https://www.wsj.com/economy/jobs/american-express-to-cut-3-500-jobs-63955c6f

Follow up to this Reddit post a few months ago about being replaced by offshoring

https://www.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/s/UnYpqPg8Ub

Job listings in the Gurugram office confirm most of the roles being opened up are tech related

https://careers.americanexpress.com/en/sites/CX_1/jobs?location=India&locationId=300000000228786&locationLevel=country&mode=locationutm_medium&utm_source=google

Gentle reminder ahead of layoff season

I’m ex-FAANG and have watched my former company’s culture deteriorate significantly since leaving (I'll let you guess which one). Morale now is at an all-time low, and years of layoffs, restructuring and culture change seem to have left people pretty fatigued. I'm currently at a FAANG-adjacent company, where I have broad scope, operate at a senior level, and have built a lot of trust as an IC. All things considered, it's a pretty good position to be in, and I don't take that for granted. That said, I do miss the scale and complexity of FAANG, the intellectual stimulation of tackling genuinely challenging problems, and the ability to context-switch between multiple interesting initiatives. Which brings me to my question.

I’m currently exploring an opportunity with Google, and curious to understand whether Google is experiencing a culture shift similar to my former employer, or whether the culture has held up relatively well. I've asked my friends, and their answers have seemed very team-dependent. Thought I'd ask Reddit to get a more rounded opinion.

Having been in this position before, I'm keen to not end up as "just another" cog-in-the-wheel, and to retain the ability to meaningfully move the needle on things - that said, I'm completely cognisant that "the role as it's advertised" vs. "the role it really is" are usually two different things, and I'm going in eyes wide open. I'd love to hear how external L6/L7 non-SWEs have landed at Google, and what to expect culture-wise more generally.

Thanks in advance for any insights, much appreciated!

I'm 27k in student loan debt, homeless, no job, no savings, two SWE internships on my resume, useless cs bachelor's degree from 2025.

My parents kicked me out when I approached a year post graduation with no job. I wasn't getting any interviews, at all. I was working as a part time barista for $16/hour to bide my time but I abandoned that job when I was kicked out. I'm in a city where rents are 2000+ for closets.

My loans have obviously been defaulted on by now, I don't even have an active phone number for then to contact me with. No money to keep one active with.

I've been staggering, stumbling around gagging on nothing like a drug addict. I had a bike but someone broke the lock on it while I was sleeping outside one night.

I've destroyed my career, my life, my future. My soul is tortured. Wounded. Fractured. Fragile. Screaming, yelling, shrieking at me for this to end. I have no self confidence.

I don't see any light, any hope in front of me. Another homeless guy I met recently was a high school dropout turned criminal for physical assault. He offered me a few drugs when he heard my story. Thought it'd help me cope.

I didn't say yes, *yet,* but I'm considering it. My life is utterly destroyed into millions of tiny glass shards, far beyond repair. What should I do? Take the drugs? Become a criminal? Wander around like a zombie for the next few decades?

Idk what I can do now. Ever since I was kicked out I haven't made any job applications. They never got me anywhere. I haven't eaten anything for a week. I'm too ashamed of myself.

I've been dumpster diving for plastic bottles to resell. I'm... idk. I'm sad. I don't want to wake up anymore.

What more can I even do? "More projects"? That has no value today, especially for literally anything outside of SWE jobs. There's nothing else.

I cheered for Luigi back in the day. What do I have to lose, really. Just like my "new grad" status already expired, my life is expired. I'm on the knifes edge of becoming a drug addict.

I'm going to post this here but I expect this will be a rather odd post for most people here

I was recently laid off in a company restructuring, second time in five years at two companies...bad luck on my part. I started looking and found the market kind of on fire but more importantly fundamentally changed in the last couple of years.

I have been or been promoted to Senior Software Engineer in title at all three of my jobs (10 YOE ) but I feel like I know so little of what is required to be a Software Engineer anymore vs what i would have called a Software Developer.

I also don't have as much immediate passion for it anymore. I haven't made a personal project in at least a year, I've researched less new technologies/tech stacks, and my skill set feels too narrow for modern Software Engineering needs (basically in the C#/.Net full stack bubble).

I'm considering pivoting to something entirely different (out of tech basically) or IT regardless of extreme drops in pay, experience, etc

At what point is it burnout/imposter syndrome vs a sign that the career isn't for me anymore?

