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Senior Software Engineer is indeed the title for L5 SWE at Google. However, whether a "senior software engineer" title is considered "senior" in a general sense
by moosedev 4y ago
Senior Software Engineer is indeed the title for L5 SWE at Google. However, whether a "senior software engineer" title is considered "senior" in a general sense these days is debatable.
- BFLpL0QNek 4y agoI noticed this. Not Google but I worked at a mid-size US based company briefly last year. The team was junior but senior in titles and highly opinionated, that was why I ended up leaving as nothing was getting done. Not last week I got a bunch of LinkedIn updates saying “Congratulate X being promoted to Senior/Staff/Principal Engineer”. The grads I worked with who were good and what you expect for a grad where getting promoted to senior’s and the seniors who were ok, maybe a little inexperienced were getting promoted to staff. I think roles mean nothing these days. They’re devalued and only exist for people to move up in to the next pay band. What I consider senior from 15-20 years ago is staff engineer now and principal today feels like someone at the top of senior 15-20 years ago.
- mulmen 4y agoThere are a lot more people in the field today so the standards have dropped as is necessary. Principal is top x%, senior is top y%, etc. It's not capability based.
- ummonk 4y agoGiven that L5 is a terminal position, and thus a mark of seniority, the title of “senior” would appear to be the correct title.