Ace The ML System Design Interview [Part 7] - Questions For Your Interviewers

Interviews are a two-way street, providing an opportunity to assess whether a company and team are a good fit. Here are the core points from this lesson:

- Prepare thoughtful questions that focus on factors directly impacting your work experience, such as on-call responsibilities and decision-making processes
- Avoid vague questions like "What's the work-life balance like?" and instead probe for root causes, such as the frequency and intensity of on-call duties or whether decisions are made top-down or bottom-up
- Understand the company's decision-making culture to gain insights into potential work-life balance challenges
- Ask targeted questions to get a clearer picture of the team's dynamics and the day-to-day realities of the role
- Take advantage of engineers’ straightforward answers to learn what it’s really like to work at the company

If you like what Ilya has to say, subscribe to his YouTube for more high-quality ML/AI career guidance: [MLEpath - YouTube](https://go.mlepath.com/taro-youtube-mlepath)

If you want hands-on support from Ilya to crack the FAANG ML interview, join his coaching program: [MLEpath - Coaching Program](https://go.mlepath.com/taro-march-25)

Amazon Behavioral Interview [Part 8] - Overcoming An Unanticipated Obstacle (Evaluation)

This video provides feedback on an individual's response to a behavioral interview question: "Tell me about a time when you had to overcome significant unanticipated obstacles to achieve a key goal."

- **Strengths:** The interviewee effectively described a challenging situation where they had to implement a new system for measuring customer satisfaction (CSAT). They acknowledged the obstacles they faced, including resistance from their team and technical limitations. They also highlighted their proactive approach in finding interim solutions (using a manual Google Form) while working towards a long-term solution (automated surveys).

- **Areas for Improvement:**

  - **Communication and Leadership:** The interviewee's description of overcoming resistance from their team could be refined. Instead of emphasizing their authority, they could focus on building consensus, explaining the benefits of the new system, and gaining their team's buy-in through clear communication and collaboration.
  - **Proactive Communication with Leadership:** The interviewee mentioned that the initial drop in CSAT scores caused some concern from leadership. They could have strengthened their response by emphasizing their proactive communication with leadership, explaining the anticipated dip in scores due to the more accurate measurement method and outlining the steps they were taking to address the underlying issues.
  - **Focus on Positive Outcomes:** The interviewee could have further emphasized the positive outcomes of their actions, such as increased customer satisfaction in the long run and improved customer relationships.

- **Overall:** The interviewee provided a solid foundation for their response. By incorporating the feedback and refining their delivery, they can significantly enhance their ability to effectively communicate their accomplishments and demonstrate their leadership and problem-solving skills in a job interview setting.

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

Getting Promoted to Senior Staff Engineer

n this lesson, **Adam Ernst**, Software Engineer at **Meta**, shares the story behind **ComponentKit**, the declarative UI framework that played a pivotal role in his promotion to **Senior Staff Engineer (E7)**. Faced with a rapidly growing Facebook News Feed that was becoming difficult to maintain, Adam and his team reimagined iOS development by adapting the core ideas of React for native mobile applications—years before SwiftUI and React Native became mainstream. He also discusses how he overcame resistance to a radically new approach and the leadership lessons he learned while driving large-scale technical change.

- **Reinventing UI Architecture at Scale:** To address performance issues, crashes, and increasing complexity in Facebook News Feed, Adam developed **ComponentKit**, a declarative UI framework inspired by React that improved maintainability, rendering performance, and developer productivity long before similar technologies became industry standards.
- **Winning Adoption Through Evidence and Collaboration:** Convincing engineers to embrace a new programming paradigm required more than technical excellence. Adam demonstrated tangible improvements through cleaner code and better performance, leveraged trusted allies to advocate for the framework, and found compromises that incorporated ideas from competing internal projects.
- **Strong Conviction with Practical Flexibility:** Adam remained confident that ComponentKit was the right solution for Facebook's highly dynamic feed while acknowledging that no architecture is universally optimal. His experience highlights the importance of understanding trade-offs, tailoring solutions to the problem at hand, and leading innovation through collaboration rather than ideology.

Original podcast link: [**https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA_OYJF3Mmw**](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YA_OYJF3Mmw)

Gilad’s Take: Burnt Out and Behind

In Part 3 of the course, we explored how to apply the core lesson from Part 2—creating positive and sustainable change in organizational performance—through four practical exercises. Each scenario challenged us to identify the **"deltas"** we can introduce as managers to increase impact at the individual, team, or systems level.

