High Expectations

Expectations at Big Tech companies are extremely high and that pressure really shapes the engineer experience. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- Big Tech roles pay top-of-market compensation, and in return companies expect top-tier productivity, output, and code quality
- Many engineers coming from non–Big Tech backgrounds experience culture shock due to stricter standards, faster pace, and more rigorous release processes
- Performance reviews are a major source of stress, heavily peer-comparative, and central to promotions and job security
- Past eras of “rest and vest” are largely gone; in today’s leaner, more competitive tech environment, expectations - especially for newer and more junior engineers - are higher than ever

Gilad’s Take: System Design Meeting Non-Participation

In this reflection on team participation during design reviews, we explored how group dynamics can have a powerful influence beyond the individuals themselves. The challenge highlights the importance of managing team culture and fostering an environment where all voices are heard.

- We acknowledge that **group behaviors can persist even as individual team members change**—a reminder that team culture is distinct and durable.
- Our role is to **introduce small, consistent deltas** that collectively improve psychological safety and encourage open participation.
- We focus on **building psychological safety** by recognizing barriers to contribution and intentionally working to lower them.
- Though these efforts may seem small or slow, **they compound into deep, sustainable cultural change** that supports long-term performance.
- Strong team cultures—like ones where everyone contributes—require persistent effort, but the payoff is a **resilient and high-performing team**.

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)

Ship & Grow 500k+ User Side Projects [Part 8] - Easy Design Wins

Creating a smooth, functional user experience isn't too hard. This lesson teaches you:

- How you can make features easier to access for users, explained with an in-depth example
- How to take care of users in trickier situations, explained with an in-depth example
- What you can do to lower the cognitive burden of using your product, explained with an in-depth example

Get The Rating You Deserve [Part 17] - Think Long Term

**In this section, we explored the importance of maintaining a long-term perspective in our careers.**

To cultivate a long-term mindset, we should:

- **Set long-term goals:** Define clear and ambitious goals for the next five, ten, or even twenty years.
- **Align short-term actions with long-term goals:** Make decisions that align with our long-term vision.
- **Build a strong personal brand:** Develop a reputation for reliability, integrity, and expertise.
- **Cultivate meaningful relationships:** Build and maintain strong relationships with colleagues, mentors, and sponsors.
- **Continuously learn and grow:** Invest in personal and professional development to stay ahead of the curve.

By adopting a long-term perspective, we can make more strategic decisions, increase our resilience, and achieve greater fulfillment in our careers.

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>.

Maximize Your Equity And Benefits In Tech [Part 12] - RSUs (Private Company Equity)

Private company RSUs can be rewarding but come with unique structures, tax challenges, and limited liquidity options. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- Most private RSUs are double-trigger, requiring both time-based vesting and a liquidity event, unlike public RSUs which are typically single-trigger
- Single-trigger RSUs in private companies can create tax issues if you owe taxes on illiquid shares you can’t sell
- Liquidity events like tender offers, IPOs, direct listings, or acquisitions are when real decision-making occurs, though each comes with restrictions like lock-up periods or partial sell limits
- IPOs typically involve a six-month lock-up period, while direct listings may allow earlier sales and fewer constraints
- It’s essential to plan for taxes—sell-to-cover elections may not fully satisfy tax liability due to lower default withholding rates on equity compensation

Next steps with Andy:

- [Connect with Andy on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/andymoranio)
- [Leave feedback and/or sign up for Andy’s newsletter](https://subscribepage.io/taroequitycourse)
- [Schedule a consultation](http://adastrafp.com/contact-us/)

Ship & Grow 500k+ User Side Projects [Part 21] - Go Deeper: Follow Through

A Taro member made a summary of the course: [Side Projects Shipping & Growing - Summary Doc](https://firebasestorage.googleapis.com/v0/b/tech-career-growth.appspot.com/o/courses%2Fgeneral_resources%2F%5BSUMMARY%5D%20Side%20Projects%20-%20Shipping%20%26%20Growing.pdf?alt=media&token=6d336c8b-26d6-45f2-a206-8682e64d21c5)

Related courses:

- [Build Side Projects With 500k+ Users: Coming Up With An Idea](https://www.jointaro.com/course/build-side-projects-with-500k-users-coming-up-with-an-idea/)
- [Level Up Your Code Quality As A Software Engineer](https://www.jointaro.com/course/level-up-your-code-quality-as-a-software-engineer/)

Peer Pressure

Working in Big Tech often means operating in a highly competitive environment filled with extremely talented peers. This creates both motivation and significant pressure, especially due to how performance systems are designed.

- Big Tech companies commonly use forms of stack ranking, where engineers are compared against peers and the bottom 5–15% may face probation (PIP) or termination each review cycle.
- Being surrounded by exceptionally strong coworkers can lead to intense pressure, imposter syndrome, and constant anxiety about staying out of the bottom cohort.
- High performers are often rewarded well, but lower performers may struggle, making the environment feel “dog-eat-dog.”
- Talent density can create problems with limited scope and many strong engineers competing for meaningful work, which can impact evaluations and career growth.
- Some teams have abundant scope and are great for growth, while others (like highly mature products) may have minimal impactful work, worsening peer pressure.