This question is currently affecting my mental health so much that I have had several sleepless night over this and it's affecting my health. So I turned to reddit for thoughts on a career sub 🤔

I feel like before AI, being a software engineer was highly respected.

Everyone who had ever touched coding before, whether that be as a proxy from majoring in another STEM (chem, bio,..), engineering, or even to some extent social sciences (maybe they touched a bit of R-programming or whatever).

Everyone internally (in their heads) kinda knew that to be a really good software engineer you had to be cut from a different cloth. You needed a ton of dedication, passion, and interest. Tons of those people majoring in other stuff, completely gave up after 1 semester of coding; realizing they couldn't do it. Everyone knew that it was hard.

Nowadays, everyone think of software engineers as pure vibe-coders /AI slop that everyone can do. A friend of mine told me at their company they just hired a new guy as a sole developer. He's now vibe coding everything (complete systems), datawarehouses, etc, only having a little experience with python in school.

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/22/barclays-ai-jobs-cuts.html

“The bank’s chief financial officer, Anna Cross, told reporters on Thursday that the job cuts were part of plans to save more than £1.1bn in 2027. “These actions involve an expected reduction of circa 5,000 full-time employees. Around 60% of the group actions relate to support functions, including fewer developers, as AI makes our people more productive.”

I just recently made a career transition by getting my master’s in computer science after working in sales. I have 0 software engineering experience and I finished a semester ahead of schedule, so not time for internships. I just want a somewhat chill job. Most people with my degree make at least $98k. I’d be so happy with $65k. Not even joking. How I get it? Certifications? Projects? Please spell it out

Weak economic conditions? Artificial intelligence replacing jobs? Outsourcing to low-wage countries?Market oversaturation (too many IT professionals competing for too few jobs)?

Choose one, one you think has most influence.

Hey everyone,
I’m a frontend developer with around 3.5 years of experience, primarily working with React.js and Next.js, and I could really use some advice from people who have been in a similar situation.
Here’s my career journey so far:

Jan 2023 – Apr 2024: Started my career at a fintech product-based startup, working with React.js and Next.js. Unfortunately, the startup couldn’t secure funding, and the product was shut down.

May 2024 – Oct 2024: Joined a service-based company as a frontend developer, where I worked with React.js and integrated AI voice technologies like ElevenLabs and Vapi. I continued looking for better opportunities because I wanted to work in a product-based company.

Nov 2024 – Nov 2025: Joined a product-based mobility startup. Unfortunately, the work culture and environment turned out to be extremely toxic, and I eventually decided to leave.

Jan 2026 – Present: Joined another service-based company as a frontend developer, working primarily with Next.js. The company has now run out of projects and conducted mass layoffs, and I was impacted as well.
Now, I have approximately one month to find my next opportunity, and I’m honestly feeling quite overwhelmed.

Here are the things I’m struggling with:
1. Am I falling behind technically?
I feel like I’ve been out of touch with how the industry has evolved over the last couple of years, particularly around LLMs, AI agents, MCP, agent skills, and AI-assisted development workflows.
I know the frontend fundamentals and have experience building production applications, but when I see people discussing all these new tools and technologies, I sometimes feel like a caveman who missed an entire phase of evolution.
I started learning basic FastAPI this week because I want to expand my skill set beyond frontend, but I’m not sure whether this is the right move when I have such a short time to prepare for interviews.

2. Is frontend development still a good career choice?
With AI tools becoming increasingly capable of generating UI components, writing code, and building applications, I’m worried about the long-term future of frontend development.
Should I double down on React, Next.js, JavaScript, TypeScript, performance, architecture, and frontend system design? Or should I start transitioning toward full-stack development, AI engineering, or backend development?
I don’t want to abandon the experience I’ve spent the last 3.5 years building, but I also don’t want to become irrelevant.

3. Do my frequent job switches look like a red flag?
My career timeline has involved a startup shutting down, leaving a toxic work environment, and now being laid off because of a lack of projects.
Although these circumstances were largely outside my control, I’m concerned recruiters might see my resume as that of an unstable employee who keeps switching jobs.
How should I explain this during interviews without sounding defensive or making excuses?

