Started a new job and seeing a few red flags, should I stay or should I go?

New / Eng
user102101

New Eng

user102101
Apr 30 18 Comments

I just started as a software engineer at a small startup. I'm new to the industry but get the feeling this company is not following best practices. They hard code things that really should be data and consider testing a luxury they don't have time for. I generally get a bad feeling about it all and it's only been my first two weeks.

I want to look for other jobs but worry that it will be a red flag that I just started at another company? (will it?) I'd prefer to go to a big company but will need to get back on the LC grind for a while before I feel confident in my chances? I recently bombed an interview at a big company.

I also might not know what I am talking about at all. I'm new to this came from a math background and taught myself to code, I'm pretty ecstatic to be actually getting swe interviews which I wasn't getting a year ago. It's fair to say I am worried that this will be my best shot for a while.

YOE: <1 year in swe 3+ years in less technical roles
TC:$120K (remote)
#engineering #software #swe

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TOP 18 Comments
  • Apple / Eng
    phase

    Go to company page Apple Eng

    phase
    Be the change you wish to see in your codebase.
    Apr 30 4
    • New / Eng
      user102101

      New Eng

      user102101
      OP
      Thanks for the advice @Criteo
      Apr 30
    • New
      Platypus1

      New

      Platypus1
      Coming from someone who has worked at a startup with strapped resources, I'd suggest bringing this up only if you will be the one implementing the tests. It's not because your teammates don't know that testing is good but that they don't have the time for it and testing has taken a back seat. Only making suggestions without doing anything might annoy people when they are already overworked.
      Apr 30
  • Google
    ๐Ÿฆ‘diveโ€…deep

    Go to company page Google

    BIO
    ๐Ÿฆ‘
    ๐Ÿฆ‘diveโ€…deep
    Nobody follows all the best practices. In a startup environment these two things you mentioned are not necessarily bad if they allow you to move quickly. Facebook in particular was famous for doing similar things until it was fairly established (and even now to some extent)
    Apr 30 1
    • New / Eng
      user102101

      New Eng

      user102101
      OP
      Yeah, it wasn't that they didn't do a lot of testing more so that they seemed to have a negative attitude towards it. I'm hoping I can try to push for it but I'm not super experienced. I'm worried I don't know enough to do it well myself.
      Apr 30
  • New
    only3sum

    New

    only3sum
    Dunno where you live but I donโ€™t think you can quit and take a severance
    Apr 30 1
    • New / Eng
      user102101

      New Eng

      user102101
      OP
      It's part of the employment agreement. Severance even if I quit in the probationary period.
      Apr 30
  • Amazon
    ๐Ÿ”ฅkc

    Go to company page Amazon

    ๐Ÿ”ฅkc
    This is typical for small startup and is not necessarily a bad thing. It is a trade off between fast prototyping and tech debt. What matters more is, can you learn from the teammates, are they good mentors, etc? Also you can always just trivially extract the hard coded stuff to a config file. It is not a big of a deal as it may seem
    Apr 30 1
    • New / Eng
      user102101

      New Eng

      user102101
      OP
      They basically have custom code per client. I've found rather superficial changes basically need an engineer to do them. Again it's not that that is so unusual but that they also seem to not want to eventually work towards something better.
      Apr 30
  • Omfgโ€ฆ do you even know what best practices are? Shut up and learn.
    Apr 30 1
    • New / Eng
      user102101

      New Eng

      user102101
      OP
      This is true too
      Apr 30