1. Making clear of your intentions that you don’t want to harm the company in any way and it’s just for personal growth you have decided to leave
  2. By giving the organization the confidence that any pending work will be finished before you leaving and even if it takes more hours to complete, you will invest it (and by doing it).
  3. By documenting all the work you have done properly, so others can understand in your absence.
  4. By doing proper knowledge transfer and making sure that the other person understands it as well.
  5. Lastly, by helping out the organization in any way even after you have quit the company if they have queries.

Working on outdated technologies is definitely a career risk.

Look out in the market about the current trending technologies and which ones are more related to the work you do, your organization does, or you are interested in. Get trained on those technologies. Self-learning is very critical but doesn’t rely just on that, get formal training. Do some sample projects and build a portfolio.

Talk within your company if they can move you to another project using contemporary technologies (which you learned), cite your dedication and the long time spent with your last project.  Also, your training will show the initiative. If a lateral movement can happen within the organization, that would be the safest bet.

Otherwise, you can start applying for jobs demanding new technologies.

Not at all.

Views about the company you work can be freely expressed within the company’s platform and even outside publicly.

In fact, good companies promote employees to speak out and express their views regarding the working environment, policies, etc.

Employees voices are a good way for organizations to mend the issues internally rather than letting it brew and affect their business or an outsider pointing it out.

The only thing to keep in mind while expressing your views publicly about your company is that you don’t disclose any business or work details that is prohibited by your contract and also to maintain decorum.

I would also add that its important that employees speak out so that issues get addressed by organizations and it would be in mutual interest and also the software professionals community in general.

Until you receive the official confirmation letter from HR, you are not considered confirmed. Legally you can resign and just serve 15 days notice period as per your contract.

Assuming that you are a young Engineer, who is technically sound and would like to do something exciting in the career (rather than play safe).

Do some due diligence about the startup, if their idea is proven and looks like they have a bright future then it would be a good idea to work for the startup.

You will learn a lot working with a startup and that experience will grow you overall. And someday with that experience under your belt, you could start something of your own.

A lot of employees in the Software Industry are from the non-CS background. All you need to know are good programming skills (if you intend to become a programmer).

An eye for finding faults or gaps is the primary skill that is required in a good QAE.

They should be able to find out issues in any product, even in normal life. This goes a long way in Software.

Also being able to do report back properly (with proper details, screenshots, comments, steps to reproduce, etc.) is also required.

And with changing technology scene it’s also essential that QAE learns automation and a little coding.

No one can become a ‘perfect’ software engineer because we are still human. But you can certainly become a ‘better’ software engineer if:

  • You understand the requirements first before starting to code (ask necessary questions)
  • Code properly (with indention, comments, following best practices, etc.)
  • Do code review and get peer code review done
  • Do unit testing thoroughly
  • Test your code in a near-production environment
  • Find out and implement coding best practices
  • Learn from your mistakes
  • Code, Code, Code as much as you can.