Tc or gtfo
Did you ever have to lie to get ahead over there? I hear the politics are insane—unlike any other tech company out there. How did you avoid PIPs? Ever see anyone genuinely get screwed? Did you say anything? Did you do the screwing?
Never encountered any of that. I was fortunate to avoid those teams (I worked on 3 different teams). The orgs I was in never had to pip people out only the performers who were really struggling and weren’t a good fit for the role. The only way I ever saw people get screwed was some managers expectations for promotion was way higher than they should have been leading to some SDE I staying as SDE for 3-4 years when they should have been promoted much sooner. I saw one guy who was hired as SDE I with 4 years experience and his manager promoted him after 3 even though he was doing SDE II work after one.
I hear you can just screw your way to the top
What was your role?
SDE I and SDE II
When you joined, what level were you and how long did it take to be promoted?
Right out of college as SDE I and promoted in just under two years because my teams project launched. I was promoted a bit to early to be honest.
Do you think you deserved the promotion at that time ? Do you think you met the SDE-2 bar at that time?
Perhaps a broad question, but what added expectations does a SDE2 have that an SDE1 does not?
SDE I is implementing feature specific things and designs from other SDE. SDE II implements broader project tasks and does some of the design
What do you mean by broader project tasks? Sorry, just asking since I’m about to come in as an SDE2
Were you an SDE? If so, what’d you look for whenever you interviewed someone? Do you know what’s said about failing candidates most during interview debriefs?
I did not do too many interviews. We have a bar raising program for them and bar raises do a ton of interviews so I never had to. I did not use the same criteria amazon uses. I asked a question and if the person was able to solve it or find a solution by asking me questions and working together with me and they were okay to talk to I would support hiring them. Usually people would say something about leadership principles when not hiring someone but I think all of that is a waste of time.
How does a candidate show leadership principles? They run school clubs, tech teams or companies before attempting to get into Amazon? 🤔
What was your experience working with PMs?
They do not do anything and your manager will have the handle all of that work or if they are a bad manager push it on the SDE. Occasionally I have come across some who were good at their jobs but it was rare.
My experience has been the same at Microsoft.
What group were you in? Alexa, AWS, ads? Can you compare the work, projects, management, promo velocity, etc among them?
I was in retail softlines and transportation. Softlines was pretty slow moving and boring projects but good work life balance and cool people. Harder to get promoted because of type of projects. Management was great where I was and I really enjoyed working with everyone. Transportation moves much faster and has bigger projects. Depending on the team can be harder or easier to get promoted. Retail was okay but heavily dependent on the team during the time I was there. I got promoted fast but because of the project I was on.
Why are u leaving? Where are you going?
I only took the job at Amazon because I would get to learn a lot and get valuable experience, which I did over the few years I was there. I got a job offer from a triple A game studio and that’s what I want to do.
Game studios are notorious for WLB and low wages. Good luck. It is a brave decision.