Google distinguished engineer reddit.

Google distinguished engineer reddit Probably for the better half of 10 years. Principal Engineers, the Level 8s, are associated with a major product or piece of infrastructure. Solution architects I've worked with are much more focused on customer interaction and rarely interact with product unless there's a new feature a customer needs in order to close a deal. One of my interview rounds was conducted by a May 24, 2024 · As a Distinguished Engineer (L9) at Google, you occupy a highly prestigious position equivalent to a Senior Director. Anyway I've been a senior software engineer for awhile. I wonder usne google main 1 saal main kaunsa system design kr diya 😂😂 . jr/associate: Fairly obvious. Mainly: the environment that engineer is placed in. I'm a software engineer at a relatively small fintech, and we've been trying to hire a Principal engineer to help us with some of our funkier apps as well as general tech vision. We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us. Undergrad Comp Sci -> Engineer -> Senior Engineer -> Architect -> Director Engineering -> VP Engineering -> CTO -> Operating Principal at PE firm (CTO to CTOs) Added an MBA and a Masters in Comp Sci during my career. 325k+ depending on bonus and stock. That's with no negotiation at all. 146 votes, 125 comments. As of 2023, Acharya held the title of Distinguished Engineer at Google. Why I don't like Google:-I hate being trapped in the open office for 8 hours a day. Today, In 2024, I’m a Software Engineering Manager at Google in California. A principal engineer guides probably about double that in technical direction/leadership. Quoting from the article below. The big yellow bank has recently completed a restructuring of its engineering job profiles. associate engineer -> engineer-> senior engineer -> staff engineer-> senior staff engineer-> principal engineer. Then a chunk of other high paying publicly traded companies with like 0. Google or Meta will swing 300k. What roles do SWEs that are 7-15 years in see? https://www. It’s an old company with a very strict, traditional compensation structure that isn’t made with devs/engineers in mind. Even the most title-happy company only has at most 8 levels of software engineer, and the top levels (distinguished, fellow etc) aren't expected to be part of a normal career track. 🦉 Advice: Pursue the most impactful projects and navigate the company to make them happen. Above senior, there's no single right way to progress (into staff, principal, distinguished engineer, etc). So if you look at it individidually it can go either way. levels. Because people are human and software engineering does pay pretty well. View more Software Engineer salary ranges with breakdowns by base, stock, and bonus amounts. Recently, the guidelines have been revised so that L4 is now considered a terminal level. Some background on me first: Work for a so-called "Big Four" in Seattle, hired directly out of college at new grad level, promoted every year there (Four times), currently a Senior Software Engineer, annual comp around $180k, always hit maximum bonus and maximum stock targets, have Anurag Acharya is an Indian-American engineer known for co-founding Google Scholar, [1] of which he has been described as the "key inventor". The only exception might be if you are coming from another Big4 or Unicorn and are already at a higher level. Stack ranking does apply to even a Distinguished Engineer however the allocation enforcement might not be as bad as lower levels but that can always change. Reply reply Top 1% Rank by size CSCareerQuestions protests in solidarity with the developers who made third party reddit apps. An engineer will be stuck on something for 2 days, brings it up, the manager looks at the code and tells him what is wrong in about 10 seconds and all that through screen share. I wonder if whoever disclosed these figures gave post-tax numbers or something because We would like to show you a description here but the site won’t allow us. That is a common mistake I see on these subs all the time. Seeing the same people. Dumb idea to have 2 separate designs for identical phones just because of the size difference. ) 900k for a lead ML scientist in a HCOL area at a FAANNG? I was really into physics and the universe. Nice write up, though in my experience you're describing a mix of solutions architect and principal/chief architect. Senior engineer is terminal because they are still an IC and can be trusted to successfully execute with little guidance. - Eventually, the scope at Google would be larger than the scope at Home Depot and would be more technically oriented as opposed to Home Depot. Apply to Engineer, Customer Engineer, Security Engineer and more! If a company has both senior and lead, then senior is probably more of an intermediate role where the SWE is expected to be independent but not necessarily leading any team level projects. Distinguished Engineers, the Level 9s, are spoken of with reverence. Feb 14, 2025 · So, I recently interviewed for an L5 SWE position at Google and something kinda unexpected happened. Entry level. For anything funny related to programming and software development. [1] Previously a Microsoft Technical Fellow, PowerShell Chief Architect, and the Chief Architect for Windows Server and the Azure Infrastructure and Management group which includes Azure Stack, [2] System Center and Operations Management Suite. 