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Any related books for Senior Staff and Principal engineers?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One area to find great engineers (and interesting jobs) is at database, infrastructure and devtools companies. Places like Cockroach, PlanetScale, Docker, JetBrains, CodeWeavers, Fastly, etc. And the databases, infrastructure or tooling teams within Meta, Microsoft, etc.
Out of curiosity, do they have junior engineers too? I would love to work on docker or jetbrains for example.
But my point is that, you can almost always find some way into an interesting company such that you may be able to eventually pivot to (or at least periodically work with) a team you're interested in.
- If your management chain isn't supporting you into a staff promo, it's because they don't value the work you're currently doing.
- A staff engineer isn't a highly-productive senior engineer. Stop optimizing for the things that got you promoted to senior.
Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…
Really bad engineers see these environments and complain without doing anything about it, ultimately leaving the project. Slightly better engineers complain about the tools and blaze ahead anyway leaving a mess in their wake. The great ones I've been so lucky to work with pave the way on those fronts at the same time as solving the problem at hand and make it easier for their successors. It's quite beautiful when you see it.
Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…
I am by no means a rockstar in any particular field of software engineering, but I have worked on a very wide gamut of projects. This enabled me to dissect the task into the constituent parts in an attempt to reduce uncertainty and complexity.
Fwiw, I have no life, severe executive dysfunction that doesn’t allow me to stop thinking about what I am working on, and an abundance of curiosity.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One area to find great engineers (and interesting jobs) is at database, infrastructure and devtools companies. Places like Cockroach, PlanetScale, Docker, JetBrains, CodeWeavers, Fastly, etc. And the databases, infrastructure or tooling teams within Meta, Microsoft, etc.
I'm at a point in my career when I need to decide if I want to work for European branch of American Big Tech or try a 20 people database startup (got offers from both). I've got 2 yoe in high performance c++, working on data processing engines. I'm really tempted to go to the startup... But big tech pays more. And I feel like I could actually learn how to use tools properly before I come back to writing them. Any opi…
> Put non-meetings on the calendar I'd love to do that. But once you throw in real meetings, no meetings days, PTOs, time zones it becomes difficult to schedule a work meeting because now there's no overlapping block of time when you need to meet. Now all meetings get pushed out even more and the calendar time required for certain tasks increases.
Lately for a 1-3 day horizon I've been adding everything I'm working on as blocked. That definitely helps me visualize my priorities for the next couple days and whether I have room to fit more meetings or tasks. The main downside is I'm used to a more free-flowing schedule where I pick a task based on how I'm feeling.
Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…
IME, yes there's comparatively far more CRUD roles than platform roles. But bluntly speaking as someone who's been on both sides of the fence, platform roles are not for everyone. For these roles, there is a expectation of quality by very technical stakeholders and this creates some pressures and incentives that don't necessarily exist in orgs that cater to non-technical faceless stakeholders.
In practice, a big challenge is to avoid being someone who is "not hardcore enough" (i.e. incapable of implementing large scale reusability due to lack of ability, tendency to cave to timeline or other pressures, or distaste for "office politics") but also avoid being "too hardcore" and being constantly in the weeds chasing some cool clever idea that might not align w/ overall picture.
One thing that is often overlooked in open source projects with sizable communities is the amount of cat herding you need to do. People have all sorts of ideas for "features and improvements" and sometimes your job as a BDFL may be to say "no" to your most ardent supporters. This also happens a lot for staff level platform work.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
One area to find great engineers (and interesting jobs) is at database, infrastructure and devtools companies. Places like Cockroach, PlanetScale, Docker, JetBrains, CodeWeavers, Fastly, etc. And the databases, infrastructure or tooling teams within Meta, Microsoft, etc.
I'm at a point in my career when I need to decide if I want to work for European branch of American Big Tech or try a 20 people database startup (got offers from both). I've got 2 yoe in high performance c++, working on data processing engines. I'm really tempted to go to the startup... But big tech pays more. And I feel like I could actually learn how to use tools properly before I come back to writing them. Any opi…
Where do all the hardcore engineering jobs live? I've been bothered by the fact that most advanced engineering roles like "staff" actually mean "manager who does system design as well" Where are the docker/redis/next.js/linux kernel/qt/roller-coaster tycoon creators? Where are the people creating amazing software and do they get a special "advanced developer" title? I guess, I'm curious if there are actual roles in c…
I manage 2 core teams, one a "platform" team made up of all senior => principal engineers, and they spend a lot of their time shepparding other less experienced teams while trying to answer very tough, vague questions like "what bottlenecks do we predict at 10x scale? What can we opportunistically do today?". No one gets huge, dedicated time blocks to code without some degree of accountability and expectation.