Nail Your Promotion As A Software Engineer [Part 18] - Organizational Complexity

In order to get promoted to senior engineering levels and beyond, you can't just be good with code, you need to be good with people too. This lesson teaches you:

- A basic, straightforward framework to understand what the organizational complexity of your project is
- How to calculate the quantity of your organizational complexity
- How to calculate the quality of your organizational complexityIn rode

Master The DSA Interview [Part 30] - Go Deeper: Follow Through

Take these courses as well:

- [Ace Your Tech Interview And Get A Job As A Software Engineer](https://www.jointaro.com/course/ace-your-tech-interview-and-get-a-job-as-a-software-engineer/)
- [Level Up Your Code Quality As A Software Engineer](https://www.jointaro.com/course/level-up-your-code-quality-as-a-software-engineer/)

Get The Rating You Deserve [Part 15] - Use Synchronous Time Wisely

**In this section, we explored strategies for optimizing our synchronous time and effectively communicating our work and desires.**

To make the most of our time and build strong professional relationships, we should:

- **Prioritize synchronous time:** Focus on activities that require real-time collaboration and cannot be effectively accomplished asynchronously.
- **Minimize unnecessary meetings:** Reduce the number of meetings and their duration to maximize productivity.
- **Communicate proactively:** Share updates and seek feedback regularly, both synchronously and asynchronously.
- **Build strong relationships:** Cultivate positive relationships with colleagues and managers through open and honest communication.
- **Be mindful of our communication style:** Adapt our communication style to different audiences and situations to ensure effective message delivery.

By implementing these strategies, we can improve our efficiency, effectiveness, and overall job satisfaction.

If you want to get personalized support from Yogi, you can reach out to him at [coaching@yogisharma.com](mailto:coaching@yogisharma.com) or schedule an introductory call to dive into your situation at <https://tinyurl.com/meetyogi>.

Write A Stellar Resume As A Software Engineer [Part 11] - Self Ratings

There's tremendous pressure to stand out with your resume as a software engineer, especially as you usually need to beat out 100+ or even 1000+ other engineers to get an interview opportunity. This lesson teaches you:

- Why self ratings don't add any value to a resume
- The dangers behind self ratings on a resume, particularly with more junior engineers

Make Your Promotion Case Easy - Keep A Brag Journal

[Become A Go-To Person 3/18] Jordan's Story (Imposter Syndrome)

Dealing with imposter syndrome and getting to the senior level.

A course by [Jordan Cutler](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jordancutler1/), Senior Software Engineer at Pinterest and Author of the [High Growth Engineer Newsletter](https://read.highgrowthengineer.com/)

Build Deep Relationships Quickly In Tech [Part 4] - The 2-Step Process

Networking doesn't have to be overly complicated and fuzzy. This lesson teaches you:

- A very basic 2-step framework to approach networking with
- The spectrum of help and providing value to people
- How much help you should provide to someone, especially prospective people you want in your network
- Why you should always give a non-zero amount of help in a work environment, especially if you work at a strong tech company

The Most Misunderstood Part Of Tech Pay - Stock Options

This segment unpacks **stock options**, a type of equity compensation typically offered by startups rather than large public tech companies. It contrasts stock options with RSUs and explains how options function, including taxation and risk.

- **What Stock Options Are:** A stock option gives the right to purchase company shares at a predetermined price (the “strike price”). These are common in startups but rare in large public companies like Google or Facebook.
- **Grant and Vesting Mechanics:** Similar to RSUs, options usually vest over four years with a one-year cliff. The total grant allows employees to buy a fixed number of shares—often a large number—at a low strike price.
- **Value and Risk:** The value of stock options depends on the company’s success. While paper valuations can be high, employees must actually buy the shares (unlike RSUs, which are granted). If the company never goes public, the options might end up worthless.
- **Types of Stock Options:**
  - **ISOs (Incentive Stock Options):** Taxed only upon sale, usually favorable for employees.

  - **NSOs (Non-qualified Stock Options):** Taxed at the time of exercising and again at sale, even if the shares haven't yet generated real money—making them riskier.
- **Tax Implications:** With NSOs, employees may owe taxes just for exercising the option (based on fair market value), creating potential financial burden even before any profit is realized.

This complexity and risk/reward profile is a key difference from the more predictable RSU structure in big tech compensation packages.

Break Into Tech And Become A Software Engineer [Part 6] - Build A Side Project

In this lesson, Brian explains the value of building side projects that not only boost your technical skills but also help you stand out in the job market.