4K votes, 507 comments. There is no universal definition of Staff Engineer, Lead Engineer, Senior Engineer, Engineering Manager, Engineer 1, Engineer 2, Engineer 3, or even Intern. I've run quite a number of coding interviews over the past couple of weeks. I've been taking a sabbatical and making advice videos on YouTube for fun while I chill. Jeffrey Snover is a Distinguished Engineer at Google. We are all bachelors. Probably less then 5% make it to distinguished and less than 1% fellow, if your company is large enough to offer them. To become a Google Fellow, a Level 10, is to win an honor that will follow you for life. I am positive that it is for the better. They basically print money. 127 - 230K for a VR engineer seems to be a very lowball estimate, since that's a really niche field without too many "cheap talent" (like say, web dev). Generally people who are top of industry e. I spent good 1 year at amazon as sde-2 (6+ yoe) and what I did mostly was some unit and integrations tests and fixing code pipelines 🤐🤐. Lead ML Engineer in Ohio, 155k (214k TC). A staff engineers function is to ensure over arching designs, standards and processes are followed and contribute to whatever the higher level goal of the company is. spread across relatively few people. The 5 Tech Giants (Google, Apple, Meta, Amazon, Microsoft) collectively employ well over 150k+ engineers in the US. g. So, I recently interviewed for an L5 SWE position at Google and something kinda unexpected happened. 5mil/year It sounds unsustainable but Google can EASILY afford it. If you question whether there is such a big difference in what Google hires and the average new grad CS major, just know that the baseline offer for a new grad Google Software Engineer is about 165k a year all-in. 3. Google Drive or JPMorgan COIN. It's interesting that L4 is now a terminal level at Google because Amazon has traditionally been that way. I’ve worked at early and late stage startups and large companies like Cisco, Oracle, Yahoo, and Google. You’re average middle of the crop meta engineer makes 200-300 TC depending on area which pretty standard among the industry, so nothing crazy. Insanely smart people. E. There are well defined promotion levels for ICs. Staff engineers work across multiple teams (20-50 engineers). hahahah i saw this guy passed in 2022 placed in google and selling DSA and system design course on linkedin . But making ~$100k (average software engineer salary in the US) and then being told a small but real number of engineers make 50-100 times that can be a rare humbling/humiliating feeling after being proud for so long for what they make. May 24, 2024 · Moreover, Level 8 software engineers at Google earn an average salary of $ 273,700 yearly. 5-4k+ engineers in the US on payroll. Shaw in India. Yep one of my managers. there's also the architect track, which is similar to the engineer track where titles are concerned but usually comes with a higher salary. QA Engineer: Usually someone involved in testing (though sometimes QA refers to making sure the paperwork is correct) Software Engineer in Test (SDET): Similar to a QA Engineer, but with a focus on test automation and the creation of test frameworks. To me, engineers build things, and scientists study things. I interviewed and collected stories from engineering VPs, directors, managers, and other leaders at today's top software companies: established, household names like Google, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn; rapidly growing mid-sized companies like Dropbox, Square, Box, Airbnb, and Etsy; and startups like Reddit, Stripe, Instagram, and Lyft. Past that it’s really difficult as a developer to get promoted but you make over $1m a year, but you’re leading hundreds of other engineers and dozens of teams. Overall goal is to keep the engineers functioning smoothly and producing high quality output. Hank joined Google in 2020, where he is a Distinguished Engineer and co-leader (with David Culler) of SystemsResearch@Google. Principals are quite high equivalent to a senior CSCareerQuestions protests in solidarity with the developers who made third party