James M Snell - System Engineer at CloudFlare

Talking Points:The disadvantage that Juniors developers haveFocus on the actual goalTake your career to the next levelQuotable Quotes:"Through mentorship programs and developer events that I run, I recognize that the biggest disadvantage that Juniors developers have is not technical expertise""Tools, libraries, technologies, frameworks, languages, they all change so fast""The disadvantage that Juniors devs have is that they don't know how more Senior engineers and managers think""That's really what I hope [the how] these interviews have given you, a window into the minds of tech leads, hiring managers, and CTOs""Over the previous something 60 episodes we've also covered some specific techniques you could put into practice to immediately be seen and treated as more senior by recruiters, hiring managers and teammates""I also hope that if you've taken away nothing else is that your ability to code and create software is only valuable if you're using it to help others or make them more productive""Look past your tools, your editor, your programming language, and whatever framework is popular by the time you are listening to this""It should be the actual goal or result that needs to be achieved, that's what should've kept in your mind""Often the best solution involves no code at all""Thanks for listening, I hope you take your career to the next level, and let me know how it goes"Notes: David Guttman twittertwitter.com/davidguttmanJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Open-source contributionsWorking with workflowsPromoting open-source projectsNetworkingFounder’s mindsetQuotable Quotes:"Getting involved with open-source can definitely make your development more visible" - AP"A lot of the opportunities that I've had in my life often come down to networking, and open-source is no exception to that" – AP "I've always generally been a proponent of just being exposed to lots of different ways to thinking or ways of working, that makes you more adaptable" – AP"That was really kind of the start of it [open-source] for me, just having tools I was building and using myself" – AP "[Canonical advice for getting started on open-source] Find a smallish but still used project, use it, try to use it in something, figure out where the gaps are in either documentation or tests or examples […] and do a small (as small as you can) PR" – DG"[Another approach] Trying to do your own project and see what it's like to sort of packaging all up and trying to have like a very complete but again small project that checks all the boxes" – DG"Go talk to people, go ask" – AP"It doesn't matter how busy a person is if you very genuinely just ask [to connect with them]" – AP"Think about who may be the dream person that you’d want to go to for advice and then just try it" – AP"I think that just about everyone should care about the other parts of the business where you work" – APNotes: Scarfabout.scarf.shAvi Press websiteavi.pressAvi Press twittertwitter.com/avi_pressJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:How to find balance to avoid burning outFinding your career goal as a developerHow to help others and learn while having funQuotable Quotes:"You should be pushing yourself, you should be learning new things" [instead of relying on an employer] - DG"Choose projects that you find fun” [to make your leisure time, your learning time] – DG"I could use that knowledge [how to push myself the right way, how to find motivation..] in helping other people, making them grow as well" - JM"I think I need [to develop] the skills that a CTO, a founder has" [to level up] - JM"With power comes responsibility" - DG"I think that's my biggest fear, to be in the same place [without any advance] for a very long period of time, I mean time is very limited" - JM"My goal is to have some kind of positive impact [...] at least do something meaningful" - JM"The second you are dying, you could say like well I did something great in life, at least my life was useful" – JM"At the end of the day if you are not capable, you probably won't go too far with your mission, that's my main concern" - JM"I think open-source is an amazing place to start [to somehow collaborate with others and help, to learn, to clarify your route]" - JM"Leave the world a bit better than you found it" - JM"My motivation to start in tech was actually to tweak stuff" [on games] - JM"I remember those times [when learned to code as a child] with a smile on my face, it's like you're having so much fun and you're not being pressed by a timeline" - JMNotes: Jose Mendoza's websitejosebmendozam.comJose Mendoza's twittertwitter.com/JoseBMendozaMJs.lajs.laJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Is it a problem if you personal GitHub is not showing a lot of activity? / Is it OK to have a basic portfolio site that has the basics? / How can you show that you are capable? How can you stand out from other people?How do I provide value to a company if I do not currently know all the in demand frameworks?How do you make an employer trust you enough so that they take a chance on hiring you?Quotable Quotes:"You don't