28 Year Old Staff Engineer @ Google

Ricky (@findingricky) went from Junior (IC3) to Staff (IC6) at Google by 28. He doesn’t consider himself the best engineer, instead crediting his blend of technical and soft skills for his ability to land promotions quickly. In our conversation, we discuss: • Managing your manager • Finding good projects (and rejecting bad ones) • Imposter syndrome • Switching from IC to engineering management • Work-life balance — Where to find Ricky: • Instagram: https://instagram.com/@findingricky • YouTube: https://youtube.com/@findingricky Where to find Ryan: • Newsletter: https://www.developing.dev/ • X: https://x.com/ryanlpeterman • LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/ryanlpeterman • Threads: https://www.threads.net/@ryanlpeterman • Instagram: https://instagram.com/@ryanlpeterman In this episode, we cover: 00:00 – Intro 01:08 – Promotion timeline 02:34 – Junior to Mid-level 04:24 – Finding independence 10:39 – Mid-level to Senior 11:20 – Learning how to say no 17:26 – Senior to Staff 20:18 – Finding next-level work 23:42 – Transitioning to management 33:46 – Reflections To hear more, visit www.developing.dev https://www.developing.dev?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=show-notes-spotify-open-access

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Numbers don't lie, right? For me, it's just revenue. At the end of the day, if my idea makes the most money, no one's gonna say anything to me. I don't know. I thought I was like a personality hire or something.

• 0:11Ryan Peterman?

  Hey, everyone. It's Ryan Peterman here with another episode of the podcast. Today, we have a guest who went from a new grad at Google all the way to staff by the age of twenty eight. He did it very fast. He has a lot to say about how to get promoted in Google's culture and how to work with your manager. But I think the thing that was most interesting to me about him was that he's the first person who ever told me that he wishes the opportunities for for promotion to staff came later in his career, and he explains why that's the case. If that sounds interesting to you, let's get into the conversation. Ricky, welcome to the pod. So today I wanted to go over a bit about your career. I know you were at Google pretty much your entire time. So you did an internship at Google, you committed full time,

• 0:53Ryan Peterman?

  and you went from junior all the way to staff in your twenties, and I just felt like there's a lot to learn from that, so I want to lay that all out today.

• 1:02Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm super excited to be here, and I hope that this podcast is very helpful to everyone else.

• 1:08Ryan Peterman?

  Can you walk me through the overall arc of your career? Can you just lay it all out? I'm kind of curious about the compensation and also how fast you got all the promos at Google.

• 1:17Speaker 00

  I started as a new grad in two thousand seventeen, and around then I was making a hundred eighty K and I had some sign-on bonus, and I think that's pretty normal for a new grad offer from Google. And then after that, I got promoted in a year and a half to level four, or what we call like a mid-level engineer. And at that point, my compensation was around two hundred fifty K, which is again, about average for an L four. And a year and a half after that, I got promoted to L five. So I made it from three to five in three years. That's very fast. I got very lucky, very fortunate with my team. On average, I would say it would take maybe like four or five years to get that done. So

• 2:00Speaker 00

  I did, you know, maybe a year and a half or two years faster than average. So at level five, my compensation was three hundred fifty K, which is again, about average. It was a little bit higher because of my initial stock grant. And then three years after that, I got promoted from five to six, so from senior to staff level. And at the staff level, my compensation was around 500, or it currently is around 520, maybe more. But it's around there. And again, that's also pretty average. I think these numbers really align with what you see on levels dot F R I, so hopefully it's no surprise to anyone.

• 2:34Ryan Peterman?

  So let's go into the first one, that junior to mid-level promo. You said you did it a year and a half at Google. What did you learn along the way? Can you tell us more about the ratings that you got and also a little bit more about the process? Maybe we can start with the ratings.

• 2:49Speaker 00

  Yeah, Google does ratings on a six-month cycle. So the very first half, I got meets expectation, which is pretty normal for anyone who's only worked there for six months. And then after that, I exceeded expectations. And then after that, I got the promo with the level higher than that. I was really nervous about going for this promotion just because it was like really ahead of schedule. So I was really unsure at the time if I was gonna get it. I definitely had all the attributes I felt like for the next level in terms of my impact and how well I was doing at work. But I just wasn't sure if my tenure would support that. And I was a little bit worried being docked about that.

• 3:30Speaker 00

  But luckily, my manager was supportive, helped put me up for a promotion, and I ended up getting it.

• 3:36Ryan Peterman?

  It sounded like you knew about it. Is it initiated by the employee or the manager at Google?