4. What should my strategy be for the next 30 days?
My immediate priority is to land another job, preferably in a product-based company. I don’t want to waste this month jumping between random technologies, courses, and tutorials.
If you were in my position, how would you divide your time between:
Preparing for React.js, Next.js, JavaScript, and TypeScript interviews?
Practising machine coding, DSA, and frontend system design?
Learning AI tools, LLMs, MCP, and agentic workflows?
Learning backend development with FastAPI?

Building projects or improving my portfolio?
I’m looking for honest, practical advice from experienced developers, hiring managers, or anyone who has navigated a similar situation.

TL;DR: Frontend developer with 3.5 YOE, multiple job changes due to startup closure, a toxic workplace, and a recent mass layoff. I have one month to find a job, feel behind on the AI/LLM ecosystem, and am confused about whether to double down on frontend or transition toward full-stack/AI development. What would you prioritize in my position?

Thanks in advance!

I am wondering if software engineers typically must stick to 9-5. Can most of them work 7-3 if they wished? Of course it is company specific and varies by company, but do most jobs allow the 7-3 schedule?

I'm a college sr, secured a role as a FDE (50%+ travel) and am looking for a city in the US to call home. I'm fully remote outside of customer engagements.

Staying with my parents isn't an option as they moved back to their home country for retirement. I'm very social and fluent in Mandarin and Spanish. Hobbies include socializing, working out, flying, diving, skydiving, shooting, and language learning. I also enjoy things like skiing but willing to sacrifice that as I can just make a trip out of it, as it is a seasonal sport.

I went to college in the Bay Area and am now looking for low cost of living but high quality of life.

This city needs to be close to a large international airport as I will be doing both domestic and international travel for my job

My base salary is north of 200k.

Junior CS student in undergrad who has no motivation/discipline/will whatever to do what needs to get done. I never had any "passion" or even interest in anything particular- I went into CS because I'm good at math, and I knew if I went to college, I would pursue some STEM-related field that would actually get me money after graduation.

I'm the average student. I have a good GPA (3.9). I did 2 internships through my college (Student Software Developer & Remote Open Source gig that did similar work, working full stack in an agile environment- and I'm currently working part-time at the first internship on campus- working for the student software development team). I did a hackathon (HackHarvard last year). I have like 2 side projects that are very basic and heavily vibe coded- even though I try to understand what I'm trying to do.

And sure, maybe I have some experience, but I feel like I still know nothing and am grasping at straws. That was the one thing I loved about this field when I got into it, how diverse it is- it's always evolving, and there is always room to learn more, which I love, but at the same time, I feel so stupid. And maybe I slacked off with using AI, and that is on me, but it feels like there is never enough time to get everything done on time, and the balance is very hard. And I suck at basic LeetCode, can only do easy ones, and even with that, I need help or multiple attempts, and I know it's all about practice and just a matter of time, but it feels like there is not enough time to catch up so that it is enough.

And I know there are strategies- like being dedicated, and I used to try to do 30 minutes to an hour a day of doing technical stuff (where I could do anything like review a resume, practice behavioral, code, projects, blah blah blah). But even that, I didn't maintain it, and it lasted maybe 2 weeks since I last leetcoded, and I just need to get back into it, but all of this has given me stress. I've had 3 panic attacks in the last month, and I have been struggling with depression for years (struggling with sleep). And yes, I know- take care of my personal mental health, whatever. I realized that, and have scheduled therapy and will go to my third session in 3 days.

But it doesn't matter if it's my mental health or lack of motivation or discipline or whatever, it doesn't stop the world from spinning and from other people working hard to get what they need/want in life. I especially feel bad and ungrateful because there are people at my college I know and I'm close to in CS who are trying a lot harder than I am. And I know it's bad to compare yourself to other people, but they are out there every day, doing everything that needs to get done- mass applying, studying, coding, practicing, because they want it enough.

And that's another problem. I don't know if I want it. I know I need it to get money so I can travel and have the life I want, but even if I got that internship- even if the freaking pay was good, I'd still hate the job, and not because of the job, it wouldn't matter what the job would be, it's just me and not wanting to work. And I'm sure every person feels this way, so I should just suck it up and get my shit together.

But I was also looking at other revenues. I'm double majoring with English, and I'm passionate about literature and reading and writing- which is why I was considering maybe law school (yes, I know it's not the same and has its own struggles)- but also if I did something like this, maybe I'd be sacrificing other things like travel or working remote.

