Arpit Bhayani

268K followers

When you join a new org or switch teams in the same, it is quite an unsettling and borderline anxious experience. Here are a few things that I did to ramp up faster.1. I consciously made an effort to remain unblocked2. I read a ton of code and its history, sometimes even unrelated3. I asked questions about the past, the present, and the future4. I took up relatively mundane tasks - cross-team work, tests, and docs5. I extended a helping hand in whatever capacity I could6. I proactively met skip-level leaders and managers to understand the visionSome companies do have a culture of pairing up with someone existing in the team, but even if you do not get a mentor, it is important that you still navigate the situation and ramp up as quickly as you can.The above list is not exhaustive, by any means, and hence you can always add things that you find helpful in your context. but the lowest common denominator is to show extreme intent and interest to get output and drive outcomes.Hope this helps.

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25 Comments

Avish Mishra

Uber • 23K followers

One thing your manager will never tell youYour promotion depends less on your performance and more on whether your team is actually growing.When I joined Amazon as an SDE-1, my team had 25 people.By the time I became Senior, it had 120+.Looking back, my “fast promotion” wasn’t magic.The org was expanding like crazy and growth creates opportunity.Here is the part people don’t like hearing:❌ If your team hasn’t grown in years, your career won’t either.❌ It doesn’t matter how good you are. There is nowhere to go.❌ The only real path up becomes waiting for someone above you to leave.So if you want to grow faster:Choose teams that are growing.Not teams that are comfortable.Skills matter.Environment matters more.

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Matt Watson

Full Scale • 75K followers

Every API call took 2 seconds. The team in Manila blamed Mumbai's code. Mumbai pointed at Miami's infrastructure. Miami insisted it was Manila's queries.Everyone was wrong. It was a misconfigured Redis cache that nobody owned.This is the hidden cost of distributed teams. Not the timezone challenges or communication gaps, but the ownership vacuum that forms between locations.Remote teams don't fail because of distance. They fail because we give them collaboration tools when what they really need is VISIBILITY tools.Think about it. We spend thousands on Slack, Zoom, and project management software to help teams "work together better." But when performance tanks, those tools tell us nothing about WHERE the problem lives.The solution isn't more meetings or better documentation. It's RADICAL TRANSPARENCY through monitoring.When every team member from Cebu to Cincinnati can see the same performance dashboards showing the same real-time metrics, finger-pointing dies. Problems get solved in hours, not weeks.The best distributed teams I've seen, they guess less.Here's my question: What's the most expensive problem your distributed team has that exists simply because nobody can see it?

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Kamran Ali

Atlassian • 34K followers

Prakhar's HLD for Dropbox's files and folders sharingPrakhar sharing a folder1. Prakhar right-clicks his "Project Alpha" folder and invites his colleague, Simran, granting her "edit" access   2. His client sends a request to the Share Service to define rules   3. Creating the Share1. Share Service creates a unique, shared record with File/folder identifier, Access level (view/edit), Recipient email (Simran), Expiration settings (if any)2. It attaches an Access Control List (ACL) to shared record, marking Prakhar as the owner and adding Simran as an editor4. Creating a "Link"1. Share Service contacts with Metadata Service to place a special pointer, like a shortcut or a symbolic link, inside Simran's file directory2. Pointer points to the shared record   5. Invitation: A notification is sent to Simran. She clicks "Accept"Simran seeing the Folder1. No Data Duplication: When Simran accepts, we don't copy all of Prakhar's files to her account   2. Instant Appearance1. The next time Simran's device syncs, it fetches her file list2. Metadata Service sees the pointer and seamlessly includes the contents of "Project Alpha"3. The folder appears instantly on her device, with zero file data downloaded yet🤔 over to you, what are benefits of "mount point" approach?Let me know in the comments! 👇📣 Join 7-day email course to effectively optimize 60-minute system design interview - https://lnkd.in/gDBzCnE3 

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Sanchit Narula

Nielsen • 34K followers

I hate legacy code.You hate legacy code.Even my grandma, your grandma, And probably the guy who wrote it hates legacy code.But in tech, legacy code is like Delhi pollution. You can complain about it all day, but at some point, you still have to breathe and get work done.After 7+ years of dealing with old functions, mystery classes, and comments that lie straight to your face, here’s what I’ve learned about growing because of legacy code.1. Let’s not judge and criticize. Most juniors jump straight to rewriting.Seniors slow down and observe.Legacy code usually exists because it works for some use case someone once cared about. Before touching anything, read the inputs, read the outputs, check for side effects.Example:If a function is doing five random things, map them out.Often you’ll see patterns that reveal why the original engineer wrote it in that shape.This habit builds your problem-understanding skills faster than writing new code.2. Improve behavior before improving beautyYour goal isn’t to “clean up code” but to avoid breaking the universe. Wrap the code in tests, snapshot the current behavior, then refactor.It gives you a safety net and makes you fearless.Example:I once had to touch a 900-line Python script that sent out billing emails. I didn’t touch a single line until I added a couple of input/output tests.Those tests caught three hidden issues before I even started refactoring.3. Document what the original developers never didLegacy code forces you to become the historian the team desperately needed. Every time you understand something, write it down in simple language.This doesn’t just help others. It sharpens your own clarity and pushes you into a leadership role.Example:Create a short “What this module actually does” note.Not a full wiki, just a clear 10–15 line explanation.People will start coming to you for context.4. Break big tangled code noodles into small, understandable unitsLegacy code often feels impossible because you look at it as a giant mess.Instead, Split logic into tiny blocks.Name them clearly.Move repeated parts out.Make the code readable even if it’s still old.Example:Pull one section into its own function. Just one.Next time you touch the file, pull out another.Over months, the entire module transforms.Small changes scale.5. Treat legacy code as leadership trainingLegacy code teaches empathy. It teaches patience.And it teaches you how to guide others through mess.If you can explain a messy system clearly, you’re already operating at a senior level.Example:Teach a junior how a legacy module works. Walk them through it step by step.That’s how you grow from “someone who fixes code” into “someone who builds engineers.”If you can handle legacy code calmly, you can handle anything.It’s not glamorous, but it builds the skill set most engineers only learn the hard way.