reddit apps. I've seen companies where Staff === single team tech lead and others were Staff === org level tech lead, but typically a senior staff or principal engineer operates at the organization level and reports into a Senior Manager / Director of Engineering rather than There isn't going to be a 'typical' project, but you can assume its going to be a major revenue generator for whichever company you're working for, ex. I know exactly why. This is what he has shared: In 2001, I started my career as a software engineer at D. I know a web dev he got 3400€ and another got 2700€, neither engineers. fyi probably does the best job of visualizing the hierarchy and comparing the roles across companies. However I think I may want to look into becoming a Principal Engineer/Architect or a Distinguished Engineer/Architect. DM for more info. Level 9 – Distinguished Software Engineer Like level 8, the software engineers at level 9 are primarily responsible for creating effective technical strategies. -My coworkers are workaholics. - I would presumably get premier technical mentorship at Google and would access to the whole engineering-oriented culture of SV/the Bay Area which Atlanta and Home Depot cannot offer. A QA Engineer may be a programmer or a manual tester. At or around the Cxx level, you will find all sorts of roles . And agian, just being your standard SE or even a senior level one isn't going to be enough to net you that 1m+ comp package, you're taking lead SE, who helped build the project and has made him/herself as The median total compensation package for a L9 at Google is $2,276,030. I wrote a paper on quantum computing in high school. 30+ years experience. A leaked Amazon document reviewed by Insider offers rare insight into how much recruiters at Amazon are authorized to offer programmers and product managers to win them over — with the document showing that for some higher-level roles, the total compensation package can go as high as $715,400. When I look for the deepest thing inside me that makes me an engineer it's that my drive is to find patterns and connections amongst very large systems/projects. It's total comp. 59 & 60 - Software Engineer 61 & 62 - Software Engineer 2 63 & 64 - Senior Software Engineer 65, 66 & 67 - Principal Software Engineer 68+ - Partner, Distinguished Engineer, and Technical Fellow The management chain follows the same rungs, but (in nearly all cases) starts at 63 minimum. Allen School of Computer Science & Engineering at University of Washington (on leave). 61 votes, 40 comments. Distinguished Engineer (L9 at Pinterest): 🏋‍♀️ Skill: Combine strong business acumen with technical expertise to lead large, impactful projects. L5 at Google is a management-level position, so from that level on up, the qualifications become less centered on technical experience (which, yes, you do need) and more on your ability to lead increasingly large teams of engineers. Leadership is most important, being a reliable interface between higher ups and the teams. -Smart people. A Distinguished Engineer would mainly come in as a technical architect and an individual contributor. At Google, 6 years was about the norm for L5 assuming there was space available. Instead, I'll just focus on the (significant) differences: Culture is more pragmatic (and a bit less cohesive) than Google, but more consistent than Amazon. At my level as a senior myself and another peer guide ~25 engineers in technical direction. He is also Professor and Wissner-Slivka Chair in the Paul G. Turned down two positions for 165k and 175k, mostly because they'd require me to work at inconvenient locations (on a base in a classified environment. I have the best job. However at very senior levels, engineers are often not really doing engineering work in any hands-on way. I work across a portfolio of >70 companies that we own. Yep, friend of mine is a network engineer (or something along those lines, I’m not 100% sure, all I know he’s damn good at it) for a power utility company. (105k base, 15% target bonus, 250 RSU w/ 4 year vest, + 15k signing bonus). Staff engineers take forever to get to since that’s pretty much the top and quant is extremely competitive due to the nature of the work. You can almost bet someone who has spent 2 years at Amazon has delivered more and has had more impact than an engineer at another top tech company. Distinguished Engineers and Fellows clear 300-450, higher for fellows (but hardly any roles) Facebook is pretty closely patterned after Google, and could probably best be thought of as a younger, smaller Google, so most of what I wrote above about Google can be applied to FB. Senior engineers are top notch and paid well. All of this is seconhand knowledge so take it with a grain of salt. true. For me, a distinguished