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No, I do not work at Figma lol

It's not...

Got me, first time I've ever had to fill out something like this

It's rough, I'm looking =)

It's a mix of ego and people not knowing what they are doing. I had to fight my first month just to get code into BitBucket. Before that, it was a server in rackspace you pushed to as the root user.

Because the CTO only does the code reviews, people create the PR and the CRF. Issue is because it takes so long, the CTO wants merge conflicts resolved before it's reviewed. Problem with that is, no one remembers the context a month (or longer later).

I have A LOT of spare time so I will often help out with doing reviews but because I'm not allowed to merge or deploy code, it's more of helping junior engineers write better code.

It's all for "PCI Compliance" lol

Still fighting with the CTO on letting people other than him do code reviews. We don't do retrospectives and code reviews also take months. I also have to fill out a change request form (CRF) that has the git hash, list of files modified, and many other useless and redundant fields that are required.

GD is joke. I worked at a company that would relentlessly take down the negative reviews. Once hired, they would butter you up to get a positive review so any negative reviews they couldn’t remove would be offset. That’s when I lost all trust in GD.

Rarely companies hit this. I’ve done work in a few startups and we never hit that point.

Also, it’s about priorities and goals of the company. Security and control is the main reasons I see companies migrate to data centers. Generally things like GitHub Enterprise are being used.

Your CTO is correct. Generally speaking you start building using the path that can deliver value the fastest to customers. This is usually something like Heroku. At some point you run into platform limitations and have to migrate to another platform. Generally this would be AWS or some other cloud. Eventually you outgrow the cloud provider and go into a data center. By that point you’re talking number of racks vs VMs.

Another thing to consider, as a developer, is how to make your app as independent from vendor requirements. For example, if you build an app in such a way that it only works using SQS you’ll run into issues down the road.

Also, why y’all using dedicated dev VMs? IMHO it sounds like there are other issues to solve before you migrate the app somewhere else. If I was in your position I would work on making the app easier to setup and deploy. Your CTO has a lot to consider and being a CTO at a startup isn’t an easy thing. How long does it take to deliver a feature to customers? How can you help speed that up? What are the engineering goals of the CTO and how can you help with those goals? Make his or her life easier and work with them. Continuing to push an issue like this will cause you frustration and make your CTO dismissive of your ideas and suggestions in the future.

Riding motorcycles has done the same for me. Take a day and just ride around and get lost. You get disconnected from technology and live in the moment. I’ve met some amazing people and I’m involved with a nonprofit biker organization now. Ride safe brother!

Personally I look for small or startup type companies. I’ve learned that VC backed companies are usually cut throat and not creative. You will get paid more, but there is a cost to that. It’s a numbers game with VC backed companies. Burn and churn. Large companies it’s hard to add value. I worked at Salesforce for about a year before I quit. One of the best companies I ever worked at as far as perks go.

I also don’t have a college degree but have the experience to back me up. I’ve noticed at organizations where they hire fresh out of college or bootcamps is just a bunch of people that would rather talk computer science than write code that can be read in the future.

The best companies are hard to find gems that look like shit from the outside. For example, one company I worked for would dispute every Glassdoor review that wasn’t a 5 star saying it was a disgruntled former employee. It was a highly toxic company with amazing reviews on Glassdoor. Compare that with the company I’m at today that has just over a 3 stars.

The best companies that aren’t complete shit will empower you and encourage you to be your best. They understand they hire for your expertise and get the fuck out of your way. They demand results and also realize that results can take time. Not many people are able to work in this type of environment. You’re essentially looking for a company who treats employees like a team. Just like any professional sports team, the worst players are cut. However, the company also understands balance and sees excessive working as a problem. You’re looking for a company where the one doing the hiring is looking for someone smarter than they are.

In my opinion, the best way would be to read the reviews, and I mean really read the reviews you find online. Why are people saying what they say? Are they new hire reviews? Research the executive team and anyone else you can find at the company on LinkedIn. Before you go to any interview do research on the company and come prepared with questions you want answered based on your findings. Ask the company why you should work for them without being direct. Try talking to others who work there and get a feel for their personalities. If you smoke, go find where the smokers are and start conversations with them. If you get an offer, negotiate a contact for 90 days. During those 90 days, you want to keep interviewing the company. How’s the onboarding? Are they setting you up for success? Is there politics? Are there any assholes? Look for any red flags. There might be warning flags but the point is, you both are testing each other out.

Every company will have its pros and cons. I’ve decided to work at smaller companies which pay a little less but I have more opportunities to learn and grow vs a larger company where I’m a one trick pony.