Career Retrospective: My Journey as an Engineer

Table of Contents

Introduction

Hello, Shoya again.

As I briefly mentioned in my previous self-introduction post, my career path has taken me from Rakuten (Japanese Tech Company) to the US, then to Meta, Google, back to Japan, and now to Kyndryl.

“Which was better, Google or Meta?” This is easily in the top 3 questions I get asked. But answering this is about as difficult as answering “Which is tastier, Burger or Brisket?”

In this post, I’d like to dig a little deeper into my career so far, including these two tech giants, reflecting on what I felt and learned in each place from an engineer’s perspective.

Master’s Degree: Research in the Right Hand, Operations in the Left

I can’t talk about my engineering life without mentioning my time in my Master’s program. It wasn’t so much the graduate school itself, but the environment of the laboratory I belonged to that formed my backbone as an engineer.

It was a slightly unusual (spartan) lab that studied the Internet, with the motto “Research in the right hand, Operations in the left.” I was able to gain “hands-on training” in a wide range of fields, from network construction to server operation and software development.

A particularly memorable experience was a reckless attempt to implement software like DNS and DHCP from scratch in about 3 weeks, reading RFCs, to use in the event network for an Internet research workshop.

At the time, I didn’t know words like software design, scope management, or testing methods. Perhaps due to the mistakes of youth, I got drunk on the “romance of purely functional languages” rather than “feasibility” and made the reckless choice to “implement a DNS cache server in Haskell.” On the battlefield before the deadline, I was elegantly fighting with “Monads.”

In the end, it was full of bugs and didn’t work properly, and I tasted the bitter defeat of having to switch to BIND in tears in the middle of the event. Even if I had written it in a language I was good at, it would have been impossible with my skills at the time. However, this painful failure was the trigger for me to get absorbed in software development, so looking back, it was an irreplaceable experience.

Because I was too absorbed in my “left hand (operation and implementation),” my “right hand (research)” was neglected, and I struggled in the second year of my master’s… but that’s a story for another time.

There may be pros and cons to spartan education, and I certainly had stomach aches from stress, but looking at the results, it was the place that built the foundation of my career.

Rakuten: Foundations as an Engineer

At Rakuten, where I joined as a new graduate, I learned the basics of being a software engineer.

Luckily, I was assigned to the search team, where I experienced a wide range of tasks, not just the application layer, but also system design using DBs and message queues, and building CI/CD pipelines.

I am truly thankful to my manager at the time. He listened seriously to the naive (and cheeky) opinions of a rookie like me, and taught me not only technical advice but also the basics of being a professional, such as “what it means to work in a company” and “what it means to contribute to a team.”

Also, the environment where English was the official language and multinational members were enrolled was very stimulating, and it was perfect as a preparation for my later life in the US.

Meta: Move Fast and Break Things

Then, I moved to the US. It was my experience at Meta where I felt the culture of Silicon Valley firsthand.

Famous slogans like “Move fast and break things” and “Done is better than perfect” might have been modified to be a bit milder around the time the company name changed, but for better or worse, they embodied the culture of this company.

Since Google, which I experienced later, had the exact opposite culture, I personally feel that Meta’s culture of “build something that works first, then iterate on it” suited my nature better.

The biggest culture shock was that the idea of “combining open source” was not a thing. Instead, there were a bunch of homegrown tools and heavily hacked versions of OSS.

For example;

• Frontend: React / GraphQL
• Backend: Hack (A heavily modified version of PHP)
• Deployment: Tupperware (A role similar to Kubernetes)

These became the default choices, and everything from chat, task management, to editors was unified with internal tools. And their integration was seamless. The ultimate optimization of a “closed world.” It was like the “Walled Garden” - isolated from the outside, yet the ecosystem within was super advanced.

Also, once a week, there was a place where Mark (Zuckerberg) spoke to employees via streaming. Reactions and comments would fly across the screen, and there was a merciless Q&A corner at the end. This high level of transparency was shocking. Sometimes harsh comments would fly, but the attitude of accepting them made me feel his philosophy as the top of a giant company.

Of course, it wasn’t all wonderful things; it firmly held common “big company diseases” such as information control and evaluation systems.

Google: Engineering Excellence

Next is Google. I should mention first that I joined just before the storm of layoffs blew. So, I don’t think I can fairly compare Google in normal times with Meta.

It was a culture completely different from Meta. “Engineering Excellence” was the top priority, and feature development and releases were strictly managed. Rather than engineers taking the lead, a division of labor system with PdMs and UX designers was established, giving the impression of being process-oriented.

Despite that, there was a chaotic side, such as a proliferation of internal frontend frameworks and legacy systems sitting in the core. It was a common sight to see employees complaining about the heaviness of internal processes in the cafeteria.

However, knowing the background of “why it became like this” taught me a lot. In the end, my conclusion is that “the strictness of release boils down to how the company makes money.”

If Meta’s service goes down for a few hours, the world doesn’t stop, but if Gmail or Google Search goes down for a few hours, the impact as a social infrastructure is immeasurable. I felt that this difference in “weight” appeared as a difference in engineering culture.

Regarding benefits, in addition to free lunch and snacks, ping-pong tables, chess tables, yoga classes, and cooking classes were provided. It’s undeniable that it feels like overkill, but I used these to build an internal network, and the effect of “breaking bread together (for free)” is immense.

Although there is the issue of Givers and Takers, for me, it became a motivation to go to the office, and I think it resulted in high productivity. Unfortunately, my body fat increased too along with the productivity. (To avoid misunderstanding, Meta also had equally wonderful benefits.)

Kyndryl Japan: Current Location

Then I returned to Japan, and now I work as a Director in the CTO Office of Kyndryl Japan.

I mainly support market development in the AI area from a technical aspect, contributing to internal AI frameworks and creating rapid prototypes fully utilizing OSS and cloud vendors. I am enjoying the opportunity to investigate and select various technologies, including hot AI-related ones, for the first time in a while. Although I sometimes miss discussions about scalability with colleagues…

The restrictions on development tools are relatively loose, and I can move freely with discretion, so the dev work has been pretty fun. Eventually, I would like to be involved in more strategic work while deepening cooperation with the global team but we’ll see how it goes.

Life is Spaghetti Code

Looking back like this, my life is a storm of GoTo statements and exception handling. However, even if I get lost somewhere or wander into another path, I feel like I’m somehow arriving at a place where I am somewhat satisfied.

Finally, I would like to conclude with my belief, which can be called my “survival strategy.”

Preparation makes you see opportunities. Luck brings them. Boldness seizes them.

I tried to sound a bit too cool there. That’s it for today.