• 3:40Speaker 00

  At Google, it should be definitely initiated by the employee. I would say, though, more than anything, it should be an ongoing conversation between you and your manager. Just making sure expectations are set of when you plan on going for promotion, what projects you're working on, and what's gonna move you to the next level. I was asking my manager, hey, do you feel like these projects that I'm currently doing are the next level? And making sure my own expectations were set, making sure the products that we're doing were indeed for the next level.

• 4:08Ryan Peterman?

  I see. So you were fully aware that the promo was happening and you were managing up throughout the whole process?

• 4:15Speaker 00

  Yeah, definitely. I fully support managing your manager. I think it's something that you have to do if you want an accelerated promotion timeline.

• 4:24Ryan Peterman?

  What was it that you did that actually made the difference at this level?

• 4:28Speaker 00

  I think just being able to have independence and finish projects on your own is really the hallmark of what people are looking for when you're getting promoted from three to four or junior to mid-level, that you just don't need that much handholding, you can unblock yourself on your own.

• 4:45Ryan Peterman?

  Is there anything that you did that helped you unblock yourself? Anything you'd recommend for someone that is junior to become more independent on the project?

• 4:53Speaker 00

  I would say what helped me the most was just asking a lot of questions. I think a lot of people, when they first start, because of imposter syndrome, they don't want to seem dumb, and I didn't want to either. But I kept telling myself, and I kept reminding myself, "Hey, I'd rather ask questions and look dumb and learn something, and maybe I'll get fired because people think I'm dumb, than to do nothing, not learn anything, not ask any questions, and get fired." I really tried to overcome my imposter syndrome with that mindset, and I think that's what helped me learn a lot from others. Because in general, a lot of people are really willing to help, really wanting you to succeed and grow. So through that, I was able to learn how to do things on my own and move my projects forward by asking people questions,

• 5:37Speaker 00

  rather than asking my manager to figure it out for me.

• 5:41Ryan Peterman?

  You don't want to ask too quick, because then you don't learn anything and someone just gives you the answer. But you also don't want to block for too long, because you're just going to be sitting there and not learning anything, and it's not productive. Especially when I had interns or people who are new to the industry. I feel like you should reach out if you spend more than half a day on something. If you spend four hours on something and you make no progress, nothing's going to change. You might even want to reach out sooner than that. But of course, you want to give it a good try before you ask the question.

• 6:10Speaker 00

  Yeah, 100%. And I think definitely if you're asking the same question multiple times, then it's maybe a red flag. You get stuck after working a while and you ask the question, that's totally fine. It's normal and expected.

• 6:22Ryan Peterman?

  Definitely, yeah. There's got to be this upward trajectory. If you're Diffs, they constantly get tons of feedback, and that doesn't change after months of work on the same codebase. Something's off there, but it's totally okay if the iterations are coming down. There's a lot of questions, but it's getting better over time. That's ideal growth. So you got that promo pretty straightforward. Honestly, in the industry, that promo is just a matter of churning out code and just doing it more independently. So it makes sense that it aligns with what I think as well. Let's talk about the senior promo. I think on this promo, there's a little bit more change in your behaviors and it's not just shipping more code. So I want to dig into that.

• 7:04Ryan Peterman?

  For you, what did you feel was the biggest shift and how you were going about your work? That helped you get promoted to senior at Google?

• 7:11Speaker 00

  I think the biggest shift is probably just taking more and more ownership and getting to a point where I could confidently say I own a certain scope or a certain area. And the buzzword is the go to person for a scope of area. So I was able to get to that point by really understanding a portion of the code base and pushing out a lot of projects that had a lot of impact in that special area.

• 7:35Ryan Peterman?

  Was that something that you explicitly planned? Like you, maybe with your manager, you thought, okay, that area, there's not a good owner yet. I'm going to go into that area. Or how did you become the go to person?

• 7:48Speaker 00

  I think I got pretty lucky on this. So I work in ads and the scope of area that I chose to invest more time in, the ads just didn't look that pretty and I wanted to make it better. And by making it better, I was able to also have a lot of impact. So I just picked kind of the most interesting scope of area that I kind of dipped my toes a little bit into. And I just kept working on it and I continued to find it interesting and slowly became more of an owner by doing more and more projects and taking my time to explore that area.

• 8:26Ryan Peterman?

  I think some people, depending on the team structure, they have to compete for scope or they worry about that. So in your case, you didn't run into anything like that, is that right?

