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

Every time I complete a project (regardless of setting), integration (or end-to-end) testing is the task I least look forward to. In my mind, I’ve probably spent weeks building and individually testing each component, sometimes testing 2 or 3 components simultaneously. By the end of the project, I feel tired and just want to work on something new, so I rush to the finish line and call it a day the moment I get all my components working together. I’ve seen the course on creating a test plan. I tried implementing this, but as mentioned above, by the time I’ve gotten to this stage, I’m so fed up with the project where I just write a couple of basic tests and tell my boss I’m done. As much as I have an icky feeling shipping something I don’t know is fully working, I also feel so tired and just want to move on to the next thing. One solution I tried was using automated tests (sort of like TDD to a certain extent) - I’d set up some expected behaviors at the start of the project and run these integration tests at the very end. It’s great if it works - making it automated significantly reduces friction of running the tests, and you get to ‘eat the frog’ by coming up with a more comprehensive set of tests at the start. The bad part is it only works if you can get automated testing to work. Most times integration testing gets tricky to automate, especially if you can’t mock out stuff like networking code and databases. Automated tests also take time to maintain. As a result I tend to forgo automated testing. A naive approach is to apply my strategy but instead of doing automated testing, just do it manually. The issue is that it feels painful having to verify correctness manually. And it’s especially discouraging if you manually verify your code to be wrong. So what are some solutions that can help me get over that last mile? Any suggestions for some low friction ways to set up tests without using automated testing?

A few days ago, I almost broke production. Our company doesn’t have any formal CI/CD protocols. When we ‘push to production’ that would mean testing code on our local computers, then going onto our single production machine, clone our changes, test on the production machine, then merge to main. The dev team was incredibly small, but this process started failing when more people worked on the codebase. My manger strongly prefers merging one large feature all at once as opposed to merging changes bit by bit. Even though I pushed for the ‘one diff, one thesis’ approach, he pushed back on it. He would rather clone my entire feature all at once over making small changes. A week and a half ago, I finished my main feature. My code successfully worked on the production machine, but my manager kept pushing back on actually landing the code to production. I kept pushing for my manager to push my code but he kept extending the due date. Now that I’m close to my internship, he is asking me to push code. The issue is that and another dev were trying to push their features to production. The other developer went first since his feature was smaller, then it was my turn. When it came to merging my code, I made errors in resolving merge conflicts, which resulted in errors. I tried ‘undoing’ the commits by reverting changes (when I should’ve done a reset), which caused the commit history to become longer and more complex, making the situation worse. After rolling back commits, somehow even the old code wasn’t working. My team and I are working to resolve the issue, but I was really upset throughout the whole process. I’m frustrated at my own incompetence with version control, but I’m also frustrated with my manager for not listening to my suggestions, as I think this would’ve been prevented if I had integrated my code earlier and in smaller chunks. My team knows that it was a version control issue (as opposed to a code issue), especially since I showed them on two different occasions that my code works. How should I handle this situation? I definitely feel like I should apologize but how can I make up?

I’ll be finishing my internship pretty soon and I think I feel like I’ve done a good job. I checked in with my manager every 2 weeks (didn’t check in with them for the past 3 weeks expecting this final conversation). Wondering what I should bring up with them in my last conversation with them? I am interested in a return offer (RO). What should I ask them about?

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?

My manager has been pushing me to move fast for the past month due to my lack of progress and as a result, I haven’t been as careful with my testing and I found a major error in my code that might set me back by a week or two. My project is essentially a data generation pipeline and there’s an error with the data generation code. I was supposed to generate data to train an ML model. I started the data generation but only realized that we had an error 1/3 of the way in. We have a major deadline by early March and I’m afraid that there’s a real possibility that I can’t make that deadline. I have some ideas that may work (building a smaller scale version of my pipeline and train a small model to validate). In January he was worried with progress but a month later he seems more relieved with current progress, so breaking the news to him is worrying since I’d make him worry again. What’s the best course of action in this case? As a postmortem, what could I have done to prevent this situation from happening?

