Amazon L5 to Google L5. Possible?

Amazon / Eng
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Go to company page Amazon Eng

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Sep 5, 2021 32 Comments

(Yet another Amazonian testing waters before 4 year anniversary)

I’m L5 SDE at amazon with experience in 2 key AWS services. Joined as SDE 1 and got promoted later. Currently I’ve started working on my L6 promo doc and expect it to go through next year.

I’m looking for a switch now hopefully to a place with better comp. and WLB. Through some research on Blind it seems like Amazon L5 -> Google L5 has mixed reviews leaning towards “not possible”. On the other hand, I fit job description for L5 position on google’s career page.

What do other blinders think? Am I naive to go by the job description? Does Google always tend to down level? Or does it depend on the interviews? #tech #google #amazon #googleamazon #career

Any help will be appreciated, both w.r.t. expectations and prep.

YOE: 6.5 years(4.5 industry + 2 of Master’s)
TC: 243k

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TOP 32 Comments
  • Amazon / Eng
    cat face

    Go to company page Amazon Eng

    PRE
    Amazon
    cat face
    >YOE: 6.5 years(4.5 industry + 2 of Master’s)

    First off, your YOE is 4.5 not 6.5.
    Sep 5, 2021 3
  • Google
    jhootharam

    Go to company page Google

    jhootharam
    How "amazonian" are you? I don't want that trash culture here
    Sep 5, 2021 2
    • T-Mobile / Other
      DentArthur

      Go to company page T-Mobile Other

      DentArthur
      With one promotion already under the belt and another on the way, I would fathom OP is very Amazonian
      Sep 5, 2021
    • Amazon / Eng
      ◉_◉

      Go to company page Amazon Eng

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      OP
      Ha ha ha. I have been lucky with my earlier teams hence I’ve not been polluted to that extent. I love good Engineering, team collaboration and strive under that setting. Absolutely vocal about bad practices and office politics(which has started hurting me in my new team).

      In summary, away from the typical Amazonian image.
      Sep 5, 2021
  • Amazon
    luvkanye

    Go to company page Amazon

    luvkanye
    Yo even if you get L4 at G you’re still gonna get a good TC bump
    Sep 5, 2021 0
  • Amazon
    w2Ah4h

    Go to company page Amazon

    w2Ah4h
    I'm an Amazon L5, eight years in industry, half of which at Amazon. Tech role but not SDE. Recently cleared Google L5 HC.

    For the googliness interview I've sat through and given enough interviews at Amazon that I can tell good behavioral interviewees from the bad ones, so I just had to be a good one. My prep was spending a whole 15 minutes the night before the interview thinking of a few projects I've worked on that demonstrate leading a project through ambiguity to delivery, resolving manager/teammate/other team disagreements to lead to a positive outcome, and leading a project to increase operational resilience/reduce operational load.

    The other big interview is system design, so I spent six weeks spending most of my free time studying the standard fare: Grokking, DDIA (great info but mostly overkill), Xu, and lots of YouTube system design videos.
    Sep 5, 2021 3
    • Amazon
      w2Ah4h

      Go to company page Amazon

      w2Ah4h
      Thanks. Hit my four year cliff and wanted to test the waters. Manager wants to submit my L6 doc next year so I was on the fence about what to do if Google were to offer L4 (maybe dive and save?), but with an upcoming Google L5 offer leaving is a no-brainer. It's too bad because I really like my manager and skip and have deep domain knowledge in our space.
      Sep 5, 2021
    • Amazon / Eng
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      Go to company page Amazon Eng

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      OP
      Congrats 🍾
      Sep 5, 2021
  • VMware / Eng
    gMlg77

    Go to company page VMware Eng

    gMlg77
    i think it’s possible, but you gotta nail it. the hardest part imo will be the googliness round. you have to convince your interviewer that you are L5 caliber.
    Sep 5, 2021 3