• 8:35Speaker 00

  Yes. My team is a little bit special because we usually pick our own projects. Of course, you can still have projects handed down by your manager, or your manager can help you pick projects. But I really made an effort to find my own projects, making sure that they had reasonable impact. Because I feel like the best projects that you can find are the ones you find yourself. Because your manager might not always give you a project that's at the next level. So I really looked for projects that were at the next level, had big impact, pushed my boundaries and put me outside of my comfort zone. So I had to learn and improve my technical skills, too.

• 9:12Ryan Peterman?

  One of the most important parts of getting promoted is getting some next level scope to actually execute on. How did you know that the things you were looking at were at the next level? How did you find those? Was there some tech lead that you were discussing things with? Or did you do it more by yourself?

• 9:28Speaker 00

  I think what I did is I looked around my team and looked at how other people might have gotten promoted to senior and tried to understand, oh, this is what exactly a senior level or L5 project looked like. And thinking about how I could create something or find something of that same scope or complexity. And then after that, I took my ideas to my manager and asked him for feedback, asking him, hey, do you feel like this is a next level complexity? Do you feel like this is a reasonable place that I can push the boundary on? And that's also kind of how I set myself up for success to get a promotion really early. Because a year before I actually got promoted, I went to my manager

• 10:09Speaker 00

  and I said, hey, these are all the things that I think are interesting, that I'm kind of working on. And here's a roadmap for the next year of what I'm planning on doing. Do you feel like this is enough for the next level? So already a year before my promotion, I did my best to set expectations with him in terms of what I'm doing and if it's at the next level or not.

• 10:30Ryan Peterman?

  So that was after, so right after you got your promo to your, to the mid-level? You put together that roadmap and you showed it to him, is that right?

• 10:39Speaker 00

  So after I got promoted from three to four, I had about six months where I was just like trying out different projects, seeing what was interesting to me and slowly like figuring out what my L5 scope looked like. Uh, and then I put together that one year roadmap by myself and then showed it to my manager and got my manager's buy-in.

• 10:58Ryan Peterman?

  Got it, okay. And so as you were going along and executing this roadmap, I mean inevitably at work, like, things come up, people might wanna give you work that is not on that roadmap or I don't know, there's some partner asks that come in. What did you do in that case? How did you handle it when work was not at the next level, but someone was asking you to do it?

• 11:20Speaker 00

  I think you just have to learn how to say no. Obviously, if it's a bug that you caused and someone's bringing it to you, you better fix it, cuz you know, it's your bug or like, if it's your scope of area and someone finds a bug, you should still fix it. But if it's a whole new project that someone else wants to take you on, maybe it is like the next level scope and you do think that is a good project and you work on it. But most of the time, I feel like, um, people will just kind of like see who might want a project or who's interested in a project. And you have to decide for yourself, hey, is this at the next level or not? Do I have time for this? Um, and I said no to a lot of products that I felt like were not at the next level. Um, sure, they might have impact, but they weren't gonna help me grow.

• 12:06Ryan Peterman?

  Do you have any tips for people say no? Cuz I think a lot of people, they don't feel comfortable, especially if the work's coming from their manager. What's the right way to say no without causing issues?

• 12:17Speaker 00

  If it's someone else giving you work and you don't wanna do it, I would escalate to your manager immediately and be like, hey, this person's giving me work. I don't wanna do it. Like, why, why, why is it being handed to me? And trying to understand like, Oh, maybe it is just like a bug that you caused, so you do have to fix it. And if it's work given to you by your manager, I think I would just try to push them and be like, "Hey, is this something I have to do? I have my own projects here that I feel like would have more impact and also help me grow more. Can I just do these projects instead?" And I think a manager's job, and this is coming from someone who is a manager, is to find projects that help you grow and succeed and projects that you actually want to do.

• 13:01Speaker 00

  Because otherwise, people might give you a project and you're forced to do it, you're just gonna do a crappy job on it. So it's better for a manager to find a project that their reports actually want to do. So hopefully, your manager's not giving you a project that you don't want to do.

• 13:16Ryan Peterman?

  Makes sense. So it sounds like you had pretty good managers throughout this process. Seems like they were pretty receptive to what you're saying.

• 13:22Speaker 00

  Yeah, I think I just built up, like, very early on, this ability to find my own projects and have impact. My manager, I felt, was not too worried about the projects I was doing and just trusted that I'd find my own projects to push on. Obviously, he still gave me a lot of feedback to help guide me and help me understand, "Oh, these type of projects might be good or bad for me." But for the most part, my ideas were bottom-up rather than top-down. And I think that's one of the ways that I was able to succeed and get promoted really quickly.

• 13:56Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. You talked about knowing which ideas are impactful and which ones aren't. How did you develop that skill?