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Sameer Bhardwaj

Layrs • 41K followers

Cracking a Senior SDE role at Google?→ 100% impossible if you can’t design a real system with scale, trade-offs, and failure in mind.Getting through a backend round at Amazon for a Senior Role?→ 100% impossible if your system design answer is just a bunch of boxes and buzzwords.Landing an L4/L5 offer at Microsoft or Meta?→ 100% impossible if you can’t explain why your design works and what breaks under pressure.You don’t get rejected in system design rounds because you “don’t know enough.”You get rejected because you never practiced building, defending, and fixing real systems.Most engineers only ever:– Memorize a few diagrams,– Read a dozen blog posts,– Copy other people’s notes…But in the actual interview. You’re asked to map out a system, justify your trade-offs, predict failures, and handle scale live.If you haven’t built those muscles, you freeze, you bluff, or you get exposed.The result? Down-level offers, endless rejections, and “come back in 6 months.”Here’s what you should do instead: 1. Work on real, open-ended system design problems— not just reading blog posts or memorizing slides.2. Sketch out the full data flow, not just high-level boxes— think through how data moves, where it bottlenecks, and what breaks at scale.3. Practice breaking down requirements, choosing the right components, and justifying every architectural decision.4. Simulate failures and edge cases— walk through what happens when a service crashes, when data spikes, or when latency jumps.5. Time yourself— practice explaining your design, trade-offs, and reasoning in 45–60 minutes, just like the real interview.6. Get instant, actionable feedback— don’t wait for a one-time mock; get feedback as you build, so you learn what actually works.7.Fix and improve your designs after review— go back, iterate, and make your solution better with each attempt.8. Create your own custom problems if you want to stretch further— test yourself on scenarios you haven’t seen before.9. Discuss your solutions with real engineers— join a community, get challenged, and learn how others approach the same problem.And you know where you can all of this and more, at layrs.me. In fact, that’s why we built Layrs, it’s Leetcode for system design.– Practice on an interactive canvas– Drag, drop, and explain your architecture– Get feedback after every problem– Try BYOP (Bring Your Own Problem) if you want– Join our Discord, discuss with real engineersSign up today, DM me if you would like to know more, the platform is free to use!

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Vasanth Bhat

Walmart Global Tech India • 60K followers

This photo being heavily circulated on LinkedIn today/yesterday. As we all know #microsoft #laidoff 6000 employees. One who is contributing heavily to Typescript got impacted. It's certain that job security is a myth, but here are few signs which will indicate you're job might be at risk.1. Working on open source project in a private company is not something a great sign. As company is not generating much revenue out of it.2. Truly innovation projects are also not very ideal. Ex: Amazon's no man store, where somebody can walk and buy the product. 3. Any AI/ML project which is giving no results since an year or more. 4. Internal product like blog or pay roll details, which is fine not working for some days. make sure you're part of products that will directly bring revenue to company, most companies don't want to take risk in those products.Vasanth Bhat

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Kousik Nath

Uber • 10K followers

In India, people have a narrow mindset about their career. It applies to tech also. People care more about optics, less about building and experimenting. We love to judge others when it comes to career choices, stability etc.India is in a transition phase where we are slowly shifting away from service and manufacture based culture to a more modern product mindset culture - very slowly though. But we still have mindset from that old 1990s era where we have a very narrow vision of how a career should be which eventually transforms young workers into labours, not innovators.If you look at China, they are already competing with US when it comes to innovation. China made it possible by radically changing their education system and investing heavily in their startup and product infrastructure. They embraced big ambitions. The result is very clear - they have DeepSeek Alibaba Group Baidu, Inc. Tencent etc and they did not build it in one night, it took them decades.Without embracing uncertainty and experimentation mindset, you won't be able shoot for the moon. That will naturally come with instability which we don't value here. India is progressing in tech, but we are way behind when it comes to innovation - we might have some random exceptions here and there. Different companies hire here just because we are cheap labours. Everyone says that India is hub of innovation, a pool of talented folks who can create big tech etc. All these look good in theory. In reality, hardly any company (home grown or multi national) innovates here. Companies hire in India because they get people who get things done. So, it's more about execution than research here historically.Also, India is a low trust society in-general. Most of the companies born in India treat their employees with superiority and toxicity.If India really needs to become a global leader, tech is a good space to start with no doubt. However, the leadership mindset in overall Indian tech work culture has to radically change. A mindset that would encourage risk taking, embrace uncertainty, a mindset that would respect all point of views and won't see things from a single lens. A lot of us question whether our govt. is investing money or do we have the right education etc. Valid points. But do we ever ask questions on how to change the leadership traits in Indian mindset in general which would enable us to take bold steps?

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Michel Tu

Databricks • 21K followers

Random thought from living in EuropeSelf driving cars are a solution for cities being built poorly built for people -- it's like adding a proxy on a system full of tech debt to patch a problem but ignore the root cause.The interesting part here isn't that much that US cities are built for cars and not people, but more that as a software engineer, you should be aware of decisions you can't easily reverse -- and carefully weight the pros and cons of the different solutions

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8 Comments