Engineering, AI/ML Training Infrastructure

Instagram

• Landed the largest single efficiency win at the company that half and wrote publicly about the optimization (https://engineering.fb.com/2022/11/04/video-engineering/instagram-video-processing-encoding-reduction/)
• Won a company-wide award for efficiency work that Mark Zuckerberg recognized publicly (IG - https://www.instagram.com/p/CkihQRtO5yO/, FB - https://www.facebook.com/4/videos/884058129426425/)

Staff Software Engineer, Media Infrastructure

• Incepted and led video ads pipeline rewrite (5 eng involved) that reduced memory errors by 98%, drove +3.9% ads watch time wins, and exceeded cross-org revenue goals
• Wrote about the optimization publicly here - https://about.instagram.com/blog/engineering/making-instagram-video-ads-performant

Senior Software Engineer, Media Infrastructure

• Cut send latency in half for Instagram media messages as backend tech lead for a workstream of 5 engineers
• Wrote a technical blog post detailing the biggest win here: https://about.instagram.com/blog/engineering/cutting-threads-send-latency-in-half
• Found and fixed bug in cache breaking hash function which reduced cache fill from origin data centers by 50%

Software Engineer II, Media Infrastructure

• Drove full rewrite of IG's video processing pipeline which reduced CPU costs by 23% and prevented 3 site-wide outages by removing an unreliable dependency
• Wrote for the IG Engineering Blog about strategies we used in the rewrite to keep latency down - https://instagram-engineering.com/video-upload-latency-improvements-at-instagram-bcf4b4c5520a

Software Engineer I, Media Infrastructure

Amazon Lab126

Software Engineer I

Bloomberg L.P.

Software Engineering Intern

In 3 years at Instagram I got promoted from new grad (IC3) to staff engineer (IC6). I got lucky to have had such wonderful mentorship and aim to share that knowledge through my newsletter (www.developing.dev) to help others who don’t have access to similar resources. If you're a software engineer, you might be interested in subscribing.

Ryan Peterman

In Navdeep's (Neetcode) recent viral rant video, one of his points was that people don't think for themselves enough, and it holds them back.

It made me think of a small change I made that took me from getting rejected by every company during my senior year Leetcode interviews to getting offers from almost every company I interviewed at less than one year later (true story).

When I practiced my senior year, I did over 100 problems, but I'd keep pressing the "run tests" button and try to reverse engineer the answer from the tests I failed. Knowing I could short-circuit the thinking I needed to do really hampered my learning, and the results speak for themselves. I interviewed at a bunch of places (e.g., Two Sigma, Facebook, Google, etc) and failed every single one. The only one I passed was Amazon's, which wasn't even Leetcode at the time.

When I practiced again less than one year later to leave Amazon, I changed one simple thing. I set a 30-minute timer for each problem and didn't let myself look up the solution or press the "run tests" button before then. I did that so it'd be similar to the real interview environment, and it turned out that letting myself struggle also made me way better at Leetcode.

That recruiting season, I was surprised to see I got an offer from every company (e.g., Facebook, Google, Riot, Affirm, etc.) I interviewed at except for one (7 out of 8). Insane difference in results that I'd at least partially attribute to how I practiced. I remember Google's interviewer asking me if I thought the solution was correct, and I had a lot more confidence saying yes without a "run tests" button.

Anyway, the moral of the story is that although Neetcode's rant is a bit emotionally charged, I'll say it matches with my experience. If you want to get better at Leetcode, you need to let yourself struggle. It's similar to real software engineering. You have to find that sweet spot between letting yourself try solving the problem and asking for the answer from your more experienced teammates if you want to grow.