Assembling The Feedback "Avengers" For Your Promotion Case

Why Nice People Get Stuck

In this lesson, we discuss how **reorganizations can sometimes be used to indirectly manage leaders out of a company**. Rather than formally terminating someone, leadership may assign them responsibilities that are less desirable, less influential, or poorly aligned with their ambitions—knowing they may eventually choose to leave. The conversation also explores why agreeable “team players” can inadvertently receive less desirable assignments and why communicating your career goals is essential.

- **Reorgs can be used to encourage voluntary departures:** Moving an ambitious employee into a role they don’t want can be an indirect way of signaling that their future opportunities within the organization are limited.
- **Being a team player can have unintended consequences:** Reliable employees who rarely push back may be given undesirable responsibilities precisely because leaders trust them to accept what the organization needs.
- **Managers can’t always guess what you want:** You don’t need to become confrontational, but clearly communicating your ambitions and preferences gives leadership the information needed to advocate for your career instead of assuming you’re satisfied with whatever role you’re given.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WaeGfLnRvc&t=24s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WaeGfLnRvc&t=24s)

The Really Important Job Interview Questions Engineers Should Ask (But Don't)

Basic questions that engineers should ask when interviewing at any company. 

From the Posthog blog: <https://posthog.com/founders/what-to-ask-in-interviews>

Poor Work-Life Balance

Working in Big Tech offers prestige and high pay, but it often comes at the cost of personal time and mental well-being. The demanding environment, peer pressure, and ambiguous policies can lead to overwork and burnout.

- **Competitive Culture Fuels Overwork**: The intense stack ranking and peer comparison systems push employees to work beyond normal hours to maintain high performance ratings and avoid being ranked at the bottom.
- **On-Call Stress and Burnout**: At scale, systems often encounter issues, and engineers may feel pressured to respond even during vacations, especially if they are domain experts.
- **Peer Pressure to Match Hours**: Engineers often feel compelled to match their teammates’ late-night work habits, contributing to a cycle of poor boundaries and collective burnout.
- **Unlimited PTO Backfires**: Policies like “unlimited vacation” often discourage time off, especially when company leadership sends contradictory messages about taking breaks.
- **Regional Differences Exist**: The culture of overwork is more intense in Silicon Valley compared to other parts of the world, such as Europe, where vacations are taken more seriously and work-life boundaries are better respected.

Demystifying LLM Benchmarks -- How To Compare Large Language Models?

In the recent launch of Google's Large Language Model (LLM) Gemini, Google claimed that "Gemini beats human level performance on MMLU" but you might be wondering:

- What are the different evaulation criteria? Massive Multitask Language Understanding (**MMLU**)? General Language Understanding Evaluation (**GLUE**)? **HumanEval**?
- How can we know which model is good at coding tasks?
- What is considered "human-level performance"?
- How do they actually get the results for these benchmarks?

In this talk, Sai breaks down all the benchmarks you need to know to be better informed when papers claim to beat benchmarks.

The next paper reading session is on January 8 at 5pm: [**https://www.jointaro.com/event/paper-reading-group-4-mistral-7b/**](https://www.jointaro.com/event/paper-reading-group-4-mistral-7b/)

**Your host:**

[**Sai Shreyas Bhavanasi**](https://www.linkedin.com/in/b-sai/) has worked in Computer Vision and Reinforcement Learning and published 2 first-author papers. He has also worked as an MLE and Data Analyst.

Empire Building & Headcount Thresholds

In this lesson, we discuss **empire building**—the tendency for managers to focus on increasing the number of people they oversee rather than the actual impact their teams create. The conversation explores why headcount becomes a convenient proxy for leadership scope, how promotion requirements can unintentionally reward organizational growth, and how these incentives can lead to reorgs and staffing decisions driven more by career advancement than genuine business needs.

- **Why empire building happens:** Measuring a manager’s true impact is subjective and difficult, while headcount is simple and visible—making team size an easy proxy for leadership scope and promotion readiness.
- **Promotion incentives can encourage unnecessary growth:** When companies establish formal or informal headcount thresholds for senior roles, ambitious managers may be incentivized to acquire teams or additional reports simply to meet those requirements.
- **Headcount-driven incentives can distort organizations:** Teams may be moved between managers, temporarily reassigned, or reorganized to create the necessary “scope” for promotions—even when those changes have little to do with what is best for the business or employees.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WaeGfLnRvc&t=24s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WaeGfLnRvc&t=24s)

When Should I Actually Use AI During The Interview?

In this lesson we talk about when and how to use AI effectively during an AI-assisted coding interview.