- **We learned to recognize that not all growth is credited to us**, and we must focus on the growth that happens *because* of our involvement—not despite it.
- **We explored supporting high performers** by making their growth more efficient (faster) and effective (more aligned with goals), rather than just letting it happen passively.
- **We tackled underperformance** by identifying root causes, offering tailored support, and protecting teammates from negative ripple effects.
- **We addressed silent group dynamics** by recognizing the power of culture and investing in small, consistent changes to build psychological safety and lasting team habits.
- **We emphasized ruthless prioritization** as a powerful delta: helping teams focus on what truly matters, not just work harder—transforming effort into sustainable outcomes.

Now, we’re ready to take this impact to the next level in Part 4.

If you want to learn more from Gilad, he shares free leadership advice daily on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/giladnaor/?utm_source=taro&utm_medium=course&utm_campaign=cta) and weekly on the[ δeltas newsletter](https://posts.managementdeltas.com/?utm_source=taro&utm_medium=course&utm_campaign=cta)

Engineering Manager Responsibilities

In this lesson, we talk about understanding incentives, especially your manager’s, as a key to navigating your career and collaborating effectively. By assuming people act in their own self-interest, we better understand how managers operate and how to work with them.

- We frame a “model of the world” where we assume people act selfishly, helping us predict behavior and align with our manager’s incentives.
- We note that understanding how an engineering manager is evaluated allows us to help them look good—and in doing so, we benefit too.
- We highlight that the EM role is challenging: they’re responsible for the team’s impact without writing code themselves, focusing instead on empowering and unblocking engineers.
- We clarify that growing engineers is only part of the role—EMs also handle hiring, firing, and performance reviews; sometimes their job is not to help us grow but to manage us out if needed.
- We describe additional responsibilities like removing cross-team blockers, resolving interpersonal issues, and creating team “synergy,” which includes a wide range of people- and process-related challenges.

Conclusion

That’s it.

Not the end—just the moment you stop walking with a guide and start carrying the weight yourself.

You’ve got the tools. The stories. The bruises that come with learning anything real.

Now carry it forward.

Ownership doesn’t show up in the big speeches. It shows up in the quiet. In what you do when no one’s clapping. In what happens after the meeting ends.

**Workbook:** [Creator’s Orientation](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sysZuPhlrLZbU5stxlJBqg3LAcGTy_S7/view?usp=sharing)

**Want to go deeper?**

- Explore more tools and courses at [**Taha’s Method**](https://www.tahasmethod.com/) — from interview prep to leadership development.

- Follow me on [**LinkedIn**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tahahussain/) and subscribe to my weekly newsletter, [**The Conscious Leader**](https://tahahussain.substack.com/), for more lessons like these.

- Get 30% off [**Top Tech Leader**](https://bit.ly/tarotopleader) with code **ILOVETARO** (exclusive for Taro members).

SWE Internship Survival Guide [Part 15] - AI Tools

With AI tools becoming increasingly embedded in the software development workflow, it’s important for interns to use them wisely without compromising their own growth or credibility. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- Interns should embrace AI tools but avoid over-reliance, as teams are assessing *their* engineering abilities—not the tool’s
- Use of AI must comply with company policies, and interns should always understand and be able to defend the code they submit
- AI is best used for boilerplate and simple tasks, but the intern should remain the core problem solver and decision-maker

Ship & Grow 500k+ User Side Projects [Part 14] - SEO

When it comes to getting traffic, a lot of it comes down to being in the good graces of a single FAANG company. This lesson teaches you:

- What SEO (search engine optimization) is
- The many ways you can waste your time with SEO
- An incredibly simple way to understand how to succeed at SEO
- The most straightforward, highest leverage way you can boost your SEO
- How to organically generate more web pages for your product, explained with an in-depth example

This is the only SEO tool you need: <https://search.google.com/search-console/about>

Ship & Grow 500k+ User Side Projects [Part 6] - Least Clicks Design

You don't need to be a product design to build great software with a smooth user interface. This lesson teaches you:

- Why *every* engineer needs to care about UX, not just front-end engineers (web/mobile)
- The core philosophy you need to remember when crafting user interfaces
- The difference between a good product and a bad product when it comes to least clicks design
- What it looks like to truly champion least clicks design, explained with an in-depth example

Let them carry it. You’ve done your part.