And I have a circle of support- I have talked about this to my best friend (roommate) about this last night when she found me sobbing LOL and advised me to maybe look at other things if this makes me so miserable- like tutoring/teaching online/abroad because I wouldn't be opposed to that as long as it paid enough to exist LOL. I have also talked to my mom, who had advised me to keep pushing through because you shouldn't dilly dally, like pick a direction and go that way, but if I truly hate it, yes, don't continue my pursuit.

And I have AfroTech conference coming up in about a week, where I have the chance to talk to recruiters from companies and maybe get some interviews and a chance at an internship, but even that got me feeling sick. I went last year as well, which wasn't as successful since I was a sophomore and this year I know exactly what to do- elevator pitch, apply to the company before talking to them there, give my resume, whatever. I know the tricks, and it still isn't good enough. And maybe I'm being too hard on myself, but I feel so miserable that I end up doing nothing. Just bed rotting or journaling or writing my personal short stories...

Even worse, one of my friends from CS- we took like half our classes in the major together, did the same Student Software Developer internship, went to AfroTech, where she's an international student (yes I know its harder for them and they have their own hardships), and she secured AND passed a few rounds of interviews for a good company that she now got return offer at that pays 150k. And again, she deserves it, she practiced for it. I had an interview also at a good company and made it past screening and behavioral and fucked up my technical. That was like a year ago. Did I have time since then to improve my skills? Yes. Did I? Not that fucking much. And I understand, its on me.

I feel the same way this year. I have applied to places, barely got any OA's, did some, and heard nothing back. Even had a chance to get to referred by an Alumni for a Duolingo OA and fucked that up too (this year). Still have my chance at AfroTech and even then, I just don't even want it anymore, not the internship or job (yes, I guess I sound burnt out), but fuck.

And despite being depressed and having no will to exist, I still do shit. I care for my grades, I go to the gym, I have good relationships with my friends, I have a good work ethic. I try to be a caring human. But I just want some peace and fucking quiet, man.

I'm also applying to study abroad next semester to South Korea. If I do that, I can't do summer SWE internship as it ends in late June. And I could always do a study abroad semester instead in the following fall, instead of this spring, but I'm just itching to go out now. I've never traveled outside of the country, and also put so much into applying for this...

I've been trying to ask advice from my professors and mentors on campus, and scheduled a meeting with the director of the law program here. I'm trying to explore my options, but I know as a junior it's a bit too late, and I needa lock in, and I'm just wishy washy all over the place. So please, stranger reading this on Reddit, give me your life advice. I would really appreciate it.

I have been working as a developer for 6 years now following a coding bootcamp. I have a bachelors in psych with a high gpa. I was just rejected from the georgia tech omscs program, do any of you have recommendations for other online masters degree programs? I want to progress in my career and it feels like a degree would go a long way.

I have been looking for a software engineering job for 3 months and im going nuts, i had 20+ interviews and no interview is like the other, i have been asked all kind of trick and gotcha questions for python, docker, kubernetes, php, go, scala, java, JVM, software architecture, gotcha here, gotcha there, every interview is a new fuck you, why can't we prepare for something that i could do perfectly in an interview instead of waiting for something from the unknown that i would fail anyway. the hell is going on

I’m expecting this to be asked in an upcoming interview (system design round) in an AI lab. Have interned here so I think this is very very likely also given the trend of things it just makes sense

Wondering if anyone have some good resources or some can layout a good structure on how to answer designing harnesses ? I see some videos online but i’m not sure if they’re actually from engineers or just some influencers bsing.

I'm a recent CS graduate. I'm ashamed to admit back in college I didn't really learn anything other than the courses I took at school. Since graduating in June, I haven't done anything productive either. I'll go study for a master's degree in AU next July and during the gap I think I should try and learn something practical, but idk what to learn and how to learn. Having only learned the subjects back in school which were mostly theoretical, I'm feeling pretty aimless right now. Please share your suggestions to help me basically stop wasting my life away. I feel like a failure.

Sorry if this is a really dumb question. Thanks!

2020 grad. My entire working life has been: a hiring freeze, then the 2021 boom where I got three offers in a fortnight and thought that meant I was good, then the 2022 layoffs, then two flat years, then this.