• 14:05Speaker 00

  I think maybe the first thing you have to do is figure out what exactly impact means within your org. For me, as an ad, so it just meant like, "How much money is this gonna make? Does it actually help the user, help the advertiser, help the publisher?" But if you were on a different team, maybe it's like increasing the number of daily active users or interactions with a certain product. So really thinking about what exactly that impact number meant. So again, for me, as revenue and as able to find projects, by running a lot of experiments to figure out, "Oh, here there's a gap where I can probably have a lot of impact and drive a lot of revenue. Here's another gap that I found where I can probably drive a lot of revenue here, too." And I think the best part about this is that numbers don't lie, right? For me, it's just revenue.

• 14:49Speaker 00

  Other people might have ideas, but at the end of the day, if my idea makes the most money, no one's gonna say anything to me.

• 14:55Ryan Peterman?

  Yeah, yeah, for sure. There are metrics and there are projects with well-known milestones that the whole org knows is valuable. So when you move those metrics, obviously revenue and ads, yeah, that there, no one can argue. If you have the biggest metric movement, let's say you're a junior engineer that moves it more than the whole team, like, okay, obviously that's going to be something, something huge. Okay, so when it actually got to the senior promo, what was that like?

• 15:25Speaker 00

  I would say that from three to four, it was a little bit scary, but then from four to five, it was even scarier because I knew I was really going against the grain. Like, I was getting promoted really fast. It's a really expedited timeline. I heard that like the average time that it takes to get promoted can be like 2.5 years, three years, 3.5 years. So doing it 1.5 years was really, really aggressive. And I was just worried that I'd be docked points for not showing that I was performing at the next level for an extended amount of time. So I was, I knew it was a pretty big stretch. Luckily, my manager still supported me and said that we can go, can

• 16:05Speaker 00

  go for promotion, though, you know, like, he set my expectations. He was like, I'm not sure, like, we'll really have to see. Again, you might be docked, but, you know, let's just try to go for it and see what happens. So I did end up going for it. I was able to make it. It was a really big surprise to me. Very fortunate that my manager supported me, even though it was a very aggressive timeline.

• 16:28Ryan Peterman?

  One last thing on this level is for senior promo, you need to lead a bit more than in the past levels. Is there anything that you did that some people, there's like growing pains to like becoming like a leader on your team? Like, how was that experience for you? Did you have imposter syndrome at any point?

• 16:45Speaker 00

  It definitely was a little bit scary. And as you said, growing pains, it takes some time to get used to almost being confident in yourself. For example, like, I had some project ideas that I ultimately handed off to more junior engineers, but I was pretty anxious that they wouldn't pan out or that the experiments that I gave them wouldn't. Do so well. And honestly, some of them didn't, but I think my batting average was still higher than than most people. And that definitely helped, but you definitely have to get used to leading and just being comfortable mentoring people. And I think in in buzzwords, you would say you'd have influence on others and their projects.

• 17:26Ryan Peterman?

  Let's go into the staff promo. You know, I think it's natural for promos to take longer later in your career. Did you feel stuck at any point?

• 17:35Speaker 00

  Honestly, I wish I could have stayed at the senior level a little bit longer. Um, I feel like being a senior engineer, you of course don't make as much as if you're a staffer or a higher level engineer, but you have great work-life balance. Like, I really miss taking a nap at like 2 P M. Or going to the gym at 3 P M. When there's no one there. Um, and I think as you become more senior, you're just involved in a lot, a lot of bigger projects that require more meetings. And your structure, the structure of your schedule just becomes more and more rigid. So I think for people that do want to go to staff, really think about, is this something you actually want?

• 18:14Speaker 00

  Like, looking at how other staff engineers are on your team or on adjacent teams and looking at what they are doing.

• 18:22Ryan Peterman?

  And at Google, do they have an up or out policy? So you can stay at senior as long as you want, is that right?

• 18:29Speaker 00

  Yes, I think maybe you can even stay at mid-level as long as you want, but I'm not a hundred percent sure. There's no expectation for people to go to staff. I think becoming a staff engineer is very much a choice, um, that to, you know, go past senior, go to staff. Uh, cause it is a lot more responsibility and a lot more work. Um, and I think some people just don't want to make that trade off.

• 18:55Ryan Peterman?

  If you were to take you at the senior level versus you at the staff level, what's the biggest difference in your mind?

• 19:01Speaker 00

  I feel like at level five or as I was a senior, I definitely started owning a space. I had a scope that I was like well-versed in and I did a lot of projects and had impact there. And I think what helped me go from senior to staff. is now that I really knew a scope of area, how can I push the boundaries of that scope of area, challenge the status quo and have a larger influence over that scope of area? I think I got a lot of points for leading and pushing the boundary of that area. And through that, I was able to have a lot of impact and just like being a leader in that space rather than someone that just knows the space.