I am assigned a project with a teammate and their code is really bad - lots of duplication, many 100+ (even going to 200!) line functions all over the place, unreadable variable names, hard-coded values and the list goes on. I don’t even know if their code works (I’m assuming it does because it compiles and his outputs make sense) but it’s really frustrating when I have to read through their code or integrate changes. Whenever we merge changes together, we always have to sit together to go through every single merge conflict. Recently I’ve started to notice regressions in our codebase that are extremely hard to debug. In these cases I’ve had to ask them to fix the problem. It’d be one thing if they wrapped their code into some interface that I can call and it works like a charm, but they literally put their code into some of the main classes I built, and I’m getting really annoyed by it. Partially because they “ruined” a class that I built by turning it into a god class and also because it’s hard to debug. I know that their code is refactorable because I’ve refactored smaller scripts they built, and it became much easier to change the code. I’m working at a research lab, so code quality isn’t a huge deal as long as you get results. I’ve mentioned several times to them to refactor the code but they don’t seem to listen (even after explaining that it’s hard for me to contribute since I can’t understand their code), though they seem to acknowledge their code is bad. I think they don’t come from a traditional CS background which is why they don’t care (or know) that much about proper engineering. How can I convince them that quality is important? How do I tell them (politely) that it’s because of their quality that we’re iterating much slower than before? It’s likely that I’ll have to deal with bad codebases at some point in my career. When do I suck it up and when do I actively address it to the team to do maintenance? What are some heuristics?

Hello, I got accepted to YC AI Startup School which happens from June 16-17 (flying back on the 18th). However, I have not even started my internship, and I am scared to ask my engineering manager because it seems like a bad look for that to be the first thing I request. For context I'm doing an AI SWE internship at Notion. What do I do?

I interviewed at a quant firm this year but didn't make the cut at the final round. The recruiter encouraged me to stay in touch with them for future opportunities. During our final discussion (almost 6 months ago at this point) I mentioned that I already had multiple offers in hand alongside a final round at Meta. The recruiter mentioned that they previously worked at Meta as a tech recruiter. Fast forward to today and I got an offer from Meta, though I'm probably going to decline it for a lesser known decacorn. I'm wondering if it's worth mentioning to this recruiter that I got an offer from Meta, and how I should go about communicating this.

I got rejected at a mid-sized tech company with ~2000 employees for a security engineering internship after the final round about 1 and a half months ago, but the recruiter said to keep in touch for future opportunities at the firm and also voluntarily gave me feedback in the interview process. She gave me the biggest reason I was rejected was because there weren't any projects available that fit me at the time. I also have my hiring manager's email as well from the final round interview and he told me at the end of the interview to keep in touch. Should I reach back out to the recruiter and/or hiring manager to check up on their projects and ask for a potential internship in the Fall or Winter? If so, what should I say in the email?

Hi everyone! I've found that while hands-on building is a fantastic way to learn, taking courses from experienced instructors can also offer immense benefits. However, I often struggle with maintaining motivation throughout self-paced online courses, especially since they can be quite lengthy and require significant time commitment. I'm reaching out to ask for strategies or tips on how to stay engaged and see these courses through to the end. How do you keep yourself motivated and on track in a self-paced learning environment? Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

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!

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.

Hey all, I am an intern at my company (where I want to return full-time). My work is fully remote and I am meeting my team members in-person for the first time this week for lunch + games (and with some of them I have not even talked with virtually). Want to get some tips on how I can create a great impression (e.g. what things to talk about with them, etc)

A recruiter is offering to interview with me in-person since they happen to be in the area, but they are happy to take the meeting online as well. I’m wondering what would be the better option? I’m leaning towards online but it seems that they’re pushing for an in-person interview. In my case, I wouldn’t need to travel too far to meet with the recruiter. Wondering what the pros and cons to an in-person interview are, and how it compares to a virtual one?

I decently well on my job search this year (5 offers from unicorns+FAANG). I was wondering if it makes sense to put my competing offers on my LinkedIn profile? Thinking from a recruiter’s point of view, I’d want a candidate who’ll meet the bar for a role I’m filling for, and if I see a candidate who’s able to clear multiple bars for reputed companies, I’d be more inclined to reach out to them. I might come off as “braggy” but I’m leaning towards this move as selling yourself as a strong candidate. Thoughts?