need a GitHub that shows lots of activity""When a Hiring Manager is looking at you, you want them to get as good of an idea of what to expect, if you were on the job, as possible""If you have it on display, they [Hiring Managers] don't need to wonder if you are capable of it""You have more control [with a portfolio site] over what you want them [Hiring Managers] to see""You can be as creative as you want, and as distinctive and memorable as you want""The more clearly you show the value that you can bring if somebody hires you, the better""What really matters to a lot of companies is the value that their product, service or platform is providing to their users""Provide to them [companies] the things that help them make more money, save money or save time""One of the things that we are good at as engineers is learning new things, none of us were born knowing React or NodeJs or Vue or anything like that""Prove that you are not gonna cost more trouble than help you're gonna provide""Control that first impression of you [...] Demonstrate that you're capable in solving their problems, saving them time, helping them make more money""As an Engineering Manager what you are worried about more than anything else is that this person won't be able to do the work and in particular that they are going to be more disruptive than they are helpful""You just need to make them [Hiring Managers] very confident that you can come in, do the work that they need done, do the technical work, that you won't require a lot of baby sitting""You won't be distracting the manager a lot with questions or complains or whatever. You are actually capable of taking directions and doing the work, that you are not going to disrupt the rest of the team and that you are gonna be generally a nice person and ideally fun to be around, adding to the culture""One of the worst things that you can do is to get stuck on an issue for too long and not let anyone know""Before you ask any particular question take at least 15 minutes to try whatever you can to solve it and document what you tried and what the responses were""Remember that how you say things matters just as much as what you say"Notes: Junior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:How could you become a successful developerApproaching mistakesChoosing a supportive environmentContributing to open-sourceTechniques to prevent mistakesQuotable Quotes:"Finding what you're great at" [to become successful] – JD"It's not all about just engineering" [but working with people, different teams] – JD"You're gonna fail and you're gonna screw up, sometimes big time" [Junior devs] – JD"From a management point of view, it really shouldn't be about the individual developer who makes the mistake and causes an outage, it should be more about the system that allows it to happen" – DG"Start contributing to open-source and get in some of your patches merged into the main branch and you'll be surprised how many recruiters try to hit you up on LinkedIn" – JD"Finding little tiny things that could be fixed so you get that adrenaline rush" [when starting to contribute to open-source projects] – JD"You gotta understand, maintainers are dealing with so much" [don't take things personal] – JD"You're able to move up because you learn from the past" – JDNotes: First Timers Onlywww.firsttimersonly.comStudy: A Simple Surgery Checklist Saves Livescontent.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1871759,00.htmlJustin Dorfman Websitewww.justindorfman.comJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Importance of networkingCommunicationManaging teamsHow to ask questionsUnderstanding the approachesDaily habitsAccountabilityQuotable Quotes:"I think both of them are essential for people coming out of bootcamps or colleges" [networking and communication] - AH"It's a huge advantage to have a conversation with somebody like that, in an informal setting before you head down the formal path of applying" - DG"Networking isn't about just getting a job, it's about making connections, it's about making meaningful relationships with people" - AH"If I wasn't a tech lead, if I was just an individual contributor, getting contacts, understanding the roles of my team-mates and communicating with my manager would be a primary focus for me" - AH"Focus on the process, on giving people contacts to the process and also being in a constant level of upwards optimization or efficiency" - AH"If you were in a 1 on 1 with me and there's an issue that you wanted to talk about, you have to think about what is the issue, what have I done to try to solve it, who I've talked to, what does the issue do, how does it affect the environment that we're in and is there time limit to this?" - AH"They are never going to get stronger if you keep lifting the weights for them" - DG"The ideal [question] is one that promotes confidence in your understanding about the issue" - AH"State the issue in a comprehensive way and list the things that you've tried in order to figure it out" - AH"Any question that you have is [a good opportunity] to show that you understand what the question actually is" - AH"To see somebody come in with 'everything is good' is not a good sign" - AH"Lead by example" - AH"I like to see developers create a plan for the day and that plan includes all of the different tasks that they are going to do" - AH"Owning your mistakes and learning from them is key" - AH"You just can't get better without making mistakes" - DG"Ask questions until you don't have to ask questions anymore" - AH"Skill does not come from ego, it comes from the work that you put in" - AHNotes: The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forevergoodreads.com/book/show/29342515-the-coaching-habitTime Boxingen.wikipedia.org/wiki/TimeboxingPomodoro methoden.