What’s next after Senior Engineer?
After becoming a Senior Engineer -> your career has just started!
Intro
I had a lot of conversations throughout my 11+ year career in the engineering industry and this particular thing was quite often brought up:
“After growing to Senior Engineer, you hit the ceiling, there are no next steps”.
And I used to believe that as well. I thought that once you become a Senior, you do that for the rest of your career.
But let me tell you that it’s completely wrong.
Once you become a Senior, your career has just started! There are so many things where you can grow and get better. And you shouldn’t stop at that point.
And I’ll tell you why next.
This is an article for paid subscribers, and here is the full index:
- Without action, you can feel stuck in a Senior Engineer position
- Here is what you can expect after Senior Engineer
- Here is my recommendation on which path to choose
- Engineering Career Path Guide
- Make sure to find out what is going to be the next step for you
- Notion Template: Decide Your Career Path
🔒 I was lucky to have found out the right path for me
🔒 Make sure to at least have an idea of the path to pursue
🔒 If you’re not sure, try yourself in a certain role
🔒 Career paths are not linear
🔒 What are some other non-traditional paths to pursue?
🔒 Read these articles next to help you decide your career path
🔒 Last words
This article was first published on
as a guest post and now I am sharing the extended version of it.Let’s get straight into it!
Without action, you can feel stuck in a Senior Engineer position
I was overthinking about my career path when I was a Senior Software Engineer.
“What is going to be the next step for me?”
“Should I go into management, architecture or should I grow as an IC?”
“What particular skills should I be learning next?”
These questions were always on my mind.
My growth was stagnating because I didn’t know that.
I am very goal-oriented and I felt a lot less motivated and driven because I didn’t know what is the next step for me.
Once it became clear in which path I wished to progress → I became a lot more motivated and my drive + overall energy grew substantially.
It's really important that you at least have some idea in which direction you wish to grow.
If you know in which path you wish to grow, it's a much bigger chance you'll actually get there.
To help you with this, I am sharing what particular paths are available out there.
Here is what you can expect after Senior Engineer
My recommendation is to grow to Senior Engineer position first before you think of moving to any other paths.
There are 3 main paths in which you can grow:
IC path (Staff Engineer, Principal Engineer, Distinguished Engineer)
Management path (Team Lead, Engineering Manager, Director of Engineering, VP of Engineering)
Architect path (Software Architect, Senior Software Architect, Staff Software Architect, Principal Software Architect)
Not every company has the exact same title names and all the paths available, but these are the 3 main paths that are used widely across companies.
Now, let’s get into my recommendation on which particular path you should choose based on your preferences and your strengths.
Here is my recommendation on which path to choose
When to choose the IC path:
You like to be very much in details.
Learning new concepts and patterns is what you like to do.
You like to be an expert in particular technologies that you work with.
You like to ensure that coding style guides and guidelines are up-to-date and well-defined across different teams.
You believe in mentoring others and helping them grow as engineers by providing them with technical support.
When to choose the Management path:
You like to communicate with different people regarding the requirements of a specific project.
You like to make sure that the team is aligned regarding stakeholder expectations and deliverables.
If you believe that you can contribute to the team’s success a lot more with non-technical skills like communication, alignment, accountability, help, and support, it’s certainly a good path for you.
You are one of the first people to speak up if something can be improved and you are not afraid to take ownership and responsibility for projects.
You see yourself as a generalist rather than a specialist.
You are very focused on trying to improve the engineering process and seek potential improvements.
When to choose the Architect path:
You like to stay technical, but have a desire to focus on the big picture a lot more than really fine details.
You still need to be good at understanding the details and good practices, but your main focus is going to be to think about the codebase and architecture ahead of time.
You enjoy defining blueprints and plans that are going to be successful long term.
You like to anticipate and talk about constraints and potential problems before implementing a solution.
Engineering Career Path Guide
Learn more about my suggestions and insights on which path to take in this guide.
Paid subscribers, you can get the guide here: 🎁 Products for paid subscribers
Make sure to find out what is going to be the next step for you
Here is my recommendation on how to find out your path:
My recommendation is to create a pros and cons list → list what are your pros (strengths) + what are your cons (weaknesses) and try to find the right path for you. It’s important that you are honest with yourself.
And once you have that → compare that with the recommendations, that I mentioned above.
My suggestion is to also talk to various people and ask questions.
Especially if they are currently in the role, which you are interested to know more about. That’s how you’ll get more context and develop a better idea if it’s the right path for you.
Notion Template: Decide Your Career Path
To help you with the path suggestion, here is a helpful pros and cons list template that you can use.
Paid subscribers, you can get the template here: 🎁 Products for paid subscribers