Dropbox Engineering Career Framework

IC2 Software Development Engineer in Test

I am prolific at delivering resilient and sustainable software projects from design to implementation and rollout

Scope Area of ownership and level of autonomy / ambiguity

• I execute on defined projects to achieve team-level goals.
• I independently define the right solutions or use existing approaches to solve defined problems.

Collaborative Reach Organizational reach and extent of influence

• I work primarily within the scope of my team with high level guidance from my manager/TL

Impact Levers Technical levers typically exercised to achieve business impact

• Craft - I am increasingly mastering my craft and leverage it for higher impact (e.g. software design)
• Mentorship - I may mentor new hires, interns, or more junior engineers.

Core Responsibilities

🏆 Results

Impact

• I have a bias for actions, act with urgency and deliver high-quality work that will add the most value for our business, cross-functional stakeholders, and customers
• I work with my manager to direct my focus so my work advances my team's goals
• I prioritize the right things and don't overcomplicate my work. When necessary, I propose appropriate scope adjustments.
• I effectively participate in the core processes of my team, including recommending and implementing process improvements

Ownership

• I follow through on my commitments, take responsibility for my work, and deliver on time
• I proactively identify and advocate for opportunities to improve the current state of projects, and team processes
• I own my decisions and mistakes, and learn from them
• I think a step or two ahead in my work, solve the right problems before they become bigger problems, and problem-solve with my manager when I'm stuck
• I respond with urgency to operational issues (e.g., SEVs), owning resolution within my sphere of responsibility
• I look for opportunities to reduce KTLO and and work with the team to ease the burden for on-call
• I am vigilant about degradations in service by tracking key metrics, and I advocate for declaring a SEV if my concerns are warranted

Decision Making

• I Identify and gather input from the right stakeholders and consider customer needs to make informed and timely decisions
• I understand the implications of my decisions and adjust my approach based on the impact and risk, and share that rationale with relevant stakeholders
• I escalate to my manager when I need help with a decision about my deliverables or priorities

🌟 Direction

Agility

• I have an open mindset to change, and am enthusiastic about new initiatives
• I work with my manager to navigate complex and ambiguous situations
• I am learning to stay calm under pressure and building practices to take care of my well-being

Innovation

• I ask questions and contribute to new ideas/approaches
• I have a growth mindset and am comfortable experimenting with new approaches, learning, owning the outcomes, and sharing what I learned

🌳 Talent

Personal growth

• I proactively ask for feedback from my manager, team, and cross-functional stakeholders and identify ways to act upon it
• I have self-awareness about my strengths and areas for development
• I drive discussions with my manager about aspirational goals and seek out opportunities to learn and grow (e.g., PGP, Dropbox-offered training, leveraging perks allowance etc.)

Team Development

• I model integrity and a high standard of excellence for my work
• I help more junior members of my team, interns, or new hires taking into account their unique strengths, backgrounds, and working styles
• I offer honest, timely and direct feedback that is delivered with empathy to help others learn and grow
• I actively contribute to interviewing and assessing candidates to help us build a diverse and talented team in terms of background and location. I am calibrated and consistently perform high-signal interviews
• I am able to represent my team’s initiatives and goals to candidates in a compelling way

🌈 Culture

Collaboration

• I can effectively collaborate and adopt necessary tools (e.g., pair programming) that adapts to virtual first and get work done
• I work with my manager to engage in productive conflict with thoughtful questioning and have the courage to state my point of view
• I avoid blame, clarify problems to focus on solutions, and “disagree and commit” when necessary to move decisions forward
• I promote and role model Dropbox core values

Organizational Health

• I contribute to a positive sense of community on the team (e.g. engage in team lunches, team offsites, and other virtual or in-person group activities, help with new-hire on-boarding).
• I listen to different perspectives and I cut biases from my words and actions
• I practice the Dropbox Diversity Commitments on a regular basis
• I champion Virtual First practices that help my team collaborate effectively

Communication

• I write and speak with clarity and focus
• I listen to understand others and ask clarifying questions
• I proactively share relevant information on my project including difficult task-level trade-offs that impact the product to my manager and team (including product/business partners)

🦉 Craft

Code Fluency

• I translate ideas into clear code, written to be read as well as executed
• My code is free of glaring errors - bugs are in edge cases or design, not mainline paths - and is well documented and well tested with appropriate use of manual vs automated tests
• I actively engage and reconcile different opinions in code reviews and can follow best practices set up by others
• I’m able to read and navigate through a large code base and effectively debug others’ code
• I address code tasks with both high throughput and appropriately high quality for the stage of project I am working on
• I'm beginning to specialize in a testing infrastructure/tooling/automation domain (ex: Web Full Stack, Front-end, Back-end, Mobile Full Stack) and am actively learning the ecosystem of tools and libraries that support a specific domain.

Software Design

• I’m able to understand the existing designs and technology choices within my area, and I make appropriate adjustments to existing designs when necessary
• Code modules I write exhibit good separation of concerns

Architecture Design

• I’m able to decompose a simple problem or business scenario into a solution composed of multiple test/automation software components interacting with each other.

Quality Engineering Fluency

• I am beginning to specialize in managing quality within a specific engineering domain (ex: Web Full Stack, Front-end, Back-end, Mobile Full Stack)
• I’m able to effectively apply my general knowledge of modern quality management approaches (ex: Regression, System, Functional, Integration, Unit) to uncover technical defects/failures.
• My focus is primarily on executing a quality management approach against functional requirements within existing test/automation strategies and frameworks, I ensure high code quality in features I evaluate.
• Working with Senior SDET’s I’m able to decompose problems and business scenarios into quality management solutions.
• I primarily engage with QE peers to remain in alignment on team priorities and the needs of our customers.

Quality Engineering Fluency

• I am hyper-focused on contributing to the delivery of risk-driven quality management solutions that are founded in the quality metrics/measurements my team reports to cross-functional partners.
• The metrics I report to my QE team represent a modern approach to measuring the impact of the quality approach I execute against and are focused on identifying technical defects/bugs and technical risks.