This lesson covers:

- How a well-crafted side project can help you learn new technologies and fill knowledge gaps without needing formal training or mentorship
- The importance of focusing on meaningful, long-term projects that you are passionate about, rather than numerous small, disconnected ones
- Using a self-assessment worksheet to identify your knowledge gaps, create a learning plan, and design side projects that address those gaps and align with your career goals

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/>

Career roadmap worksheet: <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OpjXtJeQ93TGIz8z9u-p_lYNbhSbk32rPFPDecNMDyM/edit?usp=sharing>

How side projects can even get you into FAANG: [\[Case Study\] Building An App With 1,000,000+ Users To Get Into Facebook](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/jly45Gx6qR1kqQwBmJEy/case-study-building-an-app-with-1000000-users-to-get-into-facebook/)

Ace Your Tech Interview As A Software Engineer [Part 17] - Avoiding Scams

There is a lot of desperation among job seeking software engineers, and there's tragically a lot of evil people out there eager to take advantage of that. This lesson teaches you:

- The most common "job training" scam and how it works
- The relatively new fake check remote work scam and how it works
- How to keep yourself safe with the overall principle to keep in mind when it comes to identifying scams in general (not just when job searching)

15 SWE Years In 1.5 Hours [Part 16] - Working With Your Manager

The single most important person in your professional life as a software developer is your engineering manager. This lesson teaches you:

- How most engineers perceive the engineer &lt;-&gt; engineering manager relationship incorrectly
- The importance of recurring 1 on 1 meetings between you and your manager
- How to get the most value from your manager 1 on 1s

To dive deeper into building a better relationship with your manager, take our course here: [Managing Up: Build Effective Relationships With Your Boss](https://www.jointaro.com/course/managing-up-build-effective-relationships-with-your-boss/)

Are you a PIP risk? The Ultimate Guide To Navigating A PIP

The most obvious way to identify if you’re at risk for a PIP is if you’ve received poor ratings in prior performance review cycles. But this is a **lagging indicator**, so it may be too late to do anything at this point. Ideally, we’d like a **leading indicator** so you can take steps to avoid a PIP by discovering the warning signs early enough. 

The best leading indicators are: 

- Check-in with your peers and managers and get feedback
- Compare markers of progress: code output, design docs, and updates on tickets of projects. 

On the topics of ratings, you should understand the breakdown of what percent of employees get each rating. Companies may not reveal this info directly, so you can ask your manager or look up internal documentation.

If your manager and teammates start ignoring you or removing your scope, that’s an unhealthy sign.

"How did you decide to quit your job and make a startup?" - 9/13/2022

If you're interested in starting your own startup, check out our curated playlist for it here: [[Taro Top 10] Entrepreneurship And Tech Startups](https://www.jointaro.com/playlist/ArtlSzF17v7cad1K6TJG/)

- Alex has wanted to start his own thing for a while - Ever since his side projects started getting serious traction in 2015-2016 (25,000+ users each).
- The initial goal with [Tech Career Growth Community](https://www.linkedin.com/company/techcareergrowth/) wasn't to make a business out of it. The pandemic was happening and people were suffering - We just wanted to help people.
  - Tech Career Growth then grew beyond Rahul's and Alex's wildest imaginations.
  - This made them start thinking what they could accomplish if they worked on it full-time instead of part-time.
- For Alex, there are the core reasons why he decided to make the jump back in early 2022:
  - **Diminishing returns on "preparing" to make a startup** - He had the 0 to 1 experience from doing side projects and building Course Hero's Android apps from scratch. Meta was great helping him build soft skills.
  - **Tech Career Growth taking off** - Alex had more fun working on this community than working his full-time job at Robinhood (which is saying something as he *really* enjoyed working at Robinhood!).
  - **Getting into an incubator** - In late 2021, Alex and Rahul got into OnDeck, which gives the old YC deal of 125k for 7%.
  - **Life timing** - Alex is 30 as of the publishing date of this video, and creating a startup only gets harder as you age due to increasing responsibilities outside of work.

