Day in the Life of a Software Engineer
Sophie Veksler, a Software Engineer II at EverQuote, works on the analytics platform team known as EQDP, EverQuote Data Platform.
As a software engineer, Sophie has been responsible for ensuring data is correctly added into GOAT, EverQuote’s internal metrics tracking system, among other things.
“A lot of what I have been doing for the last two years is on the data side of our various analytic platforms, so making sure when analysts want to have certain data available in GOAT that it is there and correct,” said Sophie.
Now, her role is shifting.
“This quarter, my work has shifted a little bit. I am currently working on rebuilding the GOAT server. Instead of relying on our older MySQL database, we are going to be using Snowflake,” said Sophie. “It is really exciting for me to have gotten to work with a lot of different people in the company and really understand how the data comes together.”
Sophie is also responsible for a weekly on-call rotation, called Goat Point Guard, where everyone on the team is on-call if someone has a question.
“A lot of the time the questions people ask are pretty simple and it doesn't take you long to solve them but it does take you out of focusing on other projects and then sometimes things break and you don't know how to solve them,” said Sophie. “So at the beginning, especially remotely, sometimes you really have no idea what to do but you have to take a breathe, think about it for a minute and it's always ok to ask questions of your manager or someone else on your team and after you solve the problem or someone else on your team solves the problem, it's nice to review what the problem was and what the solution was so next time you are faced with a similar problem you have a better tool kit to solve those problems.
Sophie’s day normally begins with a team standup (a team meeting).
“We have standup in the morning with the team. We would go through and say what we were working on and address any blockers we have, anything that is stopping us from getting work done. Then I would code a little bit, have meetings with stakeholders about various projects and collaborate with other team members.”
And when it comes to daily work, Sophie’s isn’t always the same.
“It depends on what I am working on. The main thing I am doing is talking to stakeholders or other engineers or analysts to make sure that we are on the right track for their project and that we are meeting all of their requirements,” said Sophie. “I am coding or talking to other people on their team.”
What is Sophie’s favorite part of her day you may wonder? The people she says.
“I love the people at EverQuote. Everyone is so smart, hardworking, kind and fun to be around. I love hanging out with the people on my team. We just made this coworking session so anyone can hop on during the day and we can just work and chat,” said Sophie. “It’s really lovely to like the people you work with.”
Sophie not only loves the people at EverQuote, but the opportunities EverQuote provides.
I love that I am free to learn. There are a lot of learning opportunities at EverQuote and you are not necessarily pigeon holed into one particular thing. You can really branch out and try new things if that’s what you want,” said Sophie.
And for Sophie, working from home has not been a hard transition.
“I’m really lucky because it’s pretty easy for me to focus at home so I definitely feel that I’ve been very productive since we have been at home,” said Sophie. “And you get a lot of time back from not having to commute and I feel it can be more flexible for when I am working.”
Even though it has been harder to see her friends from work during this time, she feels lucky to work at a place where she can say she is friends with the people she works with.
“I am really lucky that I work for a company like EverQuote where I am actually friends with the people that I work with and we do spend time together outside of work,” said Sophie.