I was laid off from a FAANG company last year then I took a job at current company because of visa issues. My previous role was in analytics and so is my current role. But my current role has lot of rudimentary data engineer stuff involved in it and I am quite enjoying that part. I want to explore data engineering as a career but my skill set aligns more with data scientist. Current company culture is not a fit for me so want to go back to tech pretty bad! I have two options - Switch to DS role asap and later move to DE Switch to DE after acquiring more skills (will take longer and not sure how long I can tolerate here) Given the job market and interview prep time. What do you recommend? I don’t want to commit a career suicide again. I already feel lost. Thanks!! Edit: YOE 4 and TC $175k #dataanalyst #datascientist #dataengineer
Another option is to continue upskilling on the DE front and consider roles in smaller companies in the future that want a more full stack data person. This happens in smaller teams but if you can do both DE + Analytics, that’s a very good place to be for being attractive to smaller companies/ teams.
Ally of companies now are expecting you to be a data full stack kind of person where you build your own data pipelines and then create kpis and metrics off them. A lot of big tech companies give you that autonomy . I would say continue doing DS and then move to DE. Maybe analytics engineer is more up your alley and Netflix allows you to have the best of both worlds.
At amazon, many BIEs have both DE and DS skills.
So when you interview at the current firm, did you bring up the visa issues?
Of course I did!
If you want to do DE maybe do a cloud certification for a DE track. Or a databricks one or whatever you are focusing on. Just be aware that DE in tech can be more heavy on SWE and you could have a leet code interview that’s the same as SWE. You will also have a system design interview. It’s not as easy of a transition as many think, particularly when the skills for an analytics interview overlaps very little. It’s doable but you’ll have to prepare for interview for a few months before even applying.
Your current employer can easily track you down with the info you gave out here. Just saying.
This level of fear is extraordinary
Full stack ds, you’ll do everything btw yoe?
Yoe, tc is required to help give advice
Edited! Thanks
My experience is that many DS hate infrastructure and DE tasks. The fact you enjoy it makes it seem worth exploring at least.
Just apply for jobs and expect bad results - keep doing it until you get an offer
That’s pretty much all there is right now