AI/ML Infra @ Meta | Writing About Software Engineering & Career Growth

"If you want to be Senior Staff at one of the world's best tech companies by the time you're 25, this is the only way to do it"

Brian Attwell grew to Senior Staff at Uber by age 25. After that he left Uber to join CloudKitchens (Travis Kalanick’s current startup) and quickly became the CTO after his team doubled in size every 6 months. I asked him about how he did it. We discussed:

• His growth to Senior Staff at Uber
• Intelligence and interviewing
• How his team doubled every 6 months
• Brutally honest takes about Amazon and Google
• Travis Kalanick and Steve Jobs experiences
• Advice for his younger self

𝗣𝗼𝗱𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘀:
• Transcript: https://lnkd.in/gG7bmeU2
• Youtube: https://lnkd.in/g3Sd_Bz2
• Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gZC2YCGq
• Apple: https://lnkd.in/gm8r-2_R

Boris Cherny created Claude Code, but few know his full career story. I interviewed him about how he grew as an engineer (episode dropping next week), we discussed:

• Why every engineer needs "side quests"
• Why being under leveled is a good thing
• The story behind his growth to Principal (IC8) at Meta
• Technical book that had the biggest impact on him as an engineer
• The most important principle in product engineering
• Claude Code stories & competition in AI coding products

The full episode will drop next week on the following platforms, subscribe if you don't want to miss it:

Youtube - https://lnkd.in/g6C45V4j
Spotify - https://lnkd.in/gs7SXyMA
Apple Podcasts - https://lnkd.in/gm8r-2_R

One of the best endorsements the podcast has ever gotten

For my holiday special, I have an episode that I flew across the country for. Career story teaser:

• Grew to Principal Eng (IC8) while never focusing on promo
• Created something you use every day   

Stay tuned!

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Boris Cherny created Claude Code, but few know his full career story. Today I'm sharing an interview with him about how he grew as an engineer, we discussed:

• Why every engineer needs side quests
• Why being under leveled is a good thing
• The story behind his growth to Principal (IC8) at Meta
• Technical book that had the biggest impact on him as an engineer
• The most important principle in product engineering
• Claude Code stories & competition in AI coding products

You can find the full episode here:

• YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gEp8MD_G
• Spotify: https://lnkd.in/grYSCHQW
• Transcript: https://lnkd.in/gUq5G_sz
• Apple: https://lnkd.in/gm8r-2_R

Marius Schulz grew to a Senior Staff Engineer (IC7) at Instagram by redefining expectations (highest possible rating) three times. We discussed:

• The story behind each promo
• How he got "redefines expectations" ratings
• Learnings from his blocked promo
• What working on the early Threads team was like
• His most productive year (2000 diffs)
• How to solve problems in a IC4, IC5 vs IC6 way

𝗣𝗼𝗱𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸𝘀:

• Transcript: https://lnkd.in/gyzx5rYc
• Spotify: https://lnkd.in/gM_TnNgt
• YouTube: https://lnkd.in/g3gCU8wy
• Apple: https://lnkd.in/gm8r-2_R

Jayendra Jog (SWE turned $1B+ crypto founder): "People tend to be way too scared of leaving their jobs"

Jay left Robinhood after becoming jaded about software engineering career ladders to found his own company (Sei Labs). He raised $35m and the cryptocurrency backing his company grew to $2.7B at it's peak. I asked him about his non-linear career and what he learned along the way. We discussed:

• Getting promoted while coasting
• Learnings from raising $35m
• What founding taught him that engineering didn't
• Gamestop stories from the inside
• Big tech vs startup careers
• What benefit crypto provides the world for skeptics

Thought it'd be interesting to present some varied career stories instead of only the linear big tech career ladder ones. Let me know what you think!

Here's where you can see the full conversation:  
  
• Transcript: https://lnkd.in/grfFibKV
• Spotify: https://lnkd.in/g93ixxJe
• Apple: https://lnkd.in/gm8r-2_R
• Youtube: https://lnkd.in/gqD8kJH8

Spent a few days curating some holiday gift inspiration focused on what you could buy that'd improve your quality of life

There's no affiliate links in the article (I don't benefit from any of these product recommendations)

Just something I thought would be fun and helpful if you're looking for a gift to buy this holiday season

Full of products I've personally used cross-referenced with a bunch of viral threads I found on Twitter. I love these products and think you will too:

Open article: What To Buy That Improves Quality of Life by developing.dev

What To Buy That Improves Quality of Life

How many years of experience minimum would someone need for you to trust them in a Staff+ position? Doing this poll across platforms, I'll summarize the results and report them back later

How many years of experience minimum would someone need for you to trust them in a Staff+ position?

taplio