20 Years Of Fighting Procrastination [Part 12] - Set Up Your Calendar

Segmenting your calendar with intention can drastically increase your deep work capacity and reduce distraction. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- Decompose your calendar by assigning specific time blocks for high-leverage work, shallow tasks (like email), and recovery to reduce ambiguity and improve clarity
- Avoid scattering meetings across the week—batch them into clusters (especially 1:1s) to preserve longer stretches of focus time
- Use your influence to improve team-wide productivity by suggesting standardized no-meeting days or more structured meeting schedules
- Even if you don’t follow your calendar plan perfectly, the act of time blocking improves your estimation skills and helps build a rhythm for deep work

Engineer Your Ideal Tech Career [Part 12] - Mitali Gala: Choosing The Engineering Manager Route

Next, [Mitali Gala](https://www.linkedin.com/in/mitali-gala) (a Mentor at Formation) discusses her decision to charge forward as an Engineering Manager and what that entails for her day-to-day work.

She reflects on some of the challenges, some of the highlights, why she is passionate about this work, and who it would be a good fit for.

Looking for mentorship from tech’s top engineers like Mitali + personalized job hunt assistance and interview prep? [Formation.dev](http://Formation.dev) can provide you unlimited career coaching, technical mentorship, personalized practice, and mock interviews. Join us here: <https://formation.dev/partners/taro>

Worksheet: [Formation - Coding Your Career](https://firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0/b/tech-career-growth.appspot.com/o/courses%2Fslides%2FFormation%20Career%20Direction%20Worksheet.pdf?alt=media&token=f6344b78-529a-411e-a449-7a34a8d55fc8)

Engineer Your Ideal Tech Career [Part 4] - What Type Of Environment Are You In?

In this video, we walk through the different environments you can or may be working in throughout your career. Depending on where you feel you most thrive, it may make some roles or companies more or less fulfilling.

Avoid choosing the middle number for each of these — do the hard work of making actual trade-offs for each option to make your preferences clearer.

We cover key environments and what they mean, like:

- Fast Paced vs. Methodical
- Job Stability & Cash Comp vs. High Risk, High Reward
- Mentorship & Guidance vs. Independence & Autonomy

Looking for mentorship from tech’s top engineers + personalized job hunt assistance and interview prep? [Formation.dev](http://Formation.dev) can provide you unlimited career coaching, technical mentorship, personalized practice, and mock interviews. Join us here: <https://formation.dev/partners/taro>

Worksheet: [Formation - Coding Your Career](https://firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0/b/tech-career-growth.appspot.com/o/courses%2Fslides%2FFormation%20Career%20Direction%20Worksheet.pdf?alt=media&token=f6344b78-529a-411e-a449-7a34a8d55fc8)

Amazon Behavioral Interview [Part 1] - Intro

This video introduces a mini-course designed to help viewers master behavioral-based interview questions, commonly used by top companies like Google and Amazon.

- **Focus:** The course emphasizes a framework and process to effectively answer these questions, drawing on the instructors' extensive experience (one was a Google interviewer, the other an Amazon Barraiser).
- **Benefits:** By learning this approach, viewers can confidently handle any interview, reduce stress, and significantly increase their chances of landing their desired job.
- **Content:** The course includes downloadable worksheets and other resources to guide viewers through the process of mastering the "STAR" method (Situation, Task, Action, Result) for answering behavioral questions.
- **Instructors:** The instructors have a combined wealth of experience in interviewing and being interviewed at top companies, ensuring the course provides valuable and practical insights.
- **Goal:** The ultimate goal is not just to teach the STAR method, but to boost viewer confidence and significantly improve their chances of success in job interviews.

Learn more about Alan's job search program, Kadima Careers, using this [discount link](https://signup.kadimacareers.com/mQBsDvu).