• 19:39Ryan Peterman?

  I see. So you were creating scope and influencing across teams?

• 19:44Speaker 00

  Yeah, definitely. Just like both cross functionally, across org, like it involved a lot of, um, at some points, like very high leadership buy-in. So I think once you start being the one to kind of like make those decisions and like push those decisions up, I think that starts to show very clearly staff level influence.

• 20:06Ryan Peterman?

  One of the things to getting a staff is that you need to find that staff level project. And in a lot of cases, the manager can't just hand that to you. That's something you need to find yourself. How did you find your anchor project that got you promoted to staff?

• 20:22Speaker 00

  I think what helped me find my staff project is just working in a space and then being like, why are we doing things this way? This doesn't make sense to me. And then starting to challenge, you know, how we've been doing things for a while. So there's definitely a status quo and uh, like one specific example is we had a lot of support backed by user research that showed, you know, this one thing to be true, but then when we actually ran the experiments, it conflicted with user research and I was able to push that and show that, you know, despite what user research shows, we can do this instead to have a lot of impact. So I would say what really helped me have that staff level project is

• 21:03Speaker 00

  knowing a space so well that I can start to challenge the boundaries or the rules that may have been set up and pushing it towards almost like this new frontier for a specific scope.

• 21:14Ryan Peterman?

  And I think we talked a little bit about influence and how important it is for staff. How do you usually go about influencing other people?

• 21:21Speaker 00

  I think at work, I just kind of already established a brand of being someone who was able to find impactful projects or just find impact in general. And then I would kind of pitch my ideas to other people. You know, obviously not trying to step on anyone's toes, but just giving ideas and collaborating with others. And I think a lot of people trusted my ideas at that point and they also panned out really well, fortunately. So I think that's how I kind of established influence with other teams or cross-functional partners. Just building a relationship, cross-pollinating ideas with other people

• 22:02Speaker 00

  and ultimately getting those ideas to become projects and ultimately succeed and launch.

• 22:09Ryan Peterman?

  You had been at the company for a while and you had already evidence of past results that gave you credibility. And so that made it that, it made it so that you could influence people a lot more easily. Is that right?

• 22:22Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'd definitely say so. If your projects keep flunking, then, you know, people might not be as willing to try out your projects or trust your word as much.

• 22:32Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. I think that's one thing that is unique about your career compared to a lot of our friends is that you have been at Google since we graduated. You've been in the same org the entire time. So all those people know you. They've seen you as this rising star that has been having a lot of success on all these projects. And so it's just natural that you're probably going to be more influential than if you got hired at the senior level on this team. You have to build all of that credibility from scratch.

• 23:08Speaker 00

  Yeah, I don't want to say rising star, but I definitely, you know, had some successful projects. I think we're able to showcase that, you know, my, my word had some value or some truth behind it.

• 23:23Ryan Peterman?

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. The rising star of it, just like that you've had past success.

• 23:28Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:28Ryan Peterman?

  You've had past success.

• 23:30Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:31Ryan Peterman?

  You're believable, you're credible.

• 23:32Speaker 00

  Exactly.

• 23:33Ryan Peterman?

  They see your name and they're like, okay, this project's probably be a good idea. For the staff level, like you also, like you were TLM for some time as well. Can you talk a little bit about, you know, why did you want to try management in the first place? I think that's like a common thing that everyone's thinking as I see. They want to make that decision for themselves at some point. So how did you make that decision? Why did you want to try management?

• 23:57Speaker 00

  I wanted to try management just because I think I already had a lot of fulfillment in helping people grow, finding projects. Even though I wasn't directly managing people, there are definitely mentees I had at work. I also mentored interns at times and it was just a really fun time watching them succeed and, you know, it's almost like having a kid and watching them grow and I really enjoyed that. So that's ultimately why I wanted to try out being a manager. Luckily, my team was also very supportive of that idea and I started managing around two years ago.

• 24:33Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. Did your manager really vet your motivations for wanting to become a manager before you, you became one? How did that process go?

• 24:43Speaker 00

  I don't know, honestly. Um, I, I pitched the idea to my manager. I think even once I was at the senior level for a while, I think I kind of said, hey, like, eventually one day I'd like to become a manager. And I think just the right opportunity came up. I do feel like becoming a manager really early on was a little bit awkward just because I at times felt like I wasn't mature enough to be a manager.

• 25:15Ryan Peterman?

  When you say not mature enough, what does that mean?

