4 ms·

We hired someone like this last year who was a lead in the last role at a small firm, had senior titles over a couple roles prior. This person is smart and wel

We hired someone like this last year who was a lead in the last role at a small firm, had senior titles over a couple roles prior. This person is smart and well-liked and called out their concerns early on, so we're working with them and have seen considerable improvement in the half-year since they were hired. So I'd say it really comes down to your environment. If you have a good, supportive culture, I would have a frank discussion with your supervisor. Either you'll find out you're doing better than expected (and it is imposter syndrome like some are saying), or you'll have a path for improvement and a supervisor who is appreciative of the self-awareness and desire to improve. At the end of the day, an experienced manager will be aware of this type of situation, that there's a wide berth of quality when it comes to software firms, and an engineer typically will only be as good as the teams they've worked with.

ipaddr 6y ago
We had a similiar issues where a senior employee came and interviewed great. She ended up becoming a pm. At another place something similiar happened and she ended up as a pm / developer. I think pm move is a great idea for someone who can sell but maybe isn't as strong. Perhaps moving to pm is a good answer for thread poster.
- brandall10 6y ago
  My attitude about this is, if it's not really the person's fault (ie. learning bad dev hygiene from bad teams) and they want to continue as an engineer then they should make an attempt. There are of course people who at the end of the day just don't have a knack for this stuff, and in that case, I certainly agree.
dntrkv 6y ago
> So I'd say it really comes down to your environment. If you have a good, supportive culture, I would have a frank discussion with your supervisor This is key. At one of my first, real software jobs as a self-taught dev, I realized just how terrible my code was. It was a small company and the CTO would review all of my code. Sending PRs for the first 6 months or so was excruciating for me. I would just sit there and wait to hear him call me over to his desk and begin asking questions about what the fuck my code is doing. But he kept at it, and by the end of the first year, I finally felt like I knew what I was doing. I still had a ton of doubts in my abilities, but I wasn't embarrassed about having my code reviewed. I stayed at the company for 3 years and afterwards jumped to a major tech company. Up until that job, I generally worked by myself and never received much input from others. I'm guessing OP is in a similar boat.

ipaddr 6y ago

We had a similiar issues where a senior employee came and interviewed great. She ended up becoming a pm. At another place something similiar happened and she ended up as a pm / developer. I think pm move is a great idea for someone who can sell but maybe isn't as strong. Perhaps moving to pm is a good answer for thread poster.

brandall10 6y ago
My attitude about this is, if it's not really the person's fault (ie. learning bad dev hygiene from bad teams) and they want to continue as an engineer then they should make an attempt. There are of course people who at the end of the day just don't have a knack for this stuff, and in that case, I certainly agree.

dntrkv 6y ago

> So I'd say it really comes down to your environment. If you have a good, supportive culture, I would have a frank discussion with your supervisor This is key. At one of my first, real software jobs as a self-taught dev, I realized just how terrible my code was. It was a small company and the CTO would review all of my code. Sending PRs for the first 6 months or so was excruciating for me. I would just sit there and wait to hear him call me over to his desk and begin asking questions about what the fuck my code is doing. But he kept at it, and by the end of the first year, I finally felt like I knew what I was doing. I still had a ton of doubts in my abilities, but I wasn't embarrassed about having my code reviewed. I stayed at the company for 3 years and afterwards jumped to a major tech company. Up until that job, I generally worked by myself and never received much input from others. I'm guessing OP is in a similar boat.