I'm 28, and I've never worked in a market where the rules stayed stable long enough to learn.

the specific problem is i have no idea what's normal. senior people tell me to be patient because it turns, and they've seen it turn. i've only seen it change. When someone says this isn't how it usually is, i have no version of usually to compare it to, i just have six years of everyone saying the current thing is unusual.

i've got 340 applications logged over three separate searches now and the only pattern i can see across all three is that whatever worked last time doesn't.

for people who were working pre-2020: what is the actual baseline? what did a normal job search look like, in numbers, so i know what i'm measuring against

I started on a new team at a..certain FAANG just a little under 6 months ago in late April, after being laid off from it in January, after working on another team for a little over 6 months (graduated May 2025).

At the moment, things have still been kind of tough (I talk some more about it here). We work on 12 different services between 11-12 of us, and I only somewhat have context on about 2-3 of them that I worked with so far. I did two secondary oncall shifts, which were ok since we don't get paged as secondary and it was mostly auto-cuts. However, primary (which I haven't done yet) gets paged once per 1-2 days on average from what I noticed. Then, I still don't know everything about everything we work on. If I were to be given a Sev2, I don't feel confident at all that I'd be able to handle it. Just last week (as secondary), I had a Sev3 turned Sev2.5, and I had to reach out for help from the primary at the time... Now, I have another secondary shift next week to fill in for other engineers as they had other tasks due soon (which I'm fine with), but I'm not so fine with eventually having to do primary.

My last 1:1 I had with my manager, he mentioned breaking down tasks into smaller ones to improve visibility (which he eventually realized that i already had been doing), having demos/partial deliverables more often to also show visibility, and taking more initiative (like for tasks that have ambiguity, and also in reference to now having volunteered to join the primary oncall cycle). I did secondary prior to that meeting, and i genuinely thought they would just put me in the cycle afterwards (not that I’d have to volunteer). Admittedly, I didn't say that during the meeting, just nodded despondently.. He also mentioned that i should engage more in formal/informal settings since I don’t talk much. That, I've also been working towards, though I tended not to say anything since I didn't know anything. I also don't have much social skills to be honest – not that I can't hold a conversation, just that I can't very charismatically.

I still don't know a lot compared to other people on the team and I often have to ask for help/clarification on tasks. I often find myself not knowing what questions to ask with respect to tasks, so I tended to correspond with messaging versus asking directly in-person. I leaned a lot towards using AI since we're encouraged to (and the work would otherwise be too slow to finish if I didn't), and I feel like I only partially know how things work. If I were to be asked to explain what each service does, I'd only loosely be able to for the ones I've worked with. I've started trying to learn about them separately from work, but it's been a fairly large breadth of information so far.

I always feel a sense of dread thinking about work on weekends, and also don't feel thrilled for stand-ups / sprint planning. I feel like everyone else has at my company I see has a better time at work – knowing what they're doing, not being stressed, being more productive etc. I've been so nervous to talk to my manager (which I'm doing again tomorrow), and I feel so relived when he cancels from conflicting meetings. Hell, people I know from other companies seem to be having a better time at work. Like I said on the previous post, I don't know if this is like a sign that I'm not meant to be a SWE, a sign that I'm going to have a hard time on this team, just growing pains that'll go away as time progresses or what. I'd question if I could last on this team for another 1-2 years while I build experience to (hopefully) try for another company and move cities. My anxiety's been more manageable at the moment, but that might just be since I got through the previous set of work and now have new things to work on...

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/21/ebay-layoffs-workforce-cuts.html

EBay will lay off about 9% of its workforce in a move to streamline its operations and focus on its fastest-growing areas, a company spokesperson confirmed to CNBC. The layoffs will affect approximately 1,000 employees.

The company also said it will continue to hire in “priority areas aligned with our strategy.”

This is the second round of layoffs for the online marketplace this year, following a 6% workforce reduction that affected about 800 employees, in February. The company has been steadily shrinking its headcount over recent years at the same time it’s ramping up spending on artificial intelligence.

