Senior Mindset Book

Are you tired of babysitting from your boss? Do you want more autonomy? Looking to solve bigger challenges? Dreaming of those $300,000+/year compensation packages?

You're not alone.

Getting the senior title is easy – just stick around. But to be a true senior, you need a way of thinking that goes beyond the code. That's what unlocks your career.

The backstory

When I came to Silicon Valley in 2015 I thought I was the shit. Able to solve any tech problem you threw at me, running circles around complexity, eating bugs for breakfast. Got my first Senior Software Engineer title and a 6-figure paycheck. Top of the world 🚀

3 years later the startup ran its first performance review. I walked into that room full of myself. Definitely the best engineer on the team, solving the hardest problems, writing the best code. Crushing it.

The CTO took a deep breath and said "Swizec, you're a great programmer, the best we've got. Everything else, though ... terrible. You'd be fired if it wasn't for your history with the founders and the fact your immigration is tied to this job"

I was crushed.

How can you be both the best engineer and failing as a senior engineer? What's going on here?

I made it my mission to figure that out and wrote essays along the way. The Senior Engineer Mindset ebook is the collection of my best essays on the mindset of a true senior engineer. The tips and tricks that unlocked my career.

At a different company now people trust me to

• lead initiatives across multiple teams,
• choose technologies,
• do whatever I think needs doing

And I get to work with product managers to define our roadmap, assess feasibility, and prioritize how we tackle business goals. That part is my favorite: negotiating scope before it becomes a problem.

Plus the extra autonomy comes with a 60% higher salary than before the pandemic, which is nice 😊

If that sounds interesting, keep reading.

The updated Senior Engineer Mindset book + audio

The Senior Engineer Mindset ebook is a 308 page collection of essays from my time in Silicon Valley. You can binge the pdf/epub or wait for each chapter to hit your inbox.

Lessons learned from crash landing as a hotshot solopreneur and freelancer, joining a seed stage company, growing to $1mm ARR, jumping ship, and growing the business from 50 to 350 employees in 18 months. With an eye-popping $100,000,000 Series B to boot.

How I approach technical decisions, writing code, and own outcomes has changed. A lot.

With the Senior Engineer Mindset book + audio package, you'll gain that same perspective and insight to grow your own career and become a true senior engineer. You'll gain autonomy, responsibility, and the trust of your peers.

If you've ever thought "Why does That Guy get to do the cool stuff and I'm stuck here building my 50th checkout form??" this is the essay collection for you.

The collection comes with 16 recorded interviews on the mindset and practices of a senior engineer as a private podcast feed and soon an audiobook with exclusive commentary. You get full access to future updates.

Table of Contents

On being a senior engineer

• Why senior engineers get nothing done
• What makes you a senior software engineer anyway?
• Computer science is not software engineering

Mindset

• A lesson on expertise from a great mafia movie
• Why engineers are worth so much
• What if engineers were paid like athletes
• Building software is a distraction
• DO more work less
• Why great engineers hack The Process
• 4 years of coding in San Francisco, lessons learned
• Nobody is coming to save you
• How to own projects like a senior engineer
• Tech debt is a tool
• How Grit superchargers your career

Career

• Your career needs a vision
• Working IN your career vs. ON your career
• What a hockey legend can teach you about career development
• How to grow as a senior engineer or why I got a new job
• Why you should talk about engineering salaries
• Should you work at a startup
• Should you take a pay cut for equity
• What I learned while 6x-ing my income in 4 years
• How to make what you're worth even if you're from the wrong country
• When to join and leave a company, project, or trend

Teamwork

• What's more productive, a team or a talented soloist?
• How to succeed as a lead engineer – tactics and mindsets from practice
• Meetings – a senior engineer's secret weapon
• How we made the best burndown chart you've ever seen
• So about that perfect burndown chart ...
• What do collaborative teams look like?

Tactics

• My favorite lessons from Pragmatic Programmer
• What I learned from Software Engineering at Google
• HOW great engineers hack The Process
• When do you fix tech debt?

Price goes up for every 100 purchases.

Price history

Mar 14, 2022 👉 $29

Mar 15, 2022 👉 $39

Mar 21, 2022 👉 $49

Jul 2, 2022 👉 $59

Oct 9, 2022 👉 $39 and $59

Oct 21, 2022 👉 $44 and $69 + purchase power parity

Feb 16, 2023 👉 $49 and $79 + purchase power parity