I got my first swe job this past August and it honestly has not gone well. I've enjoyed it, but it is clear that I am not seen as reliable and definitely not kn

I got my first swe job this past August and it honestly has not gone well. I've enjoyed it, but it is clear that I am not seen as reliable and definitely not known for completing things fast. Question, why do you think it is? If you're truly objective an honest with yourself, might there be a reason you can think of for this? If so what is it? I would say as a more senior engineer and someone who hires juniors, some of the most frustrating but easy to fix things are as follows: 1. Not asking questions and doing the wrong thing instead. You mentioned it's too late to ask, bullsh!t, it's not too late, start asking now, explain why you're asking, come clean, tell them why you're starting to ask...because you want to improve and help them. If they do spend time answering though, you better either remember or take notes so you don't forget. If this reason isn't good enough, maybe start looking for new team mates, they should be very happy you want to improve. 2. Not communicating, just in general, "I didn't update you because my dog was sick, so I took the dog to the vet, it's ok now, but them my girlfriend was sad so I took her for ice cream", ok cool... but just tell me before disappearing for the day, then it's much less of an issue and I don't have to chase you. 3. Being too slow and not accomplishing things. There's many, maybe infinite reasons why this happens, but just don't be that person, if something is assigned to you, take a deep breath, step back, and plan your path to success. If there is a reason why something isn't achievable, that's cool, go back to point 2. Make sure you communicate it, ask for help. 4. Understand the big picture as best you can, be less fixated on code, problems and solutions. Be more focused on solving issues the team is facing. If you're just focused on tasks, you're likely to produce solutions which might not be ideal and properly contribute to the overall success of the team. 5. Not being reliable, honestly, you might just have to sacrifice sometimes, I think it's part of learning and being a junior, but it will be part of being a senior too. If you committed to doing something, just make sure you do it. If you've accepted a meeting invite, make sure you're there. It's basic stuff, just do it. Be disciplined. Should I be writing reminders to myself to always double check everything? Should I write down the steps to every process? Yes, you should be doing that, surgeons and pilots use checklists, you should be too and you should be documenting things, the whole team should have visibility into this documentation. The next time a junior comes along, you can become a mid-level, because you've made yourself somewhat redundant by documenting the things they will need to know. Last thing I want to say is, no one is perfect, we're all learning. I'm not perfect, you're colleagues aren't perfect, you will never be perfect, we're all students, we all have things to learn, and we're always going to make mistakes...at least from what I've been told :) Hope it helps.