You’ve seen the pieces.\
Now we pull them together.

This final act is about how ownership moves—how everything you’ve practiced shows up when things get messy, unclear, or just plain stuck.

It’s less about new ideas, more about recognizing the patterns, and deciding what to do when they land on your desk.

**Workbook:** [Creator’s Orientation](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sysZuPhlrLZbU5stxlJBqg3LAcGTy_S7/view?usp=sharing)

**Want to go deeper?**

- Explore more tools and courses at [**Taha’s Method**](https://www.tahasmethod.com/) — from interview prep to leadership development.

- Follow me on [**LinkedIn**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/tahahussain/) and subscribe to my weekly newsletter, [**The Conscious Leader**](https://tahahussain.substack.com/), for more lessons like these.

- Get 30% off [**Top Tech Leader**](https://bit.ly/tarotopleader) with code **ILOVETARO** (exclusive for Taro members).

Become An Engineer Influencer [Part 17] - Frequency

Burnt Out and Behind

In this final exercise, we confront a situation where a team is putting in extra hours but still failing to meet deadlines. This signals systemic issues that go beyond individual effort—and calls for thoughtful intervention.

- We recognize that **unsustainable effort without results is a red flag**—it shows that working harder isn't the solution.
- We can introduce deltas by **investigating root causes**: Are goals unrealistic? Are priorities misaligned? Is there a process breakdown?
- It’s our responsibility to **shift focus from intensity to effectiveness**—fixing the system so performance improves without burnout.
- We look at **team norms, project planning habits, and cross-functional dependencies** to identify leverage points for change.
- Our role is to help the team **recover sustainably**, improving delivery while preserving morale and long-term capacity.

If you want to learn more from Gilad, he shares free leadership advice daily on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/giladnaor/?utm_source=taro&utm_medium=course&utm_campaign=cta) and weekly on the[ δeltas newsletter](https://posts.managementdeltas.com/?utm_source=taro&utm_medium=course&utm_campaign=cta)

Why Being A Good Interviewer Is So Hard

Every software engineer know what it's like to be interviewed, but few know what it's like being on the other side of the table giving the interview. It's important to understand this flipped perspective as it will help you resonate with the interviewer.

Here are the core points from the video:
- A good interviewer has 2 core goals:
  - Get signal on the candidate's abilities
  - Provide a great candidate experience
- Unfortunately, these 2 things usually conflict. In order to get good signal, the candidate often times has to struggle to solve a tough problem. Struggle is generally not associated with good experience.
- *A truly good interviewer makes it so that the candidate enjoyed their round even if they didn't pass.* This means that you need to get signal in a positive way by building the candidate up and bringing out their true skills without solving too much of the problem for them.

Related resources:
- [[Taro Top 10] Effective Interview Prep](https://www.jointaro.com/playlist/HLBYxJI7D1j8STolrwum/)
- [[Masterclass] How To Ace Your Big Tech Interview - Data Structures And Algorithms](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/V4sTACzfOh22nMVcUV3w/masterclass-how-to-ace-your-big-tech-interview-data-structures-and-algorithms/)
- [[Masterclass] How To Ace Your Big Tech Interview - System Design](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/J3I9fTW9ulr6T9KjxpqY/masterclass-how-to-ace-your-big-tech-interview-system-design/)
- [How Alex Got Into Meta With 0 Prior LeetCode Experience](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/ZYiTbN21FsqFxFdpwt5a/how-alex-got-into-meta-with-0-prior-leetcode-experience/)

Weekly Business Review

###### In this lesson, we introduce the **Weekly Business Review (WBR)** as Amazon’s core mechanism for consistently analyzing, improving, and controlling business performance. This structured, weekly ritual helped us align leadership around metrics, dive deep into customer experience, and create a culture of truth-seeking and operational rigor.