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pomodoro_TechniqueJs.lacontribute.js.la/speakJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Difference between Senior and Junior engineerWays to gain experience quicklyCareer paths10x engineersSetting up the right mindsetQuotable Quotes:"You can have one year of experience five times or you can actually have five years of experience" - ST"The more Junior somebody is, the more obsessed they are with their code following some sort of textbook perfection" - ST"The more Senior people tend to focus on is delivering value" - ST"The real art of engineering, specially in software, is how you respond to those evolving requirements, that's where most of the experience comes from" - ST"Going to a product-focused startup is a really good way to rapidly learn a lot of things" - ST"The actual titles aren't that important, they don't translate that well between different companies" - ST"At some point you become so good that writing the code yourself is a waste of your time" - ST"It doesn't matter how good of an engineer or a coder you are, a team of five people is always going to outcode you no matter what" - ST"Figuring out ways to get the same benefit without building the feature" - DG"Find people who have done that and talk to them" - ST"Having much more the consultant mindset rather than an employee mindset" - DG"If you are a developer, you have a superpower" - DGNotes:Swizec's bloghttps://swizec.com/Swizec's twitterhttps://twitter.com/SwizecSenior mindsethttps://seniormindset.com/So Good They Can’t Ignore You: Why Skills Trump Passion in the Quest for Work You Lovehttps://www.calnewport.com/books/so-good/Junior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Building tools developers useLearning a new codebaseThe viability of open source careersWhat makes a good team memberAvoiding burn outQuotable Quotes:“Every line of code you change is going to have an impact somewhere and it's going to impact someone.” - JS“The amount of knowledge you have...will never define you, it's how you apply it, it’s how you recover from mistakes.” - JS“[How to learn faster] Figuring out what you don't know and knowing how to quickly identify the gaps in your own knowledge.” - JS“I don't mind helping...but I also want to see you putting in the effort yourself to figure it out.” - JS“[Learning new code bases] I fiddle and break things, and then figure out what broke.” - JS“If you're just spending all your time looking at code and thinking about code, you will burn out very quickly.” - JS“The people that I enjoy working with the most take a very humble approach to the code they write.” - JSNotes:James’ Twitter https://twitter.com/jasnell James’ Githubhttps://github.com/jasnellJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Figuring out your career pathLearning to codeWorking in a team settingThe skill of communicatingWhat makes a good engineerQuotable Quotes:“Handoff your code so that somebody else can maintain it.” - GC“I strongly encourage all junior engineers to work in at least a mid-sized to a large-sized company.” - GC“One key skillset an engineer must have is communication.” - GC“The easiest way to do that [align yourself to the priority of the company] is align yourself with the bug priority list.” - GC“You don't want engineers who become complacent, they produce so many bugs.” - GC“That's very important, that you're always learning.” - GC“You should always be assessing yourself.” - GCNotes:Gene’s LinkedInhttps://www.linkedin.com/in/genechuangGene’s Githubhttps://github.com/genechuangGene’s Organizationhttps://www.ctoslackers.comJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io

Talking Points:Code as a means to an endFocusing on the business problemBuilding business valueThe alignment of goals within an organizationNot being afraid to ask stupid questionsQuotable Quotes:“In our culture, we build businesses...we happen to use code most of the time.” - SP“Do you want to succeed or have fun?” - SP“Culture is what you do, not what you say you do.” - SP“Make sure you really understand the problem [that your team is] trying to solve.” - SP“The best people are completely willing to ask stupid questions all the time.” - SP“I think that the biggest mistake of junior engineers is being intimidated [to ask questions].”  - SP“Good [or bad] ideas can come from anywhere [from junior or senior].”  - SPNotes:Seth’s LinkedInlinkedin.com/in/sethpurcellSeth’s Company Siteconstructor.devJunior to Senior Communitycommunity.juniortosenior.io