Hi everyone, my name is Aiden and I’m currently interning at a bank as a software engineer. I’m have switched major from biomedical science to computer science and currently in the process of getting the degree. I am self taught and looking for internships at MAANG company. As I am very new and have little knowledge in terms of growing in my career. I will appreciate any mentorship I can receive from this amazing community. I also enjoy getting to know new people happy to chat with anyone. Feel free to reach out :)

I will be interning at Meta for this summer. I know Meta engineers collaborate via a tool called Workplace. Based on what I have heard, it seems to be normal for engineers to work over 50 hours a week. I was wondering if there is a preferred time window when I should be online and engaged on Workplace. More specifically, should I be active on Workplace during the evening hours after 5 pm, or is this unnecessary for an intern? Thank you for your help!

Every time I work on a project, the amount of progress increases logarithmically. This means I start off really strong and I end off really weak. I’ve noticed this for a majority of projects that I work on. I think a big reason why this happens is because when my project is able to get 50-60% of cases (ie it works but don’t touch it), internally my brain feels like it’s done and I don’t want to work on it anymore. When I start off a project I get huge boosts in dopamine when I finish a part and get it to work. Over time there are fewer and fewer things to do and I don’t get as big a dopamine hit when I gradually finish up remaining features. This gets really ****bad when I try to think of edge cases, because it’s not entirely clear what needs to be done, and I don’t even know what edge cases exist. This has affected the quality of my work and I would like some strategies of keeping high output even towards the later stages of a project which involves less excited parts of work. I think this somewhat relates to Alex’s video on “sweating the details”, but I feel that the hard part is that I don’t even know where to begin. I don’t know where edge cases may. On a component level it’s not too bad, but when you’re doing integration testing and when the space of possible inputs is extremely high, it feels like you’re put in the middle of the ocean. As an example, recently I was tasked with writing a bot to draw an ordered set of lines, curves and arcs on a canvas. The input a vector representation of the drawing and the output is an mp4 recording. First 3 days went pretty well. In fact, I pretty much built the entire system and integrated everything. The annoying part comes to solving edge cases from integration testing. For the next 7 days I spent days kind of just sitting around, testing my system, and getting bored. I was waiting for my partner to finish his part of the system. What strategies are there to make my output more consistent? I tried doing a test plan but they tend to be really shallow because I don’t know how the system looks like/what edge cases look like until I’ve actually built the product.

For much of my life, I’ve been hyper-focused on prestige and external validation, and only recently I found it to be damaging relationships. In college, I struggled to land good internships. When people asked about my experience, I often felt insecure. This past new grad job hunt was a very different story — I performed well and received multiple offers. But instead of simply being proud, I found myself mentioning the number of offers and how difficult the decision was in nearly every conversation. My close friends pointed out that our talks shifted from hobbies and everyday life to topics like leveling systems, career trajectories, and company brand names. When it came time to choose between offers, I exhausted every possible angle. I asked friends, family, mentors, and anonymous forums. I read countless blog posts in search of the “right” answer. But in retrospect, I wasn’t just seeking advice — I was searching for external validation. I wanted reassurance that my decision would be respected. This led me to reflect on a deeper question: Why do I want to be seen as someone who made the "right" choice? And the honest answer is that perception matters — especially in tech. In many ways, career advancement depends on how others perceive you. Recruiters scan for recognizable brand names. Visibility drives promotion decisions. Referrals come from those who view you as high-potential. Professional development courses often focus on improving how you’re perceived by peers and managers. In a system where your worth is often defined by the market, it seems rational to focus on how you're seen. That’s why I find myself highlighting my accomplishments and leaning toward prestige. I want to be seen as someone worth helping, worth investing in. I want future recruiters to see my resume and not hesitate. But in the process, I’ve started to value prestige and how I’m seen more than my own long-term goals and personal values. Choosing between offers this season forced me to confront this tension. One role aligned closely with my personal interests and growth goals; the other offered greater prestige and brand recognition. Making the decision felt agonizing because each reflected a different version of how I wanted to be seen. Conventional advice says to “stop caring what people think.” But is that even realistic when almost every system in tech (and the world in general) is based on what others think of you and how you're ranked?