If you're interested in how Alex published ~30 apps that got ~3 million users combined, check these out:
- ["Finding a mobile app idea - How to do it?"](https://www.jointaro.com/question/KJ4VXh6rUhKbWeiJoRDe/finding-a-mobile-app-idea-how-to-do-it/)
- [[Masterclass] How To Come Up With 100k+ Users App Ideas You Can Build For Free](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/AI4zi759PSGn6RwIFT6f/masterclass-how-to-come-up-with-100k-users-app-ideas-you-can-build-for-free/)
- [[Masterclass] How To Build And Grow Tech Products To 500k+ Users For Free](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/OEuX0KMhcnNSTJ50Voee/masterclass-how-to-build-and-grow-tech-products-to-500k-users-for-free/)

Lastly, here's a great discussion on how hard startups are compared to leveling up at a "traditional" job: ["Career advancement or building a startup? Which one is harder?"](https://www.jointaro.com/question/EquWmWjZhqiiujyltreJ/career-advancement-or-building-a-startup-which-one-is-harder/)

The 4 Pillars of ML Interview Success

In this segment of the course, we’re introduced to the core framework for succeeding in machine learning interviews: the four pillars of ML interview success. These pillars form the foundation of how we’re evaluated and what we should focus on during preparation.

- We need strong **software engineering foundations**, including clean coding, system design, and engineering best practices.
- We must demonstrate a solid understanding of **machine learning theory and algorithms**, knowing when and why to apply specific methods and models.
- We should be able to **design and implement end-to-end ML systems**, translating business problems into ML solutions while considering scalability, deployment, and data quality.
- We’re expected to show **business acumen**, aligning our technical decisions with product goals and user needs.
- Each interview round targets one or more of these pillars, and we’ll stand out by showing balanced strength across all four.

If you want to learn even more from Yayun:

- Book 1 on 1 career guidance with her here: <https://calendly.com/your-friend-yayun/1on1>
- Follow her on LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/yayunjin/>

Ace Your Tech Interview As A Software Engineer [Part 20] - Automated Coding Screen

Tech companies are trying to rely more and more on robots to screen software engineer job candidates out. This lesson teaches you:

- When automated coding screens appear
- What to expect when you get an automated coding screen like HackerRank
- Whether you should do automated coding screens

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/)

Become An Open Source Master [Part 9] - Solve A Need

When choosing an open-source project to contribute to, we should:

- **Focus on solving a need:** Choose a project that you'll benefit from and have a passion for working on.
- **Assess the project's health:** Look for signs of active maintenance, such as merged pull requests and recent activity.
- **Seek insights from others:** Talk to people who have worked on the project to get their perspectives on the community and development process.

Connect with James: 

- GitHub: <https://github.com/jamesgpearce>
- Twitter (X): <https://twitter.com/jamespearce>

Ace Your Tech Interview As A Software Engineer [Part 35] - Temper Your Expectations

You just went through an interview as a software engineer and are eagerly awaiting the result. Is it time to get your hopes up? This lesson teaches you:

- The dangers of having the wrong mentality after an interview
- Why having tempered expectations is crucial for long-term success on the software engineer job hunt
- Why software engineers often overestimate how they performed on an interview, especially with top tech companies like FAANG
- The exact calculation and framework you should follow to set expectations appropriately after you have gone through an interview, particularly an onsite (final round)

Make Sure To Set This Up With Your Manager To Ace Your Performance Review

- Work with your manager to figure out which peers you should request feedback from at the end of the cycle: They may already have a bunch of peers in mind!
- Once you figure out these key peers, talk with them upfront about your goals, especially if they're ambitious and you're gunning for promotion. Work with them early to build this relationship, especially if they're more senior.

[Part 3] Meta Intern Success Series - Onboarding Efficiently

- Onboarding is arguably the most important part of your internship as it sets the foundation and tone for your entire software engineer internship.
- Set up a 30 to 45 minute meeting with your intern manager (IM) ASAP, so they can explain the codebase to you at a high-level (i.e. a component level).
- Make sure you have a recurring 1:1 meeting with your IM, which should be a weekly 30 minutes. Your IM should set this up for you, but in case they don't, you can work with them to set it up.
- You will get 2-5 onboarding tasks to work on across the first ~2 weeks. The purpose of these is to familiarize yourself with the codebase.
- Aim to put out your 1st diff by the end of Week 1. If you're doing this around the end of Week 2, you're really behind.
- Ask a ton of questions and learn to ask high-quality questions. Don't be afraid of "over-asking" questions: If you're polite while asking questions and attaching great context to them, you will be fine no matter how many questions you ask.
- Use Work Chat DMs to ask for help aggressively during this period as it's vital for you to become productive within the codebase very quickly

Related resources:
- [Asking Effective Questions That Get Great Answers Quickly](https://link.jointaro.com/E8eaKmMpZcKWNGkbA)
- ["How can I learn a large codebase fast as an intern?"](https://link.jointaro.com/L8tXjWah6ycdNpNf7)
- [There Is No Such Thing As A Stupid Question](https://link.jointaro.com/F4p3fL4eHqp5GXti7)

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.