- **Find the right balance with AI:** Learn how to avoid over-delegating core logic to AI or underusing it and running out of time, by aiming for the “middle path” that maximizes leverage while minimizing risk.
- **Accelerate typing, not thinking:** Discover why you should use AI for scaffolding, boilerplate, and clearly defined test cases—but retain ownership over algorithms, data structures, and key design decisions.
- **Optimize for easy verification:** Understand that AI is most helpful when you already know what needs to be built and can quickly verify the output, and least helpful when you’re still figuring out the correct approach.

How Managers Hire Great Engineers [Part 7] - LinkedIn Search

If you work in tech, it's impossible to escape LinkedIn and this applies for engineering hiring as well. From this lesson, you will:

- Learn why LinkedIn search is a go-to tool for sourcing candidates and why a LinkedIn premium subscription is recommended for engineering managers
- Understand the limitations of LinkedIn’s free tier and the benefits of upgrading to LinkedIn premium, including unlimited search results and in-mail credits
- Explore the differences between LinkedIn Premium and LinkedIn Recruiter and why LinkedIn Recruiter may not be cost-effective for engineering managers
- Gain practical tips on how to use LinkedIn search effectively, including filtering by title, company, and school, and leveraging Boolean searches to refine results
- Discover how to maximize the value of your existing network by searching through first and second-degree connections before expanding your search

Connect with John Egan on LinkedIn: [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jwegan/​](https://www.linkedin.com/in/jwegan/%E2%80%8B%E2%AC%A4)

Future Job Prospects

Having a Big Tech name on your resume, whether Meta, Google, Uber, or others, often leads to significantly improved job-seeking outcomes. This reputation, deserved or not, dramatically influences how recruiters and hiring managers perceive candidates.

- **Stronger Resume Signal**: A stint at a Big Tech company increases perceived credibility and opens doors. Even a one- to two-year tenure can 100x the likelihood of landing interviews at other desirable companies.
- **Perception of Operational Excellence**: Recruiters and startup founders often assume that employees from companies like Amazon or Meta carry with them the systems, processes, and best practices that helped those firms succeed.
- **Proximity to Core Value Drives Perception**: Engineers who worked on flagship products or core systems (e.g., TikTok’s recommendation engine) are perceived as especially valuable, as if they embody the company’s strategic advantage.
- **Brand Halo Effect**: Just being associated with a known entity creates a trust shortcut—recruiters assume a baseline of competence and quality due to the rigorous hiring practices and peer environment of Big Tech.
- **Standardized Hiring Signal**: The structured interview process (e.g., Leetcode-style DSA questions) at these companies helps ensure a consistent bar, reinforcing the belief that Big Tech engineers are generally stronger than a randomly selected candidate.

Become An Engineer Influencer [Part 7] - Mid-Funnel Channels

Maximize Your Equity And Benefits In Tech [Part 19] - Pre-Tax vs. Roth

Choosing between pre-tax and Roth 401(k) contributions can significantly impact your long-term tax outcomes. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- The net tax advantage between pre-tax and Roth depends on your current vs. future tax rates; Roth may be ideal if you're in a lower bracket now, but pre-tax offers flexibility for future low-tax Roth conversions
- Roth IRAs offer penalty-free access to contributions anytime, while Roth 401(k)s have stricter withdrawal rules, often treating withdrawals as a mix of contributions and earnings
- Pre-tax retirement accounts are subject to Required Minimum Distributions (RMDs) starting at age 73, which can force taxable income in retirement
- Doing Roth conversions during low-income years (e.g., early retirement) can reduce future RMD burdens and smooth your tax liability over time

Next steps with Andy:

- [Connect with Andy on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/andymoranio)
- [Leave feedback and/or sign up for Andy’s newsletter](https://subscribepage.io/taroequitycourse)
- [Schedule a consultation](http://adastrafp.com/contact-us/)

Maximize Your Equity And Benefits In Tech [Part 7] - Other Considerations (RSUs/Bonuses)

Even with a solid RSU strategy in place, there are a few overlooked tax and compliance details that can complicate things. Here are the core points from the lesson:

- Insider trading policies may limit your ability to auto-sell or manually sell RSUs immediately upon vesting, leading to short-term gains or losses you can’t always control
- Wash sale rules can disallow losses if you repurchase the same stock within 30 days of a sale, which can easily happen with monthly vesting schedules
- Incorrectly reporting RSU-related wash sales on your taxes may go unnoticed, but technically violates IRS rules and can affect your cost basis going forward

Next steps with Andy:

- [Connect with Andy on LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/andymoranio)
- [Leave feedback and/or sign up for Andy’s newsletter](https://subscribepage.io/taroequitycourse)
- [Schedule a consultation](http://adastrafp.com/contact-us/)

Before you challenge them, ask if they trust you yet.

You’ve seen this happen.\
A good idea, pushed too soon—and everything shuts down.

This section gives you the signal to look for before you push.\
And what to do if it’s not there yet.

**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).

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.