I recently got a full-time new grad SWE offer from Amazon. I'm obviously really happy about getting this offer because of the all the things that are going on with the tech job market. The only issue is that the range of start dates they gave me is April-June, and this conflicts with my schedule because I actually signed a offer to intern at another company this summer. I've reached out to Amazon and they've said that I would "need to select a start date in Quarter 2 if possible." Does anyone have any advice on how I can push my start date back?

tldr: I have an offer from Meta and a niche growth-stage (series D+) startup. My gutfeel is telling me to go to the startup even though it’s all against conventional wisdom to go to big tech, and I don’t know if I’m making a mistake. I got into a growth-stage startup that’s relevant to my background and aspirations to be a founder. Engineers talk to customers, work with sales and scope projects with PMs. These tasks are important skills for me. Meta is more siloed until E5, and even then it’s still not quite end-to-end. I talked to over 10+ engineers (including 2 friends) and all of them love working there despite the long hours. I’ve heard both the pros and cons and I know what I’m getting myself into. I aggregated all of the new grads’ starter projects and compared them with my friends at FAANG. My big tech friends say that the new grads at the startup are doing FAANG mid-level work as their first project. The team I’ll be matched to aligns very well with my strengths and interests. Whereas I won’t know team matching with Meta until later. Business is doing well. VC friends said there’s a strong growth trajectory in a hot space. Cap table is all the top VC firms and angels. It’s a stable company and few performance-based layoffs, in contrast my friends at Meta are all stressed about PSC. If I don’t take a risk now then when will I? However, it seems like every forum and well-regarded figure (Interviewing IO, Ryan Peterman, Dan Lu, even Taro, etc.) in the SWE space advises the opposite: join big tech over a startup for career growth and brand. Brand is especially important and is what’s holding me back. I don’t have any name brand companies on my resume. My friends with big tech have a 20-30% callback rate whereas mine is 5-7%. I might learn way more at the startup, but won’t be able to transfer these acquired skills if I can’t find a job in the future to transfer them to. Throwing away Meta feels like keeping myself trapped. This makes me question whether I’m being overly optimistic (even delusional) of the startup. I feel like I did reasonable due diligence and, reasoning from first principles, it seems like this is the better opportunity for me. I’m wondering if someone was in my position and regretted not going to big tech? Is there any more due diligence/questions I can do to reach a more definitive decision? Is Meta’s brand name worth more than career alignment or goals?

I will be interning at Meta for this summer. After watching the videos on Taro, I learned that Meta engineers are evaluated according to four axes: project impact, direction, engineering excellence, and people impact. I was wondering if a similar criteria is used to evaluate the performance of interns. From what I've observed, I feel the direction axis may be less relevant for interns since it involves setting the roadmap for the larger org. If possible, I would also appreciate any examples of common failure modes to avoid for each criterion, as they would help us better understand potential pitfalls. Thank you so much for your help!

I know a few companies that have pretty flat corporate structures. A pretty common example of this are quant firms - they usually only make a distinction between regular and senior SWE, with no higher levels. But this also happens at tech. For example, my friend at Palantir said that the hierarchy is pretty flat, so there’s no level distinguishing between them. I’m currently interviewing with a rocket ship startup and they seem like a great place for career growth, but everyone’s title is SWE. Most of their engineers are ex-FAANG, so talent is top notch. Having talked to multiple engineers there, they all agree that by their first 1-2 years, they’ve taken full ownership of a vertical in their respective teams and some even leading cross-team collaborations. Would this be considered top-end E4/E5 level scope? My worry with these flat hierarchies is that you’re able to demonstrate scope but you don’t have the title to match up to what you show. And while title is just a string, I worry that recruiters will use your ambiguous level against you? For example, if you’re an engineer with 2 yoe demonstrating E5 level behaviors without the title, how would recruiters level you? And a more general discussion: how do recruiters figure out how to place you in the correct interview loop? Is there a way to ask the recruiter to move up or down a level?

I am new to react and .net and sql. The codebase in my internship uses all 3 for front end, backend and server side. Now, I saw some videos on how react works. But I keep on struggling with even fixing the smallest problems like styling one component inside another. How do I learn the languages and technologies in an unfamiliar code and what would you do do learn fast and create impact in the codebase (solving the tickets assigned to you). What are some things I should be doing daily/hourly and what questions should I be asking? I feel like I do not understand anything as I am overwhelmed with how the codebase works. Also how do I understand it in a way easy to relate to and remember what the components inside the codebase does and also learn the languages? Thank you for helping with this! 🙏