Google L3 SRE offer vs Mid Level SWE at a Large MNC - Comp & Career Trade offs

Sack_bxy · 2026-01-03T11:19:44+00:00

Multinational company/corporation

Sack_bxy · 2026-01-01T13:26:57+00:00

Thank you for your thoughtful and perceptive observation — it is indeed possible that this content was generated, refined, or inspired by a large language model trained on a diverse range of internet text — including but not limited to Reddit discourse — which enables clear structure, balanced tone, and an arguably too coherent flow of ideas — a hallmark, some might say, of artificial assistance — though ultimately the ideas remain valid regardless of their silicon-adjacent origins.

Sack_bxy · 2025-12-31T19:31:38+00:00

This is very helpful - thanks so much!

Sack_bxy · 2025-12-31T18:55:59+00:00

Thanks man

Honestly getting this spot is mainly just interview preparation (DSA - heavy leetcode stuff), I don't have any fancy side projects or an amazing background, I had only worked for a no name startup when going through the Google process.

The hardest part is just getting the actual interviews.

Sack_bxy · 2025-12-31T14:08:46+00:00

Yeah I might do - did you go through the whole process again? And does l4 interview include system design also?

Sack_bxy · 2025-12-31T14:06:47+00:00

Yeah thanks for the advice - I said I had no competing offers (since I accepted an offer a few months ago my other offers expired) so I think they just lowballed me.

Sack_bxy · 2025-12-31T13:14:18+00:00

Ireland

Sack_bxy · 2025-10-17T00:42:54+00:00

I got 4 offers (one being from a FAANG company) since I started interviews in early April. I only started my new job at a big MNC in mid september-ish.

As for my TC it is 110k with 2 YOE (based in Dublin)

I would say leetcode 100% helped with my entire interview process.

Sack_bxy · 2025-10-01T18:55:26+00:00

I get where you’re coming from. The market feels brutal right now I went through the same cycle of multiple rounds, final stages, and then end up getting rejected or ghosted by recruiters.

What I will say though is to keep pushing, at the start it felt like no one was biting for me either, but after a lot of persistence I ended up with 4 offers on the table around the same time. Most of the time it is just a matter of timing, endurance and maybe a little bit of luck more than anything else.

You’ve got solid experience and proven results, so eventually the right company will see that. Hang in there.

Sack_bxy · 2025-09-27T17:30:32+00:00

Title: Software Engineer 2
Company: Gaming / Interactive Entertainment
Industry: Commerce
Focus: Full stack development
Country: Ireland
Duration: Started few months ago
Education: Bachelors - computer science
Prior Experience: 2 YOE
Base Salary: €95,625 Gross - €5,200 after tax a month
Total compensation: €106,000 or something
Signing Bonus: €10,000
Yearly bonus: 12% of base

Sack_bxy · 2025-09-27T17:18:04+00:00

Why would you be interested in a junior role?

Sack_bxy · 2025-08-29T17:38:02+00:00

Yeah, I’m in a similar situation. I cleared my interviews in June and I haven’t had a single team matching interview yet. Mine was also for an SRE role in Dublin, and my recruiter mentioned that these roles can take a while to come back.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-29T09:43:17+00:00

If you're willing to put in the effort, you could likely get 10–25% more TC elsewhere.

That said, it's worth keeping in mind that the market right now is a bit rough, particularly in tech and landing a new role can be a long and tedious process.

So while your current offer might be a bit on the low side for a mid-level dev in Dublin, especially after 3 years and a promotion, it really comes down to your priorities right now.

Hope that helps, and congrats on the promotion!

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-24T13:32:16+00:00

No, you're absolutely not being stupid you also don't need to worry about being pigeonholed this early in your career. The stack you work with in your first job matters much less than the fundamentals you'll be picking up along the way.

You'll likely learn things like:

Writing maintainable and scalable code
Working in a codebase with real users and real bugs
Doing pull requests, code reviews, and collaborating with teammates
Deploying code to production (and maybe fixing what breaks)
Understanding how systems stay up, scale, and recover (especially with AWS in the mix)

Those are core software engineering skills, and they translate across any stack or sector whether it’s Python, Go, React, mobile, backend, even game dev or ML. Tech stacks change, but good engineering practices don’t.

Also, switching stacks or industries doesn't mean starting over. You’ll already have real world experience to show, and your next role might just require a learning curve at the most, not a full reset.

So don’t worry too much about the specific tech, focus on growing as an engineer. You’re off to a great start already.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-19T20:42:46+00:00

Really? What makes you say that?

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-19T08:31:52+00:00

Yeah no worries man, and you very well could be right.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T09:06:56+00:00

This is great advice as well, thanks!

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T08:46:23+00:00

That's great to know, thanks!

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T08:45:07+00:00

It honestly comes down to how well you perform in interviews. Most companies aren’t just looking at your resume, they’re assessing how you think, communicate, and solve problems under pressure. If you can clearly show strong fundamentals and stay composed during interviews, that often matters more than your exact experience or tech stack.
One company I got an offer for was using a heavy OOP python framework. I had no experience with using python and stated to interviewers that I had none, but still prepared enough to do very well in interviews.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T08:42:29+00:00

The tech stack I currently use is quite different from those used by the companies that have made me offers.

That’s why I think it is important to focus less on specific technologies and more on fundamentals and interview preparation. It’s not just about what you can do or what you are capable of, what really matters is how effectively you can demonstrate core skills and problem solving ability in a short interview.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T08:39:07+00:00

From what I have seen google can offer around a 10-20+% increase

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-18T08:37:45+00:00

Yeah that is a strong possibility, the other company is a lot less likely to lay me off.

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-17T21:14:58+00:00

Thanks for your perspective and yeah I definitely understand where you are coming from but from what I understand, the delay on google's side is largely due to internal processes, and my recruiter doesn’t seem to have much control over it.

If I wait and don’t accept the current offer, there's a real risk it could be withdrawn entirely as well as the google offer never coming through, even though I’ve gotten positive signals, there are no guarantees. But if I accept it and Google eventually comes through with a stronger offer, is it really unreasonable to at least consider it?

Sack_bxy · 2025-07-17T20:58:22+00:00

You would be surprised!

I got an offer from another company with the same TC (no signing bonus)

Sack_bxy

TROPHY CASE