### Key Takeaways:

- **We used the WBR to bridge strategy and detail**: Contrary to conventional advice, we didn’t choose between high-level strategy and operational detail—we embraced both. The WBR let senior leaders dive deep while still steering big-picture strategy.
- **We built the WBR around the customer journey**: Our report flowed from financials to marketing, browsing, shopping, fulfillment, and customer support. Each department leader owned and explained their metrics—not analysts—ensuring accountability and depth.
- **We started before everything was perfect**: We launched the WBR even before our metrics were fully refined. By including many metrics upfront, we learned over time which ones provided signal and which were noise.
- **We continuously refined our metrics**: In each WBR meeting, we didn’t just review results—we asked whether we were measuring the right things and how to improve clarity and relevance of our metrics.
- **We made it a disciplined habit**: Reports were automated and delivered every Monday by 7 a.m., enabling prep ahead of the all-company WBR. This rhythm created organizational focus, enabled early issue detection, and aligned everyone around the brutal facts of performance.

The WBR was not just a meeting—it was a **weekly dose of operational truth** that made Amazon more customer-obsessed, data-informed, and execution-focused.

To dive deeper into Input Metrics Mastery and learn more from Bill and Colin, follow these links:

- Take the full course at their website: <https://workingbackwards.com/>
- Buy the book: <https://www.amazon.com/Working-Backwards-Insights-Stories-Secrets/dp/1250267595>
- Bill's LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-carr/>
- Colin's LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/colinbryar/>

Amazon Aurora: Design Considerations for High Throughput Cloud-Native Relational Databases

Session led by [Dharin Shah](https://www.linkedin.com/in/dharinshah/)

In this session, we delve into the intricacies of Amazon Aurora, a high throughput, cloud-native relational database designed to meet the demanding scalability and performance requirements of modern applications without compromising on the simplicity of access via SQL. The paper presents a thorough examination of the design considerations that underpin Aurora's architecture, understanding how it achieves unparalleled levels of efficiency and reliability within the cloud. We will explore key concepts such as Aurora's distributed and decentralized approach, fault tolerance mechanisms, and the optimization of data storage and retrieval processes.

Get Hands-On Experience With Frontline And Customers

In addition to data and structured methods, **immersive, first-hand experiences and direct customer research** gave us some of the most impactful input metrics and ideas at Amazon. These approaches helped ground our innovation efforts in real customer needs and operational realities.

### Key Takeaways:

- **We gained critical insight from frontline experience**: During Amazon’s early years, leadership—including Jeff Bezos—regularly worked in fulfillment centers and answered customer service calls during peak seasons. These visceral experiences helped us better understand operational pain points and identify new input metrics.
- **We institutionalized hands-on learning**: The value was so great that we made it a requirement—every Amazon employee spends time in frontline roles each year. This creates empathy, sharpens customer focus, and surfaces measurable opportunities for improvement.
- **We used customer research to drive innovation**: Surveys, focus groups, and third-party data sources gave us clear, actionable feedback. A simple survey on why customers didn’t shop more often revealed four key barriers—shipping cost, delivery speed, selection, and price—which directly shaped the creation of Amazon Prime and our long-term priorities.
- **We traced key customer complaints back to inputs**: From that early research, we began measuring and improving core inputs like in-stock rate, selection breadth, delivery speed, and pricing—cementing them in our flywheel as long-term business drivers.
- **We leveraged sales and customer interactions in B2B contexts**: Especially in business-to-business scenarios, we worked closely with sales teams and met customers in person to gather input-rich feedback, helping us refine offerings and discover metrics specific to client pain points.

Together, these methods reinforce the importance of **direct, empathetic engagement with customers and operations**—not just to build understanding, but to generate input metrics that we can track, improve, and build entire services around.

To dive deeper into Input Metrics Mastery and learn more from Bill and Colin, follow these links:

- Take the full course at their website: <https://workingbackwards.com/>
- Buy the book: <https://www.amazon.com/Working-Backwards-Insights-Stories-Secrets/dp/1250267595>
- Bill's LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-carr/>
- Colin's LinkedIn: <https://www.linkedin.com/in/colinbryar/>

SWE Internship Survival Guide [Part 9] - Build In Public

It’s not enough to quietly ship code during your internship—sharing your progress publicly is a key strategy for visibility and success. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- By default, no one except your mentor may know what you’re working on, so it’s your job to build in public and generate awareness
- Visibility leads to stronger relationships, more feedback, and more people who can advocate for you when return offer decisions are made
- Intern projects often aren’t on the critical path, making it even more important to market your work through demos, updates, and conversations
- Reusing assets like screenshots or videos from your pull requests is a great way to showcase progress
- Use team standups, Slack channels, emails, and meetings to share what you’ve built and invite feedback, always including links and tagging collaborators to maximize engagement

Career Priorities List

We walk through the many different priorities that can shape which company and team are truly right for us, and why this makes the choice so hard.