engineer just means self motivated, self disciplined, and with an engineer mind set. For Employers USD / yr Change Just gonna repost my answer from when this one was last asked, as some people seemed to find it fairly helpful. [3] The google pixel engineers should be the ones feeling bad about designing an ugly ass phone. fyi. 4M subscribers in the ProgrammerHumor community. I'd recommend reading about staff archetypes and some case studies on folks who've made it above senior. One of my interview rounds was conducted by a Distinguished Engineer (L9)! I was already nervous enough for the interview, but this just ramped up the anxiety tenfold. So, inevitably, you will top out at some title level where you're probably not going to be promoted again. The levels comparer on levels. We received organizational announcement on two new distinguished engineers joining the ADAS software org. I'm a staff level engineer and currently the tech lead of a group of 40 engineers across 6 teams. The most senior engineers at meta were getting over 1. reddit's new API changes kill third party apps that offer accessibility features, mod tools, and other features not found in the first party app. For most engineers, I would guess 75% end with 'senior engineer' as their terminal position. . Dhirendra Sinha: Software engineering manager at google. Also it's shameful to have a chin and a notch. Charter/Spectrum has Principal Engineer IIIs over 300 at TC, Comcast and Verizon have similar titles and comp - view Colorado job listings, and look at bonus + rsus. [2] He and his Google colleague Alex Verstak co-founded Google Scholar in 2004. Recommended entry salary here, by union, for computer engineer is around 3700-3900€. As a senior software engineer I've already lead many large projects. Principal Architects make 250k+ at most SPs. com. Google leveling is very conservative. You can weigh the most motivated engineer down with, for example, lots of process (“everything needs a ticket, and that ticket needs to go through these processes that take 1-3 calendar weeks”) and suddenly that amazing engineer is not so amazing anymore. 7-15 years of external experience are typically leveled as L4 - L5. Sufficient tenure is required to reach the highest levels. This is the first time that I encounter this title (distinguished). Do you know their level as individual contributers? Can we get to this level by internal promotions or we must come from a fancy silicon valley company to earn this title? Why I like Google:-Free food -Everyone thinks I'm smart -Perks I don't use -On the weekends, we blow so much cash going out and getting drunk. I'm not anywhere close to being a senior engineer but the near-FAANG company I work at has salaries for positions wildly higher than the ones listed here. You are responsible for setting technical direction and strategies that broadly impact Google’s technology and products. I got 3200€ during my 6month probation as embedded engineer. As for your timescale question : "average engineers do NOT make it to higher positions" Reddit iOS Reddit Android Reddit Premium About Reddit TIL The Engineer from TF2 is a far better example of an engineer than the "distinguished" ex-Google engineer. I spent 30 years working in industry, including research, Microsoft, Amazon, Google, Oracle, etc. Apr 10, 2025 · The estimated total pay range for a Distinguished Software Engineer at Google is $469K–$772K per year, which includes base salary and additional pay. the highest salary engineering position, networking or otherwise, in many corps is "distinguished" or "senior principal" and they generally make as much as VP and SVP level management. 304 Google Distinguished Engineer Reddit jobs available on Indeed. Distinguished and fellows roughly equate to directors or executive directors. Know firsthand knowledge. 9. Maybe another 20%, as principal/staff/lead. Amazon has a culture problem but anyone who has survived at Amazon more than 2 years is generally a very capable and solid engineer. Staff engineers and high level quant engineers. The biggest thing you're missing is roles with the same name have different levels of responsibility between the companies. 63 & 64 - Senior Software Engineering Manager Title: Software Engineer Location: Madison, WI Salary: $95,000 Relocation/Signing Bonus: $15,000 signon Stock: None Total Comp: $110k year one, $95k then on I originally applied for Google's Engineering Residency, but was told to interview for full time SWE. Principal engineers set the vision for their entire organization (100-400 engineers). I really want to lead bigger projects and initiatives. The average Distinguished Software Engineer base salary at Google is $269K per year. hhun tyuvdy yhjv ihsww dxl jgk vuqq dxvuw aviz udpqtf kyzyf jpeyv wgnxrr cwyhv avjbn