Performance Marketing Associate in Mumbai

My co-founder is a genius coder and that's the fkn problem

I'm 23M. My friend, same age as me, is literally one of the most brilliant programmers I know - built his first app at 15 and won every hackathon in college. We started a SaaS startup 6 months ago that helps small businesses automate their inventory. Got a 500k seed round cause investors loved his tech demo. But I'm losing my fucking mind dealing with him. He codes like a genius when he wants to, but that's the problem - when he wants to. Won't show up till 2pm cause "he codes better at night". Won't push updates for weeks then drops massive changes at 3am that break everything. Our beta users are pissed cause features they need are sitting in his "almost done" list for months while he builds random shit that excites him. I handle everything else - customer support, investor updates, sales calls, documentation, bug reports, and he still has the nerve to say I don't understand tech enough. His new gaming friends are over at our office all the time for "LAN parties" that last till morning while I'm trying to run a fucking company. Don't get me wrong - when he actually sits down to code, he's incredible. Built our core product in 2 weeks. But now he's more interested in playing League of Legends and watching coding livestreams than fixing critical bugs. Says "real startups don't have fixed hours" whenever I bring it up. I really need advice. We have a product that could be huge, users who actually want to pay us, but I'm watching it all slip away cause my co-founder would rather speedrun Elden Ring than talk to customers. I don't wanna lose a friend but my mental health is fucked from carrying this whole thing alone.

Struggling to Adapt in My New Role as SDE 1 at Amazon

I’m two months into my new role as an SDE 1 at Amazon, and I’m struggling to complete tasks. The codebase has too many high-regression areas and dependencies on away teams, and I find myself moving too slowly out of fear that I might break something. In my previous organization, I always worked in monolithic repositories with a debugger, but now it’s completely different. It’s difficult to locate the relevant packages and test my hypotheses before even writing documentation. I also find it hard to understand the complex architecture. To make things worse, my team doesn’t own any service. The project I’m working on has a huge blast radius, and the code feels like spaghetti. I’m constantly fearful of being put on a PIP since I’m lagging behind and not performing well. One of my teammates told me that we are judged based on the number of code reviews, lines of code, and stack ranking—which increases my anxiety even more. I keep context-switching between tasks, and meetings consume most of my time. My sleep has dropped to just 4–6 hours a night, and I end up working Saturdays and Sundays as well. I don’t know if this is sustainable or even the right approach. Sometimes I feel like I made a mistake by joining Amazon. At my previous company, I was rated an “Exceeds” performer, but here, I’m falling behind. In performance reviews, I might be compared with my peers. For example, someone who joined after me was assigned to a project where the LLD was already completed, so his work is mostly implementation. Because of that, his lines of code and CRs are much higher, while I’ve only managed to raise one CR so far—a small change with limited impact. This makes me feel bad and demotivated. On top of this, no one in my team is particularly helpful. Sometimes I even feel like they are misguiding me. They keep saying things like, “Don’t stress too much early on,” or, “It’s fine to go slow, don’t work on weekends.” But I can’t shake the fear that they might just be trying to make me the scapegoat. Now I’m at a crossroads: should I switch to another team or stay where I am? My manager is good, oncalls are not hectic, but I don’t feel the same way about the team. The senior engineers are offsite, and the onsite folks aren’t consistently supportive. Also, since I only joined in late June, I’m wondering whether I’ll even be included in the performance review cycle next year. Do you have any recommendations on how I can turn this around?

The Most Ridiculous Hustle Culture BS: My Former Manager's Cult

28M, software dev.. Thought working at a fast-paced startup meant I had to bleed code. Boy, was I wrong. Last year, I joined a new org. The manager was full-on hustle mode. Guru worship 24/7. Elon podcasts, desi "founders" on LinkedIn - you name it, he followed. Their mantra? Eat at your desk, sleep at the office, crush life. Sounded insane to my rational brain. My life became a freakin' nightmare: - 2AM Slack replies: Expected - Weekend code deployments: Mandatory - "Optional" team bonding at 9PM: Required - Canceling dates: Normal - Bragging about no sleep: Encouraged Rinse and repeat. Every. Single. Day. Guilt was my constant companion. Leaving at 7PM? Slacker. Taking a sick day on a Wednesday? Waste of time. Wanting to see your parents? Think of all the sprint points you could be burning! The kicker? Being the only single guy on the team. Felt like I had to hustle 10x harder just because I didn't have "family excuses" to go home. Result after 18 months of this madness? - "Rockstar" employee award: Check - Blood pressure issues: Check - Nonexistent social life: Check - Severe burnout: Check Guess what: All that hustling led to jack shit. No promotion, just more work. Now, at 28, I'm unlearning this toxic BS. Realizing success isn't about slack green dots, equity promises, or how little you sleep. It's about actually living. To all the desi devs killing themselves over performance reviews and sprint velocity: STOP. Your life is worth more than a startup's valuation. Success without boundaries is worthless. Don't waste your 20s like I did, chasing a toxic manager's definition of success. Anyone else seen this ridiculous hustle culture BS? How'd you break free?