Here are the core points from the lesson:

- We list 14+ possible priorities—compensation, work-life balance, company prestige, supportive team, growth opportunities, stability, maximum outcome (upside), remote work, product space, company ethics, technical space, title, benefits (like parental leave), and location—showing how many different axes there are to optimize for.
- We explain nuances within each priority: for example, early-stage startups can offer huge upside but high risk, big tech often offers more stability but lower ceiling, and team makeup/scope can make or break growth even inside a good company.
- We emphasize that the macro environment (economy, industry turbulence, company-specific churn) must be considered alongside our personal priorities when evaluating offers and career moves.
- We share that we have strong opinions and heuristics, but the goal is for each of us to examine and “stack-rank” our own priorities, test our assumptions, and disagree deliberately rather than blindly following default paths like “just go to FAANG.”

"What does your day to day look like?" - 8/19/2022

- *In short, it varies a **lot**.* Startups are extremely unpredictable, and the biggest problem facing the company will change every month or even every week.
- However, there are 2 constants:
  - **Talking with new Taro Premium members** - We chat 30 minutes with every new member to get to know them, make sure they're set up properly within the community, and understand their job and career goals. These meetings add up, and we have a decent amount of them every day.
  - **Talking with Rahul** - There's always a ton going on, and we always have a bunch of ideas on how to evolve Taro, so we need a lot of time to talk each day, usually 45 minutes to 1 hour. According to YC, cofounders falling out is the #1 reason startups fail, so we really want to make sure that doesn't happen.
- We try to get a decent amount of code in every week, but it's hard to find time for it and the company's top priorities are often times not build related.
  - On a side note, the highest build priority for us right now is to really make the Taro web app silky smooth.
- We are fundraising right now, so that's dominating our lives.
- We have a lot of meetings in general as networking is crucial for startups.

Successful Disagreements for Software Engineers

[**Ryan Alexander Wiens**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-wiens/) is an experienced English communication coach who has worked with more than 70 SWEs. In this workshop, he shares the nuances of expressing disagreement in a constructive and respectful manner. With years of coaching under his belt, Ryan understands the challenges faced by engineers when English is not their first language.

**Key Takeaways:**

- Understand the phases of a diplomatic disagreement.
- Interactive exercises including breakout rooms and real-time Q&A.
- A phrase bank for participants to use in their daily communications.
- Practice scenarios on common workplace topics for SWEs.

Ryan discussed the importance of including the right words and phrases, clear thinking, defined outcomes, and effective communication frameworks. He underscored the need for skills such as active listening, presenting new ideas, building rapport, and confidence in practical application. Ryan also led a discussion on the topic of successful disagreement at work, suggesting that the level of comfort with disagreement might depend on the situation and culture of the workplace.

**Disagreement's Importance in the Workplace**

Ryan emphasized the importance of expressing disagreement in the workplace, as it leads to better decision making, avoids useless work, and creates opportunities for learning and growth. They stressed the need for disagreement to be done respectfully, keeping it impersonal and listening to others before forming a response. Additionally, they suggested picking battles wisely and staying calm and respectful. 

**Constructive Disagreement Framework**

Ryan introduced a framework for constructive disagreement that emphasized respect, evidence-based opinions, and softening disagreements. He encouraged attendees to suggest phrases to use when expressing disagreements respectfully. Instead of using the word "but" in conversations, Ryan suggests alternatives to soften disagreements. At the same time, you should own your disagreements and remove bias from the message. In situations of imbalanced authority, Ryan advised picking battles carefully and being strategic about which battles to pursue.

Ryan led a group activity aimed at fostering disagreement resolution skills. Find the [worksheet here](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G0As8QS7MZ4O0PTCeDEPeSborW9ahU_m/view?usp=sharing).

Additional resources: 

- [\[Masterclass\] How To Build Deep Relationships Quickly In Tech](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/tyaPFMXPoz2pmzB7OVzt/masterclass-how-to-build-deep-relationships-quickly-in-tech/)
- [\[Masterclass\] How To Work Better With Your Engineering Manager](https://www.jointaro.com/lesson/2PbJb2fuqF3iMHy57eEg/masterclass-how-to-work-better-with-your-engineering-manager/)

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.