Ex-Meta ‘Coding Machine’ Shares 3 Mistakes Software Engineers Make

What mistakes can stall a career in software engineering?

Meta’s former so-called “Coding Machine” recently spoke about some pitfalls developers should avoid.

Michael Novati, a former senior staff engineer at the social media company, recently appeared on the podcast “The Peterman Pod” and shared his advice. He honed in on a handful of mistakes engineers commonly make, including some that he made himself.

The first is “not turning the gears and not doing anything,” he said.

“A lot of people who ask me for advice or questions, they’re like thinking too much about what to do and not doing enough,” he said. “So, step one is do something, just do anything.”

The second mistake he highlighted is “not getting feedback from the right people.”

He gave the example of a coding boot camp grad getting feedback from someone who finished a boot camp six months before them.

“That feedback, it doesn’t encapsulate that experience and taste and that judgment that you want to learn from,” he said. “It encapsulates the judgment of someone who’s like a little tiny bit further ahead of you.”

Instead, he said, you want to get feedback from people who “have the judgment and taste that you aspire to.”

And, of course, you have to know what to do with those assessments.

One common mistake is “not actioning the feedback” and focusing too much on results, he said.

“If someone gives you feedback and you’re taking it as like a judgment or an approval, you want to pass the test, and it’s like you failed, and you want to pass it, and you’re not actually reflecting on the feedback,” he said. “You’re not going to iterate fast enough. You’re not going to make enough changes. You might change the wrong things because you’re not accepting the feedback.”

Novati said he struggled with this himself.

But by focusing on doing the work and getting and acting on feedback, “you can accelerate your progress so much,” he said.