• 25:16Speaker 00

  I think I felt a little bit awkward at times. One example is like being in a meeting of a bunch of managers and I think a lot of the managers in our org skewed to be a little bit older, just, you know, naturally because some of them were even like higher level of managers. And have been managers for a while. So there's, it felt a little bit awkward there. Another time I felt awkward is like when I'm out at a music festival and I'm really drunk. And then I see my reports out there. I think at the end of the day is probably fine, but I think, uh, I just didn't really think that that would happen until it actually happened.

• 25:54Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. And before you came, had you done interns or any, uh, did you have any management experience? Or did you just kind of ask your manager and he was like, okay, maybe one day and it just happened?

• 26:07Speaker 00

  Yeah, I did not have like any special managing experience. I never had an intern. I was a little bit surprised. For some reason, I thought that there'd be more of like a textbook on how to be a great manager. But I feel like a lot of people just kind of get thrown in and then, uh, you know, they do their best. Uh, I'm not saying that Google doesn't have resources. Google has tons of resources, but. I don't know. I thought there'd be a little bit more structure, but it seems like in general, people just become a manager.

• 26:43Ryan Peterman?

  When you became manager, what do you feel was the biggest difference between, uh, being an IC and, uh, and manager?

• 26:50Speaker 00

  I think what a lot of people told me before I became a manager, um, and I agree with their advice even today. Is that when you're just like a TL, you have all the fun parts. You get to help them grow. You get to help them succeed. And then all the harder parts is like giving difficult feedback when people are not performing so well. And a lot of almost the busy work of writing reviews and like going to calibration sessions. So there's just a lot more, I guess, overhead when you're a manager as opposed to being an IC. But I do feel like at the same time, it's a little bit more rewarding when you actually get to see your reports get promoted.

• 27:35Speaker 00

  Because you are their manager, right? You help them get promoted as opposed to just being a TL and helping someone get promoted.

• 27:43Ryan Peterman?

  Definitely. So now that you've tried it, do you think that you regret becoming a manager?

• 27:50Speaker 00

  I would say that I just wish I became a manager later. I think at the time, my team just, we had like a really odd scenario where we had twenty new hires and I felt like I was helping them all. And I wanted a more formal role, just so that I would only be responsible for the people that actually managed, which was four people rather than twenty people. So in that sense, like, I feel like I was able to have more time back because I only had to really help four people. But if I had the choice, I probably would have been a senior engineer,

• 28:31Speaker 00

  maybe a couple more years, just because I think there are less responsibility and it's less stress. And I think in your, I don't know, early or mid twenties when you wanna just relax a little bit more, it's just better to be a senior engineer than to be a staff level engineer or higher.

• 28:50Ryan Peterman?

  That's fair. Yeah. And there's a lot more meetings at the staff level, especially as a manager. I feel like it's all meetings sometimes.

• 28:57Speaker 00

  Yeah. It's definitely a skill that I feel like you have to learn or get used to, just powering through six hours or eight hours of back-to-back meetings or one-on-ones. Some managers, I think, have all of their meetings in one day. Some of them have it sprinkled out throughout the week. But in general, as you become more senior, whether or not you are a manager or not a manager, at the levels of six, seven, eight, you're gonna have a lot of meetings no matter what because the influence you have is always gonna be through other people and it's gonna be less code that you actually write yourself, whether or not you're an IC or a manager. So for me at least, I think when I first graduated from college, I was like, oh my God, I wanna be a director one day.

• 29:40Speaker 00

  It's gonna be so fun. But I think as I become closer and closer to these high levels, I'm understanding what it actually means. And it means no more random naps at two or three P M. I want it means no going to the gym at, you know, eleven AM. Obviously, to a certain extent, you can still have doctor appointments in the middle of the day if you have to. But there's definitely less flexibility. And I think if you look at the calendars at work of any of these more senior people, you'll also see, sure, they still only work nine to five, but they are working nine to five. They are definitely working.

• 30:16Ryan Peterman?

  I feel that this is definitely a lot more meetings. I think when I, when I got promoted to staff, I remember my schedule was basically a large chunk meetings nine to five. Not, not entirely nine to five, but meetings kind of just fragment your focus time.

• 30:31Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:32Ryan Peterman?

  So then every day I would have, you know, fragmented meetings for most of nine to five. And then I would start working on my stuff at five until like I went to bed. So, yeah, I totally agree. It's, it can, can become a lot.

• 30:48Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 30:49Ryan Peterman?

  Um, so I guess last thing, you actually go for the promo, of course. Were there any differences between the past promos or was it pretty straightforward?

