I wrote about my plan to become a Site Reliability Engineer (SRE) at Google, but recently I found myself gravitating to the new Software Engineering role I discovered at work. That role is called a Customer & Partner Solutions Engineer. Why does this new role interests me so? And why am I moving away from becoming a SRE? I’ll answer the latter question first.
My Reasons Moving To The New Software Engineering Role
I recently had a meeting a SRE manager at Google, and I asked him what I needed to study and/or learn to successfully land that role. He gave me quite the list:
- Continue to improve my skill-set in a particular programming language. I’m currently doing just that.
- Learn about System Design. I added that to my list of things to learn.
- Then learn about System Design involving large infrastructure systems. Okay, that sounds challenging, but I like a good challenge.
- Develop a good knowledge of Data Structures and Algorithms. That was already on my to-learn list.
- Learn about handling very large numbers involving data in a large infrastructure system. This one I had to ask for more clarification on, and even then I’m still a little unsure.
After that the SRE manager told me it took him two months of studying on and off just to prepare for the interview even though he had a plethora of experience. That’s when I got a little iffy about the role. I’m not saying I can’t become a SRE, but I don’t know if I want to invest one to two years of my life preparing for that role. So I thanked the manager for his time, and started thinking about learning the skill-set needed for the new Software Engineering role I recently discovered.
What Is The New Software Engineering Role I Found?
The new Software Engineering role I found is called a Customer & Partner Solutions Engineer. This type of engineer develops technical solutions for customers regarding life-cycle events. The team the job role I found handles Google’s first party and third party authentication.
These engineers also identify technical gaps and other opportunities to reuse solutions or create new code to resolve those issue. In addition, they create technical documentation for the customer’s developers and/or partners.
Finally, and this isn’t an exhaustive list of duties, Customer & Partner Solutions Engineers create tools and dashboards to track and improve efficiency.
Why I Think This Role Fits Better For Me
First, I get to work on problems and find solutions. Thus, I get to perform research and write code to resolve those problems. Next, I also get to work with customers, which I do enjoy doing. I know some people don’t like to work with customers because they can be demanding. Especially if they aren’t sure what they exactly want, but that just means a person like me has to explain what’s doable, and what isn’t. Finally, I have the ability to write technical documentation which I do enjoy too.
The Qualifications Needed For This Role
These are the minimum qualifications:
- Computer Science degree or equivalent practical experience
- Experience with client-side web technologies like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and HTTP
- Experience with one or more programming languages like Java, C/C++, or Python
- Technical troubleshooting experience, and managing internal and external customers
So I have all those skills (except the Computer Science degree). However, I do need to work on the following preferred qualifications:
- Experience in web technologies like XML, databases, SQL queries
- Knowledge of programming languages like Java, Python, and PHP
- The ability to implement web and/or mobile operating system authentication and authorization protocols
- Demonstrate project management and analytical problem solving skills.
These I can learn in about six months with the learning schedule I follow now. That’s why I rather work toward this role.