Career growth advice (SWE)
As a backend engineer, what your practical advice on growing beyond L5 at Google? Typical pain at a big company I've been experiencing: - boring projects - many people chasing few opportunities - teams moving slowly I considered switching to new companies, but I don't see how this is a solution to goal of long term career growth. I know there are many senior folks here, what's your advice on career growth? Should I consider expanding my skillset in areas such as AI/ML to gain the competitive edge, or shall I focus on my own area of backend engineering and trying to drive more impact and look for other better opportunities wherever available? #careerbuilder
Change teams or departments as necessary to find runway and support. A rising tide lifts all boats, so pick a product area that is growing and making money or is about to. Pick your manager, then your team, then your project in that order of importance. Mostly I see people get stuck in bad career situations that could be resolved just by finding a place with more room to grow and better management and peers.
“I know there are many senior folks here” if you call 2 yoe as senior folks then hell yea, blind is full of those extra senior folks. Jokes aside, I would say getting promo at large company is more political driven than performance driven. You gotta be in the right place at the right time doing the right thing. One way to get promoted is being on a team who’s senior folks quit and you become in charge as you are the most knowledgeable after they have left.
I think if you work hard and you are consistent in producing results you should get to L6 in 4 years. Also L5 in G is a great level and I don’t think you should take too much pressure unless you want to make millions of dollars and are willing to put in a lot of hours and hard work. In that case join a pre ipo company and work hard