Hello, I’m a junior developer at a small company. I’m in a tough situation and looking for opinions.
The company hired me for an ML/data-oriented position, basically a backend developer with ML/data focus. Currently, I’m tasked with a full computer vision project, which means that I have to do almost everything on my own: object detection, analysis, database storage, data extraction, etc., all in real-time. I received a subpar laptop, making testing and regular work difficult. Despite limited support from senior developers, the project works, but not flawlessly. How can they expect me to build this?
I’ve asked for help, but the response is delayed, and there’s no mentoring. Recently, I expressed my struggle, and they questioned why it’s not finished. I fear they might let me go. Some senior friends of mine advised me to leave. I’m unsure; any advice? Also, my salary is 50k which as I know, rather low.
What is your education?
I can tell you as someone who took a lower paying job at the start because my phd wasn’t in Ml it’s a lot of fight to get your salary raised.
I can also tell you as someone who worked in a smaller company where top management had no Ml expertise their asks were unrealistic a lot of the time, the timelines were unrealistic, and they rarely were able to articulate clearly what they wanted.
I eventually left after years due to this. The one big positive for me in that whole time is I was free to come up with solutions how I saw fit and I also had a lot of control into how I got it done. It all just required me to be constantly managing expectations. Which if you are like me, is very frustrating. I most likely had more influence than your position warrants so I’d keep that in mind.
Finally, even when my pay started low, it was higher than what you are making and this was years ago.
I’m happy to discuss more and/or help if I can.