• 30:58Speaker 00

  I already said that I was unsure from three to four and four to five. I was also very unsure from five to six, honestly. Uh, I definitely had really good ratings, so that was definitely a signal like I had like, you know, the highest ratings possible uh for a while already. But I was kind of just unsure, just because I think people have said that going from five to six is notoriously hard. Three to four, four to five, obviously it still takes work, but it's a little bit more straightforward. And people say that going from five to six is almost like a complete job change in some aspects.

• 31:39Speaker 00

  So I was pretty worried about it just because even if you're a superstar senior engineer and you're having tons of impact, it doesn't necessarily mean that you are going to be a great staff engineer. Though I did end up going for a promo. Again, I feel very fortunate, very lucky that my manager was supportive and I was able to get promoted. And only took me one try, which is I'm also pretty thankful for.

• 32:08Ryan Peterman?

  So all of your promos, there was never a miss and try again, miss and try again. It just landed every time.

• 32:15Speaker 00

  Yes, but I was very lucky. I was very lucky.

• 32:20Ryan Peterman?

  So yeah, looking at the whole career, do you think you could do it again? Or was a large part of this luck?

• 32:26Speaker 00

  I think you definitely have to be a little bit lucky just because sometimes you might not enjoy the team that you're on, or maybe your manager is just out on fraternity or maternity leave. So they can't help you as much, or they can't support your promotion as well. I think where I got lucky was that my team was a product area that I ended up really liking, even though I didn't pick that, I didn't pick my team, but they just matched me there. And I've been on that team for seven years now. Clearly, I like it to some capacity. And I think my team was also relatively stable. My manager, although I had some like manager shifts, ultimately was still under the same broader

• 33:11Speaker 00

  and larger team. So nothing crazy in terms of reorgs or restructuring that might have hindered my career progress. But I will say that luck is like two parts. One of them is the chance of an opportunity actually coming along, right? Sometimes you just have to wait for that and it might take longer. It might not take as long. I think the second part is being prepared for when that chance actually comes. So just making sure that you're doing your best and doing the right things so that when an opportunity does come along, you can actually take advantage and seize the opportunity.

• 33:46Ryan Peterman?

  What percent of your career do you think has been due to your abilities? And what percent do you think was luck?

• 33:54Speaker 00

  Um, I would say maybe like half, half.

• 33:59Speaker 00

  Like, I'm pretty confident that eventually I would get to senior. And I think that most people will eventually get to senior as long as they are like making sure to grow and putting work in. But maybe if I was on a different team, or I just really did not like the stuff I was working on, it might've taken me longer because I'd have to switch teams and then get ramped up in their code stack. So I think I was just really fortunate that uh, things worked out the way they did. But I definitely made sure to put in the effort and was very conscious about the next level and what I had to do to get there.

• 34:34Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. Yeah, luck is a huge part of it. There could be an engineer that's better than you, but they're, I don't know, the team they're on is like literally just the worst. It's reorging every six months. They have no consistent project. And so in that case, of course, you couldn't do it. And on the flip side, it sounds like you had a lot of things around it, like a good manager and like the scope to continue to grow. Your product was like impactful and all of that. So that makes sense. One of the last things I want to talk about is, you know, I think we kind of mentioned that out of all of our friends, I think it's a little bit unusual to be at the same company

• 35:15Ryan Peterman?

  for seven years, especially in this industry. People are kind of job hopping to try out new things or, you know, get more compensation or whatever. And so what kept you at Google for so long?

• 35:30Speaker 00

  Yeah, I think it's really important to ask yourself, I don't know, maybe every three months, just ask yourself, hey, am I still enjoying the work I'm working on? Do I still feel like this team has whatever I want? For me, it was like, I really wanted some career growth. I also really wanted to travel a lot. I didn't care as much about what I was working on, as long as it wasn't like too boring. So my team, I felt always had those opportunities for me. And that's why I didn't leave. But I think what I often tell people is I just kept asking myself, is the grass greener here or elsewhere? And it was greener on my side of the lawn, so I ended up staying. That doesn't mean that I wasn't thinking about leaving, or if I should change teams every so often to make

• 36:15Speaker 00

  sure that the job was doing as much as it was for me. Of course, there's survivorship bias, right? I'm sure people that did not get promoted as quickly, maybe they just didn't really enjoy the team or didn't enjoy the work, whereas I just had a good matchup.

• 36:32Ryan Peterman?

