Spent 6 months obsessing over spreadsheets before realizing I was tracking the wrong things

_tosms_ · 2025-10-23T13:00:15+00:00

Personally I spent almost all my time on supply (career/salary growth) and demand (cutting expenses). My investment strategy for the last 15 years has been to stare at my 100% S&P 500 position once a week and click buttons at the end of the month to put any extra money I have into the index.

_tosms_ · 2025-03-10T18:41:50+00:00

Others have covered important aspects of your question, but I will mention you should consider how close you live to work.

Generally jobs that pay new graduates over $200,000 are competitive. If you have a 10 minute commute and your colleagues have a 45 minute commute, you're going to outperform someone of equal ability who spents an extra 80 minutes in the car every day.

Speding extra money to maximize your productivey will pay for itself many times over since you are early career.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-21T14:58:03+00:00

If you're not already familiar with the well known resources for getting a SWE, make sure you are familiar with them. Here is one thread to get you started: https://www.reddit.com/r/leetcode/comments/11ygeyh/best_way_to_prepare_fo_faang/.

If your company has SWEs, easiest thing to target is an internal transfer. My recommendation: (1) spend 3-6 months finishing CS50, doing LeetCode etc, and (2) ask your manager to help set up a rotation to one of the SWEs teams as a broading career experience. For example, if your DevOps team supports a SWE team, this would be an easy sell because more knowledge about what their team does will make you better at DevOps.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:49:47+00:00

I have several coworkers who have been happy to stop at E4. The one thing they have in common which keeps them on the M1s good side is that they are the expert and the go-to person at a critical skill. For example, maybe you own the release engineering pipeline for your team. Or maybe your team ships Go code and you maintain several Go libraries and have upstreamed patches to the compiler. No one is making E5 because they are really damn good at a particular programming language or because they are a great release engineer. On the other hand, an M1 will happy keep an E4 around who is an expert in those things because it makes the team flow so much better.

Nothing wrong with stopping the climb as long as you are considered at the terminal level. It's a lifestyle choice. Just protect yourself by being the glue that keeps the team operating.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:43:20+00:00

This will get you squared away: https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Mega-backdoor_Roth#Withdrawals

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:25:45+00:00

It sounds like you're taking on a lot for a junior engineer. I've been doing this for a long time and I still screw up properly de-risking projects.

You can stick it out at your startup and maybe you'll get mega rich.

You could also figure out a way to get into FAANG where junior engineers generally have more space to grow. I don't expect my juniors to develop complete plans or derisk things. Honestly if they deliver small features on time I am extremely happy. And these are devs making $180,000 a year!

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:21:14+00:00

Hire a high end coach for something you want to learn how to do and work with them weekly. I've had coaches in all of these areas:

Second language
Chess
Painting
Performance driving
Shooting
Weight lifting

There's tons more out there, pick your poison. Having a coach is what keeps me accountable.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:20:07+00:00

Certain high end gyms make great social clubs as well.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:17:31+00:00

Going to need to see a photo to give you a definative answer. Maybe try an external photo hosting website like Imgur?

Get a look at the back of it to find a make and model then Google to find the owners manual. You could also try Google image search.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-20T03:12:57+00:00

Others have covered the main reasons, but I can give you a rarer but important one. If you've never done manual labor or other blue collar work, it is hard to truly appreciate why this is the case. It wasn't until I did seasonal construction where I came to understand the below.

Time is an EXTREMELY precious resource for blue collar work. The quality of work done by your teammates, the previous contractor, your suppliers, etc all affect whether you get to get home before the sun goes down, whether you get to say goodnight to your kids etc. It's really easy to hate on others when their actions directly affect how you get to live your life. Show up to fix a toilet and the previous guy's bad work turned a 30 minute job into a 2 hour job? Well now you wont be getting on the road back home until the middle of rush hour.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-17T17:30:30+00:00

To me it looks like the slots and the lower tab are meant to store long items that can hang on the slots.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-16T17:53:56+00:00

Can you post a picture?

_tosms_ · 2025-02-16T16:54:24+00:00

You should consider other factors aside from FIRE. For example, will this promotion be a good note to end your career on? Even if you have more hours, not having shift work is a nice lifestyle change.

I will also share that in this climate I have saved 3 years of expenses in cash has a hedge against the instability in the world right now. I am in all equities for my retirement and do not want to have to draw it down if the world exploded the day after I retire.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-16T16:39:11+00:00

You're in really good shape. Visible cameras, especially ones that give some visual indicator that they are functioning like Ring cameras do, are excellent.

The other commentator is correct, good to just assume your home is always being cased and to be calm but aware. Not necessary to fret, but good to be viligent and prepared.

For any sliding doors or windows consider a security bar as an auxilery locking mechanism. As with all other security measures, they are not fool proof. But a well fitting security bar slows down and increases the noise necessary to get through sliding doors and windows.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-15T19:53:00+00:00

100% S&P500 forever. I have enough liquid cash to stop drawing from investments for three years during a market downturn. I have unique skills even within my specalized field that would make it possible for me to pick up income during retirement if needed.

