Bxdty

I was hired at this company about a month and a half ago as a junior programmer.

I realize that they were looking for a senior dev, but felt like I could do the position with a little training based on my portfolio and interview responses.

Things have been difficult from the very beginning but, somehow I managed to survive by asking a lot of questions. Slowly adding features and building up confidence.

It seems like they noticed this, give me more projects larger ones. Not something as simple as the add 50-100 lines of code, and write few queries to production database.

Recently they gave me this large project which will take about 2 weeks to complete. And it’s a very important feature which has been talked about for a while.

I am sure in their eyes (senior devs) they look at all the features as being the same, since they have worked there for so long (one 5 years another 2 years).

However I am feeling a lot of pressure and my stress levels are unhealthy. One of my co workers suggested breaking the project into smaller tasks so I don’t feel so overwhelmed.

Other juniors I have spoken to told me they get as much as 3 months of training, but it seems like everything is very accelerated at my job. How do I manage this situation and not feel so much pressure, I am worried that I will not complete in time or complete but not to their satisfaction.

Recently they gave me this large project which will take about 2 weeks to complete. And it’s a very important feature which has been talked about for a while.

It looks like your hard work has paid off and you're getting an important feature to work on.

However I am feeling a lot of pressure and my stress levels are unhealthy.

A month and half into the role, I would say you're still onboarding, which means you'd be paired with one or more seasoned engineers to bring you up to speed and mentor you on projects. I normally say you're onboarding at least until you hit between 3 - 6 months, but varies from company to company and group to group.

One of my co workers suggested breaking the project into smaller tasks so I don’t feel so overwhelmed.

Your coworker's suggestion is an important one. I can't tell you how many projects I've gotten where some well meaning non-technical manager says this project is easy, one engineer can do it in two weeks. Sure enough as soon as the engineer start looking the feature it's way more complex than the manager suspected.

It's important to look at the feature and break it into deliverable bodies of work. Don't feel like you have to deliver everything in two weeks. Do your homework, lay out all of the different deliverables and provide time estimates for each to your manager and/or product manager. They can help prioritize what is critical and what isn't with you. If necessary, they may even pull in more people to help or push out the deadline.

Remember don't feel like you have to go it alone and keep communicating with your manager.