15 SWE Years In 1.5 Hours [Part 11] - Behavioral Rounds

Data structures and algorithms (DSA) suck up all the air in the room, but behavioral rounds are actually the most important interview round. This lesson teaches you:

- The signal behavioral interviews give that DSA interviews cannot
- The 3 keys you need to communicate in a behavioral interview
- How to structure your behavioral interview answers effectively

To dive deeper into behavioral interviews, take our course here: [Master The Behavioral Interview As A Software Engineer](https://www.jointaro.com/course/master-the-behavioral-interview-as-a-software-engineer/)

15 SWE Years In 1.5 Hours [Part 7] - Imposter Syndrome (Building Confidence)

Software engineers are constantly underestimating themselves. This lesson teaches you:

- How to flip your mentality when it comes to everyone in tech being smarter than you
- The best environment to be in to maximize your growth
- How to quickly become stronger and get rid of your imposter syndrome

Come Up With 500k+ User Project Ideas [Part 17] - Just Keep Building

Failure is a part of life and software side projects are no exception. This lesson teaches you:

- The builder mindset you absolutely must have to succeed with side projects
- Why a failed side project really isn't that bad, especially if you're following the advice from this course
- How Alex made several stupid side projects destined for failure so you don't make the same mistakes he did

Come Up With 500k+ User Project Ideas [Part 8] - The 3 Levels Of Tech

One of the easiest and most common ways to sabotage a side project is build out an idea that's way too technically complex. This lesson teaches you:

- A 3-layer framework you can use to categorize side project ideas and their technical difficulty
- The difficulties of any level beyond Level 1 with Level 2 being incredibly hard and Level 3 being insane
- Why you should stick to Level 1 project ideas as an engineer working on side projects, especially if you're earlier-in-career

Take the code quality course here: [Level Up Your Code Quality As A Software Engineer](https://www.jointaro.com/course/level-up-your-code-quality-as-a-software-engineer/)

Come Up With 500k+ User Project Ideas [Part 6] - Your Idea Is Worthless (For Now)

While the idea behind a side project or any tech product is extremely important, ideas as a whole are usually placed on a pedestal they don't deserve. This lesson teaches you:

- Why ideas are initially worthless
- What truly makes a side project valuable (hint: it's not that much about the idea)
- Why you shouldn't build out the vision of that random MBA you just met for 0 pay and 10% equity

DSA Crash Course [Part 67] - Fibonacci Approach

In this lesson, Alvin explains the fundamentals of dynamic programming by applying dynamic programming to fibonacci:

> Write a function *fib* that takes in a number argument, *n*, and returns the *n*\-th number of the Fibonacci sequence.
>
> The 0-th number of the sequence is 0.
>
> The 1-st number of the sequence is 1.
>
> To generate further numbers of the sequence, calculate the sum of previous two numbers.
>
> Solve this recursively.

```
fib(0); # -> 0
```

```
fib(1); # -> 1
```

```
fib(2); # -> 1
```

```
fib(3); # -> 2
```

```
fib(4); # -> 3
```

```
fib(5); # -> 5
```

```
fib(35); # -> 9227465
```

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: [**https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/)

DSA Crash Course [Part 37] - Binary Tree Intro Lecture

In this lecture, Alvin explains the basic structure of a binary tree.

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

DSA Crash Course [Part 35] - Zipper Lists Walkthrough

In this lesson, Alvin walks through the python implementation for the *zipper_lists* problem.

Code along and test your work in the following editor workspace: <https://structy.net/problems/zipper-lists?language=py>

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

DSA Crash Course [Part 21] - Sum Numbers Recursive Walkthrough

In this lesson, Alvin walks through the python implementation for the *sum_numbers_recursive* problem.