  That makes sense. Yeah, and I think there's pros and cons to staying at the same team. There's this momentum that you get by staying on the same team and the same company. You're like this snowball of organizational context and like the code-based know-how. And after four years in the same area, you're not just the go-to person in one area, you're like go-to person in like many areas. And you just become this person that just knows how to do, get everything done. You have all the relationships. So if you can get lucky with a good org setup and all of that, there is this benefit to having all that context

• 37:14Ryan Peterman?

  that can give you unusually fast career growth. On the flip side, of course, you can job hop and try to get promos too. So it's not black and white, one is better than the other. I guess it's like a counterpoint to. I feel like the common opinion is like you should jump and you should switch. And there is actually some value to staying, as long as your situation's good.

• 37:36Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:37Ryan Peterman?

  Okay, and the last thing I want to know is if you were to talk to that Ricky at the beginning of your career, junior engineer Ricky, just entered the industry, what advice would you give yourself and why?

• 37:49Speaker 00

  Hmm, I think to my younger self, I would just tell him to trust himself a little bit more. Because I think for a very long time, I just had so much imposter syndrome. I was so anxious that, you know, I wasn't gonna do so well. And over time, I like built up that confidence, like through projects, my projects succeeding and working well with others and getting good feedback. But I think I was like really unsure of myself. And I actually feel like I could have done more if I was willing to trust my judgment a little bit more or have more of, almost like audacity to push the boundary and try new things.

• 38:29Speaker 00

  Because I had a lot of ideas that I felt like I maybe waited a little bit too long because, you know, I felt like, oh, am I gonna rock the boat too much? But I ended up doing a lot of those projects that did rock the boat and they were very successful and. I wish I just, you know, trusted myself a little bit more to do it earlier. So I'd be less anxious and stressed all the time and be fretting less over imposter syndrome in the beginning of my career.

• 38:57Ryan Peterman?

  When you say imposter syndrome, was that mostly about your technical skills? Or is it something that you learned that made you have less imposter syndrome?

• 39:05Speaker 00

  I don't know. I thought I was like a personality hire or something.

• 39:11Speaker 00

  And over time, I realized, you know, obviously like Google's not going to do that. But I think I was always just a little bit worried because I think during my interviews too for Google, I think I like did okay. I don't feel like I like hit a home run and the same thing with my internship. I didn't feel like I hit a home run. And also think at the lower levels, I wasn't really sure how to kind of gauge my performance. And even though I would like bother my manager a lot and be like, am I doing okay? Like, are things going well? And he'd tell me like, oh yeah, you're doing fine, you know? I would still like kind of be anxious like, oh, but like, is it enough? Um, is it just okay?

• 39:55Speaker 00

  Or is it like, am I doing like, am I passing? Is this like a C that I'm doing or am I like doing an A plus? Like, what's the vibe, you know? And I was just stressing out about that.

• 40:07Ryan Peterman?

  Yeah, that makes sense. That's supernatural.

• 40:11Ryan Peterman?

  Awesome. All right. Well, yeah, I think that's everything. Ricky, is there anything that you want to plug or, you know, where can the audience find you?

• 40:18Speaker 00

  Yeah. So on social media, I'm Finding Ricky. If you want to watch my content, it's not really tech related. I have to warn you. I feel like I'm in a very different niche than Ryan here. But if you do want to follow me or check out my socia, it's Finding Ricky. Um, and I hope that this podcast was helpful to everyone. And I'm so happy that I could be here today.

• 40:42Ryan Peterman?

  Awesome. Alright, thanks so much for your time Ricky.

• 40:45Speaker 00

  Alright, thanks everyone, bye.

• 40:47Ryan Peterman?

  Hey, Ryan here. Thanks so much for listening to the podcast. I hope that it was helpful and if you wanna hear more from Ricky, you can go and check him out on YouTube at Finding Ricky. He recently posted a video about a day in the life as a staff engineer at Google. I know it sounds sensational, but actually I think he did a good job in capturing what the day to day is like. It's not just flexing big tech perks. It's more about the daily work of a staff engineer and how things kind of become much more different as you have more and more responsibilities. So you can take a look at that. And then two other things that I wanna add is, one, thank you so much for the feedback on the first video. I hope that you can see that I took it to heart and the production quality is a little bit better. Still has a long way to go, but look at the background here.

• 41:31Ryan Peterman?

  I bought a backdrop to make it a little bit nicer and I'll be using that for future videos. And then the other thing too that I got a lot of feedback on is the jump cuts. And so I tried to get rid of as many of those as possible while still removing filler words and things like that. So you can see that I'm playing with the camera angles. I really appreciate the feedback and if you have any more, feel free to drop comments on YouTube. I will take a look there and try to make every episode incorporate the feedback that I get. Thanks so much for your time.