the project at the optimal pace and he said he would "take it from here" but there is still time. I've tried to ask my mentor if I should do anything and they said I should coffee chat with people but I don't think this is going to look good when I'm presenting to VPs next week. Any feedback would be appreciated. My manager & skip is on vacation this week as well.

I was supposed to start my next internship on the beginning of next month. I also have a conference on the 2nd week of my next internship (it would result in me being remote for 3/4 days and working different hours) and an exam on a day of my first week. I really don't want to leave a negative impression for my work because I want to return there full time but the earliest start date now would be end of next month, which would delay my hearing back about a full time offer as well by a month. I think I'm trying to figure out what the best course of action would be in this case - any input would be appreciated!

Hi fellow Tarodactyls! I'm preparing for a call with a hiring manager which it'll be behavioral & my fit with the team; and, at my level (new grad), there are definitely work situations I haven't faced.

That said, I'm wondering how I should prepare for questions on things I technically haven't done (i.e., "Tell me about a time you built a cross-functional feature that influenced other teams"). How do I frame my answer so that it doesn't trigger my interviewer's liar detector, but also open doors for further conversation (instead of an "I don't know" response)?

Everyone has heard of the 80/20 rule. I was wondering as an intern / junior engineer, what are the few things that I need to do that will give me the most impact on my career prospects?

Wanted to know if anyone here has purchased and was it worth the $90?

Meeting with the hiring manager tomorrow and I’m pretty nervous. Any last minute advice?

Context: It was for a full time role with NYT.

The rounds are recruiter screening, meeting with the hiring manager, technical interview, system design talking about building an example system and what systems you've worked with in the past, then final meeting with recruiter and team.

Hey Everyone,

I’m currently working on an iOS application, that has already been deployed on the App store. I’m still experimenting with it internally with a few friends, but I noticed that for some of them, when the app is installed it is just displayed as a blank screen or with missing icons or default font colors.

The app passed through App store screening before it was deployed, but I suspect that there is a compatibility problem. I was wondering if anyone has suggestions on what the cause might be, and how I may resolve it.

Link to see the screenshots of the normal and buggy versions of the app:

Link to download app:

A little about the application --> It is a security surveillance iOS app that aims to minimize criminal illiteracy by providing citizens with technology for staying aware, secure, and connected. It includes features such as direct messaging, rapid alert system, sensory data monitoring, and a siren observability module.

I'm open to sharing my code too for a review, but only privately. Thank you so much in advance!

I know you guys on this platform push learn by doing heavily. I want to learn more on docker and kubernetes but i don't have a project idea right now that needs me to use those tools. How would you suggest me learn? I'm just trying to get off learning everything from a tutorial.

Also I found this platform from twitter and wanted to know what you guys thought of it? since it has labs and technically you're doing... lol

I recently came across this post and wanted the feed back from the community.

I have some experience in MLOps and was recently contacted by a recruiter from NYT. Reading the job description I had some skills, and the others I never even used before. I really want this opportunity, but want to put my best foot forward. Is there any advice on what I can use to prep on this and really do my best?

So far i discovered this repo and started to read through it. I'm also open to connecting and having sessions with any engineer with this experience.

I'm grateful to have received a return offer as a backend engineer. However, my long-term career goal is to transition into a machine learning engineering role within the company.

• As a recent graduate, what are the most effective strategies to prepare for this transition?
• While I understand that my immediate focus should be on excelling in my backend engineering role, I'm keen to explore how I can simultaneously build my skills in machine learning during my free time. Could you offer any advice or insights on balancing these two objectives effectively?

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?

So i'm a entry level engineer and was reading some post on twitter about getting deeper in CS to be taken seriously. The post mentioned learning a lower level language and I always wanted to learn C++. But when i asked my friend who is senior that then went on to become a CTO at his own company he told me I should learn java since it's low enough that a lot of systems are built on it which in return means more jobs. When I looked at job listings for both languages there were fairly the same amount of job postings but he's saying it would be easier to get in entry level with java and that C++ is more for mid and higher levels. also i always wanted to learn C++ because i saw that with python is mainly used at hedge funds which eventually in my career i always wanted to join one, so which one should I choose? And please make a choice for me lol and not respond with "whatever you feel like doing", because i'm kinda indecisive with this choice.

Hey Taro community. So I saw on and Alex touched on seed startups being not really good for early careers. I wanted to ask: So I met this person at a tech meet up and we exchanged twitter names over the summer. She’s currently building in health tech now. She made a tweet asking if any engineers wanted to work at a seed stage AI devtools startup (round led by top tier technical firm) and to DM her if you were interesting.

Should I do it or just leave it? Knowing how the climate is now just thought about beggars can’t be choosers.

I was going to ask what is the best way to approach recruiters from each company and what type of questions would you ask? Also what type of conversations would you try to have with the recruiter as well? Overall I was really looking to know how to get the most value out of a career fair as I can.

Hi, I recently completed a product management interview with a company. I believe I can articulate some of my answers more succinctly via email. (this was not a strict coding style interview and thus I think more open-ended in nature). Do you think I should followup?

The company's feedback timeline seems to be a couple of weeks. While I respect their process, I assumed the evaluations were on a rolling basis, prompting me to expedite my interview, potentially at the expense of some polished responses.

When probed about potential hesitations regarding my fit for the role, I received a neutral response, leaving me uncertain about my standing.

Would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks for your guidance!

With learning other languages do you go straight into building or you have to learn some stuff first? I saw a video and the guy was like he just used Go getting started and just built as he go and learned way more from that than a tutorial. Cause there’s a CLI tool I wanna make with Go but I’m tired of the tutorial I just wanna build.

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)?

As an intern focusing on full-stack engineering, specifically the design and development of web interfaces for business applications, I'm eager to understand the key accomplishments that would strongly resonate with future recruiters in the full-stack web development space.

Could you advise me on the desirable goals (the [X]s) that I should target so that I can devise effective strategies ([Z]) to attain them, thus enhancing the appeal of my resume? Specifically, I'm interested in outcomes that can be quantified or measured ([Y]), as this format seems prevalent and persuasive in successful resumes.

As an intern undertaking my first industry-relevant experience, I often find myself drawn to continue working on projects beyond my scheduled work hours. Should this extra time be considered overtime and discussed with my manager, or is it expected to be unpaid and regarded as a personal choice?