Code along and test your work in the following editor workspace: <https://structy.net/problems/sum-numbers-recursive?language=py>

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

DSA Crash Course [Part 20] - Sum Numbers Recursive Approach

In this lesson, Alvin explores the strategy to solving the following interview problem:

> Write a function *sum_numbers_recursive* that takes in an array of numbers and returns the sum of all the numbers in the array. All elements will be integers. Solve this recursively.

```
sum_numbers_recursive([5, 2, 9, 10]); # -> 26
```

```
sum_numbers_recursive([1, -1, 1, -1, 1, -1, 1]); # -> 1
```

```
sum_numbers_recursive([]); # -> 0
```

```
sum_numbers_recursive([1000, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1]); # -> 1001
```

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

DSA Crash Course [Part 18] - Recursion Intro Lecture

In this lecture, Alvin introduces the mental model we should use when applying recursion.

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

DSA Crash Course [Part 16] - Intersection Approach

In this lesson, Alvin explores the strategy to solving the following interview problem:

> Write a function, *intersection*, that takes in two lists, *a*,\_b\_, as arguments. The function should return a new list containing elements that are in both of the two lists.
>
> You may assume that each input list does not contain duplicate elements.

```
intersection([4,2,1,6], [3,6,9,2,10]) # -> [2,6]
```

```
intersection([2,4,6], [4,2]) # -> [2,4]
```

```
intersection([4,2,1], [1,2,4,6]) # -> [1,2,4]
```

If you need additional support taking these DSA skills and actually applying them, take [**Alvin's**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/) *complete* data structures and algorithms course on [**Structy**](https://structy.net/?utm_source=taro). You can try out the concepts yourself in their interactive code editor and learn advanced DSA patterns like stack exhaustive recursion.

Use [**this link to get 20% off**](https://structy.net/purchase?promo_code=taro20) the entire Structy DSA learning experience.

Follow Alvin on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvin-zablan-b73a92117/>

Master The DSA Interview [Part 24] - It's About Consistency

How should you spend your time with data structures and algorithms problems? This lesson teaches you:

- Why it's better to have consistent, more reasonably sized studying blocks for data structures and algorithms instead of monster 1-day sprints
- What a good data structures and algorithms prep schedule looks like, shown with an in-depth example

Master The DSA Interview [Part 20] - Missing What Matters

When you're doing a data structures and algorithms interview, you don't have a ton of time. That's why it's important to focus on what matters. This lesson teaches you:

- What order to code your solution in when it comes to happy flow and edge cases
- Why the core data structures and algorithms themselves often aren't that important during the interview
- How to get functionality for free, explained with a real-life Meta interview example
- A tactic you can use to prioritize components of your data structures and algorithms solution properly

Master The DSA Interview [Part 13] - You Must Be Fast

Quality is important, but quantity is too, which is mainly demonstrated with velocity. This lesson teaches you:

- Why raw speed is so important with data structures and algorithms interviews in particular
- The quantity bar you need to hit to pass a data structures and algorithms interview the vast majority of the time
- Why interviewers often ask 2 data structures and algorithms problems in a single round
- How an interviewer asking you a harder data structures and algorithms could actually mean that they're trying to save you
- Tips for getting faster at data structures and algorithms

Break Into Tech And Become A Software Engineer [Part 7] - The 6 Steps For A Great Side Project

In this lesson, Brian walks through six key steps for creating a meaningful and impactful side project that builds skills, credibility, and even potential business opportunities.

Brian's ["Side Project Template" Google Doc](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1H508NN2HCnnKmkRMgCg3pj_mXr3i8x3Np0jS6w4xzCs/edit#heading=h.cueymdkrqyb1).

This lesson covers:

- Starting with data or APIs to ensure your project is feasible and solves a real problem you care about
- Choosing the right front-end and back-end stack that balances familiar and new technologies while focusing on full-stack development
- Structuring your project with clear user flows, a deployment strategy, and involving real users for feedback, making your project more impressive and valuable in interviews

If you need extra help breaking into tech, join Brian's exclusive, cohort-based bootcamp (just 10 students per batch). Use this special link for $800 off: <https://www.parsity.io/taro>

Connect with Brian on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/brianjenney/>

Tech Career Growth Videos

Our instructional videos provide software engineers with insights needed for career growth. Masterclasses go incredibly in-depth on a specific tech topic while case studies are real examples from established engineering leaders.