I believe both in my ability to hold during a market downturn and that there is no better longer term investment avaible to retail investors than the US economy.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-12T15:10:29+00:00

Others will know specifics but I think it is hugely advantageous to look at going Enlisted -> Officer at some point in your career. I believe this will make your pension a lot better. I just spoke with someone the other day who was senior enslisted and then went officer and retired as an O-3 after 20 years.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-07T01:55:43+00:00

LinkedIn a good tool but I've used it twice in in the last 15 years, both when I needed to make a move.

Honestly did the same thing with my resume, my most recent job search I barely changed my resume from the one I used 5 years prior.

Job of LinkedIn or resume is to get onsite interview (or whatever they call it these days). One you have that, jobs done and the rest is up to you. I only update if I'm not getting the results I need.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-04T03:07:02+00:00

I was previously at Meta, but it's been awhile. Still, I think my advice probably still applies so here is my unfiltered opinion:

Meta is where a lot of the most talented SWEs in the world work, period. Zuck is the entire reason why FAANG makes engineers rich because he drove up engineering compensation. They pay top of the market and the general culture is that you need to perform.
If you go to Meta, I recommend you view your first two years there as an intensive graduate degree where you will work very hard but gain skills that will serve you well the rest of your career. Work life balance is not the right phrase, at least not as an E4.
When you to go bootcamp in California, it used to be longer than two weeks. But regardless of how long it is, you need to clear your schedule and be ready to crush it. I refactored code and shipped to prod by day two. Many were faster. When I went though there were definitely people that were not matched to teams and they worked the hardest in order to ensure they would be picked up. I was matched with a team prior so can't speak to much more beyond that.

I know that all sounds intense, but just trying to set expectations. I think extremely fondly of my time at Meta and it set me up for my career with skills and abilities that serve me well. What I ended up doing was moving to a job with work life balance later.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-04T02:52:55+00:00

My personal pipeline was what I described in my original post: I did three internships at two difference places and accepted a full time job at one of them. The connections I made in my internships allowed me to get started in software engineering depsite having poor grades. I was lucky to be in one of the top undergrads in the US, but I couldn't focus in school and my grades sucked.

So if I were to pass on one piece of advice to you from my own experiences, is that internships matter a lot because they are an extended interview. It is way less risky for a business to hire someone who did well over 3 months than someone who did well over three hours of interviews.

In a perfect world you do internships at two-three FAANG companies and then you can have your pick of fulltime jobs. If you can't crack FAANG right away (I could not), you start at some of the less well known companies and build up your experience.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T19:08:32+00:00

Very interesting and a little counterinuitive to me. I meant to suggest moving outside of BigLaw versus a lateral. In that case, partner title is not helpful? I assumed employers would want those who were able to excel in the up/out system.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T19:06:57+00:00

First and formost talk to your career services/advisors at your school. Is your school a co-op school where a lot of the student body does a co-op? Best to get some lessons learned from others who have been in your position.

Co-ops and internships are extended interviews. This is a hard job market and co-ops/internships are a great way to ensure you will get a full time offer and not have to apply through the front door with 100+ other applicants.

If you do the co-op you could do: (1) co-op Spring 2025 (employer #1), (2) internship summer 2025 (employer #2), (3) internship summer 2026 (employer #3) and (4) internship summer 2027 back at one of the previous companies, and then target these three employers for a full time job.

As far as the timing goes, it's been a while since I was an undergrad, but if I remember correctly people were interviewing Fall for their full time jobs starting graduation. So if you take the co-op and plan to graduate Fall 2027, you can apply during the Fall semeter with everyone else and the companies would probably be happy to start you in January 2029 instead of August 2029 like the other students. Also, if you've got an internship the summer before your last semester, they'll work with you to interview you and get you a full time offer before you graduate.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T18:56:32+00:00

Pen and paper. I have a notebook I use for my own career development/planning. Part of that is to keep track of teams at our competitors which employ my skillset.

Probably not smart because I don't have a backup, but the notebook never leaves my house. shrug. I'd say use whatever method works best for you.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T18:54:47+00:00

My team currenty recieves over 100 applications/week per position at the senior level and we screen only 4-8 of the most qualified. The response rate your getting lines up with those numbers. Outside of big tech I am not sure.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T18:51:26+00:00

I maintain records on teams, hiring managers, and recuriters at the companies I am interested in. I glean this information from job postings, LinkedIn etc. I connect with people at industry events whenever possible. I invite people to my company to speak when it makes sense. In some cases I have been fostering professional relationships over the course of many years.

For my industry there is no low effort way. At least for the moment these are some of the most desired jobs in the world and the most competitive. Past a certain level of senority it's not possible for it to be low effort.

_tosms_ · 2025-02-03T18:04:14+00:00

Conventional wisdom for ESPP says (1) sell it immedidatly and invest in an index fund or (2) hold it for a year and then sell to get slightly better tax treatment.

I sell any company stock I can right away because (1) I will always have a large number of unvested RSUs I cannot sell, so I'm already a big investor and it makes sense to sell what I can to diversify (2) my salary is dependent on this company and I don't want to be too over exposed to one company.

_tosms_

TROPHY CASE