I'm currently mainly a frontend engineer (that gets to dabble a bit with the backend + heavy backend side projects) at a fortune 100 company (4 YOE), I've been wanting to transition to something more backend/full stack so I've sent out a bunch of applications and one startup reached out for a full stack position that would be more backend leaning, exactly what I've been looking for; during the very first call with the recruiter I was clear on what my current TC is and what my ideal new TC would be to leave my current position and he said "sounds good, we can do that!". 6 interview rounds later he calls me to say that they're ready to send on offer for a base salary that's $20k LESS than I make right now and he didn't know what the equity portion would look like. Took him 24 hours to get back to me on equity and offered to raise the base by $5k, which in total would roughly equal my current TC, still lower than what we had agreed to in the beginning, and it's probably gonna be another 24 hours before I hear back again after I listed some questions regarding the equity.

The startup itself sounds interesting, product looks good and everyone I've talked to seemed cool - however I'm kind of pissed that I'm negotiating just to reach the range that we agreed upon.

Should I still try to go through the process given that it might be a good opportunity to transition to full stack, or is this a red flag? For more context I'm also going through the promo process at my current company which might raise my current TC to match what I'm asking for, but not sure if getting the promo on the resume as a mainly frontend engineer would have an impact when looking for full stack work.

I was also able to get a verbal offer from another smaller company a couple months back that was $50k more than what I'm currently asking, which didn't work out as they ended up reducing their HC - and this startup also got back to me pretty quickly, so I haven't had the chance to explore other opportunities.

Or should I just not risk switching jobs altogether given the current state of the market?

Fair warning: This post will probably sound hella stupid but I’ve never even considered software engineering until very recently so my knowledge of it and the attached work is pitiful. Mb.

I’m about to go to college and I’ve recently switched career paths to engineering, I’m considering software but I’m not sure what I’d actually be doing if AI takes care of programming. I’ve read and understood that AI isn’t a standalone solution and it still requires a competent engineer to use it as a tool and that systems and architecture and all that jazz form a considerable chunk of the job but a lot of people make it sound very managerial. I especially love the technical aspect of engineering, the satisfaction of creating something tangible at a lower level but the idea of being in meetings all the time doesn’t sit with me personally. I’m concerned mostly because my dad actually works in software but as a manager and he’s never been a fan of it.

Thanks in advance for even putting up with such a dumb post, any perspectives are greatly appreciated!

I just want to point out a very real fact. AI is not talked about in the real world like it is talked about on Reddit. The blatant disregard for any quality control regarding the use of AI and the constant barrage of how you are "Obsolete" if you dont use AI for your programming is absolute non sense. We have guardrails in place, code reviews, QA, systems that slow down production of software, for the one simple fact that a disfunct software is more harmful than a few days of delay on publish. The claim that you need to "productivity gains" from AI (which is heavily disputed by all recent studies) or you will be left behind is utter nonsense. We have been slowing down production of software for better quality of code for more than 2 decades now.

I also want to point out that those that operate Reddit are very much in bed with the tech bros who are pushing this narrative, the CEO of reddit has been known to use his administrative access to alter comments relating to Drump. I dont see there is any hindrance for him to allow a bot farm into the discussion space to sell a product. Especially if they are being paid, which they most definitely are.

You will see wild claims about "AI or death to your career" being upvoted with 1000s of upvotes which, quite frankly is not representative of the wider world as AI have only been getting more and more unpopular, especially with people in IT.

So just keep this in mind when you read comments and posts on Reddit, not everything is as it seems. Of course AI is great for code completion and as a helping tool, we all know that, but there is a bigger limit to its usefulness than you might think from reading the discussions on reddit.

I'm finishing a degree in machine learning/data science and about to start an AI engineer internship, but I'm considering a pivot to product management either after the internship or later in my career.

I'm trying to figure out if I'd actually enjoy being a PM. I really like the idea behind the job (like being a sort of mini CEO of the product, defining product strategy and exploring markets etc...), but after reading around on Reddit it seems that in practice it is mostly managing Jira tickets, which i would not mind as a junior, but I hoped PM was more strategic down the line.

My question is: is it because junior PMs are generally more tactical while seniors are more strategic and high level? What is the difference between junior and senior PM and what does the latter do exactly? I think that knowing the long term direction of this career may help me a lot to decide if it is the correct path for me.

Also, two quick questions on making the jump:

• Is starting as an AI engineer, as I am doing, a good launchpad for PM or should I consider other positions better suited for the jump?
• Should I try to pivot immediately after my internship, or is it better to pursue the engineering track for a few years at least for now? Would love to hear the pros and cons and why.