Moving back to an IC position

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I have been working as a manager of engineers for four years and am now back in the role of an individual contributor (IC).

Since this is not something I do not read much about online, I tried to write a complete article. Hopefully, this will be insightful.

Oh, I used an interview format just for fun but it's really just me here.

So you left Mercado Livre?

Indeed I did. After almost two years in the biggest Marketplace in Latin America and its fintech Mercado Pago, my time came to depart.

I learned a great deal over there like navigating through a very large organization, dealing with dozens if not hundreds of stakeholders, deploying/monitoring apps to millions of users and doing all of this half of the time in a new language, Spanish.

My key takeaway here is that change from one company to another is hard but rewarding in the middle to long term. You learn way more out of your comfort zone and in a different environment. Plus I gained experience managing mobile (iOS/Android) developers.

How did the process go?

After a bit of reflection, I went back to job searches. First of all, by contacting fellow engineers, designers, and EMs I know. Many good opportunities get filled by recommendations and I saw that happen a lot in the past. As Luciano Santos wrote in his great book "Be Selfish with your Career" (my translation from Portuguese) or "Seja egoísta com sua carreira" (https://linktr.ee/lucianoresponde (opens in a new tab)), use your network, it is a very valuable asset in your professional life.

I also checked on several job boards, around 20, and got back in touch with recruiters who had contacted me through LinkedIn in the past months.

Quick tip moment: I try to always respond politely to a recruiter even a bit late. You never know when you might need to get back in touch the other way.

One thing that I quickly realized was the fewer number of engineering management positions available compared to the last time I looked for a role in 2022. I do not have a chart available but it would be interesting to make a timeline with several job boards to see the rough amount of open (known) positions for those roles. My impression is that in 2024 H1, there were not so many openings compared to 2022 H1.

Now I have to make way for an ex-colleague of mine who became a friend. We had a chat a few weeks after my leave, and talking about positions and companies, he brought my attention to the fact that no EM positions were available at his company but that several IC positions were. IC frontend. See where I'm going?

Quick tip: Again, use your network, and cultivate it. If it is comprised of friends in the business, even better. I frequently meet for a beer with ex-colleagues who became friends in Rio, ICs and EMs, and we have a great time sharing good ideas and contacts.

So, what do you do when the kind of job you are looking for does not seem to hire that much? Well, you look for alternatives. And the one that made its way through my head was that of, drumrolls, Software Engineer Frontend. Ok, that one was easy. So here I went, expanding my searches to IC positions too.

What about the hiring process for IC?

A few contacts and calls later, I started interviewing for both positions. First of all, I created a simple sheet with every company I was getting in touch with. This is a tremendous help in the search. I used a basic Googler Drive/Sheet solution for easy access via desktop and cellphone. In the process, I discovered an app that acts as a career agent. If you want to check it out, there it is: https://commit.dev (opens in a new tab)

Some numbers on my sheet:

In parallel, I adjusted my LinkedIn profile, updated my website at https://kevinchevallier.me (opens in a new tab), and invested in a brand-new laptop. I used to work with the company's computer and use my old desktop for personal projects. But it was clear that with the interview processes to come and the training I wanted to do, this would not go well. So I invested in a good machine and it paid off, I was able to train well for the interviews and was at peace when the first online meetings started. Good hardware lets you focus on what you need to do and not how you will do it.

The interview training was something that paid off as well. I was a bit nervous to tackle those from the other side because I was more often on the hiring side rather than the candidate's, and the last time I had done an IC interview was in 2017.

So I sat down and looked at interview processes for ICs as of 2024. I came upon the https://www.greatfrontend.com (opens in a new tab) website that possesses great resources, especially about the System Design step. I picked up online themes and trained out loud in front of my computer as well as wrote down pages of designs.

Quick tip: Use a style that suits you, for example, I learn well by writing in a physical notebook.

I also trained the Coding Challenge step with online links to real challenges. Here is one Github repo that lists a few: https://github.com/felipefialho/frontend-challenges (opens in a new tab)

Finally, I went a bit further in terms of code training and rewrote my personal project https://bolao.io (opens in a new tab) to a new major version with NextJS, and Typescript. It's still not 100% finished but the functionalities are ok. I knew those technologies would be important to learn so I did an intensive training.

Quick tip: Try to find out what your potential next company uses and work on it if you are not that familiar with it.

And you got a job offer in the end, right?

Yes, I did. I moved back to my previous company as an individual contributor. Several factors made me decide to make this move.

First of all, the people there. Even after two years out, I knew that I would be back in an environment I liked a lot with great co-workers. People I remembered well, great developers and designers I loved to work with.

Second, the possibility to go back to the office whenever I want. My new position is remote-first but I can go any day to the office. This is a great plus I think, allowing me to see people face-to-face and exercise more by simply going to the office building. Remote work is great with the freedom it gives me but a mix of both is the perfect combination for me now.

Third, I always loved writing frontend code, and as said above, I never stopped testing things on my own and working on my projects. So I am excited to get back to this position and I think that my years as an engineering manager will greatly help me in the future.

So what is your new title and did you get a similar salary?

I recently got my copy of the Software Engineer's Guidebook (opens in a new tab) by Gergely Orosz and it was great to read about the "switching jobs" chapter before actually making the move myself. Gergely tells about downlevelling and in my case this is what happened. I went from four years as an engineer manager to a senior software engineer. Nothing super frustrating but when thinking of a typical career growth it might feel like downlevelling indeed. Truth is, I am not really concerned about this and think that my years as EM will pay off in the middle to long term.

I won't bring any number here aside from one: 20%. I accepted a 20% drop in salary between those two positions. At first, it seemed like a bummer but after four weeks in the position, I'm sure I made the right move and I'm no longer bothered by it.

And what about your First impressions?

It is still super early to tell. Four weeks in the position now. Globally, I'm loving writing frontend code again, even if it still is at a slow pace. I got to get up to date with tools, like Typescript, testing environments, new CI/CD setup, a new product context, etc. So I'm still not at full development capacity but warming up. It also feels great to be back in the office when I want, and exchange with old colleagues as well as meet new ones.

Last question, what about the future of EMTalks?

Good point. I think I'll keep on writing on it for a while. As said above, I do not see many articles out there about "migrating back" to an IC position and it could therefore be interesting to tell how it's going. Plus since it's really my project, I can even rename it to something else, and make it evolve.

Last thoughts?

One yes! I learned that the EMTalks event was still happening on a frequent basis at VTEX. So that really made me happy.

Last tip: Go ahead, build, organize, and maintain that project you believe in. Who knows the impact it might bring to others or yourself? (Hopefully a good one :)

© Kevin Chevallier.RSS