Shadowing Practice: A Day in the Life of an Amazon Software Engineer - Learn English Speaking with Video

Everyone wants to work in big tech because of the beautiful offices and the high salaries, but what is it actually like?

Today, I'll be taking you through a realistic day in my life working as a software engineer at Amazon.

I want to talk a little bit about what it's like working in big tech.

I just hope that this doesn't break any of my already existing code.

I've definitely been lingering on leaving Amazon.

We need some sort of distraction for everybody.

Anything new on YouTube?

I just got to the office

and today is actually my last day being on call before I hand it over to the next engineer

So let's go over everything we're gonna do today

So first off I have my one hour on call handover

meeting where I go over all the tickets I did

and hand over the pending items to the next engineer

And then I have some project work that I need to chip away at and another one hour meeting today.

So let's go I have this idea, I'm sorry, I'm coming with you.

I'm just saying.

So, this is cool.

Lately, I've been feeling pretty conflicted about work.

Some days, the job feels interesting.

I get to see my friends, get out of the house.

And other days, it feels really procedural and hard to feel excited about.

I think like most software engineers, I got into this field because I love to create things.

I started programming in high school and things just clicked for me when I started.

I found so much joy in watching my code run and solving problems.

These days, it's been really hard for me to feel that same excitement at work, and I wonder if that's just how work is.

I guess I'm not that passionate about accounting software, but it kind of seems like the people around me are not that excited about it either, so I wonder how they're dealing with it.

Maybe work is just going to be work sometimes.

Alright, so for my Ops handover meeting, I go over all the tickets that I got this week, especially the SEV2s, which are the critical errors that need immediate attention.

I talk about how the issue occurred and what I did to mitigate it

and what we can do to prevent it in the future.

And then I also discuss all the other tickets

that I wasn't able to get to so the next on-call can focus on those.

I just turned 25 and I feel like there's probably more out there

and I probably should be doing something more stimulating and exciting with my life.

It's also weird because I spent four years in university trying to land a software engineering role

and I really wanted to work in big tech.

I've always admired it in other people and I just always wanted to do it for myself.

But now that I'm here, it doesn't really feel as fun as I had envisioned in my head.

I've always wanted to make some sort of impact on the world

and I've always wanted my work to actually help someone out there.

But I kind of feel like working on accounting software that only internal Amazon financial accountants use isn't really for me.

It is really boring and sometimes boring is really draining.

But then I also feel guilty for complaining about this job

that I know so many people want to have and I was once someone really excited to have this job.

So I'm still really torn.

I wonder if there's other software engineers feeling the same way about their work or maybe it's just me.

Anyways, enough of my existential crisis.

Let's get back to work.

I want to talk a little bit about like what it's like working in big tech and the pros and cons.

My very first internship that I got was a very small company of four people.

We basically did consulting for a different company.

The office that we were in was probably the same size as the room that I'm in right now.

I learned a lot in that internship.

My project was to make a full stack web page for the clients

and it was an admin page so that they could change user information like emails or their username, things like that.

When I was done my project, I actually got feedback from the clients.

They found my page very useful.

It was kind of addicting to know

that something I had built was actually being used by somebody else

But I did feel like something was missing I really wanted to make big impact

and work on something big and cool

And I really wanted to work in big tech after this small internship

So that year I grinded leek code and practiced behavioral questions and then I landed my amazon internship that year Looking back.

I had the most fun during that internship.

Everyone I met was so smart and ambitious I was like

so inspired by everyone who was here

and I also learned an insane amount of information in a short time I literally didn't know what aws was

when I started

and then I ended up creating full stack applications with aws

services like lambda glue S3 I also learned how to write design documents

and the behind the scenes side of shipping software like getting changes deployed safely and watching for issues Before they go live.

It was really awesome and I felt like I was building something useful I felt like really fulfilled during that internship.

So when I returned to Amazon as a new grad, part of me kind of felt like it was gonna be similar to my internship.

I knew it wasn't gonna be the same, but I felt like I was gonna have a similar experience and feeling.

But what you don't really realize when you join big tech is that it doesn't really correlate to having big impact.

Most of the times, big tech companies are so big, they have

so many organizations within the company they each run like their

own mini companies my organization has about like 300 people

which is bigger than a lot of startups i work on

a very small part of amazon their financial accounting team the

work i do is very specific in terms of the experience

that i gain but i don't gain a lot of breadth

and because you're working on something so specific the customer is also very specific

and it's kind of hard to feel the impact of your work.

I kind of feel this way about my project.

I really don't know like how many people are going to be using it

and if I'm going to even get much feedback from it.

So while working in big tech is amazing, it exposes you to the most amazing engineers, technologies, and opportunities.

It can be also limiting in your impact and your scope

and hopefully this is helpful to anybody who's wondering what it's like to work in big tech

and maybe they were thinking about like choosing between like a small startup

or a big tech company there's definitely pros

and cons to each of them

but one thing i do like about working in big tech is there is a lot of amazing people

and i'm really happy this year

because i was able to make some new friends i'm going

to be getting lunch with one of my friends right now

so let's go i'm coming out out of what out to society what are you talking about Thank you.

Wow.

100

That actually looks really good.

101

I'll send that to your present.

102

What?

103

This is a little present.

104

Don't go with it.

105

Wait, I'm gonna go.

106

Oh my gosh.

107

Thank you.

108

Thank you i love i love this video yeah you can

109

just save it for later yeah i appreciate it bro on tiktok i've been seeing

110

so many stories of the people like my husband like had an affair

111

they're so awful and i'm like everyone i watch them i'm always like

112

hmm like men really age it i can't always do this

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okay no no no okay i have to tell you the most insane one this girl

114

so basically i tried for batch sake initially the day i

115

did need a full loop say this might be constant ever

116

since all the layoffs started happening work has felt a bit unstable

117

and it's really hard not to think about it in the back of your mind even

118

if your team feels fine today there's always that lingering question of what

119

if i'm still pretty early in my software engineering career i've been working for one year

120

and there's so many fears around ai taking over my job, losing my job, to the layoffs, and it honestly makes things feel a lot more uncertain.

121

I've been trying really hard to not let that anxiety take over my life.

122

After work, I just want to disconnect, relax, and not think about coding, performance reviews, or the job market.

123

But at the same time, it's really scary to ignore it completely, especially knowing that I don't have much experience yet, and if I suddenly go out, I'll have to interview again.

124

So I've been trying to stay positive and just focus on what I can control, keeping my skills sharp and staying open to opportunities and remind myself that I'm still growing.

125

I want to help with my burnout by just keeping my options open so I don't feel stuck in one place.

126

Recently, I've been trying to keep my interview skills sharp on the side, but the hardest part for me isn't just solving the problems, it's remembering to practice consistently.

127

So I built this system that reminds me to practice every day using Notion.

128

Notion recently introduced custom agents, which are basically automations that run in the background of your workspace.

129

Instead of manually prompting the AI every time, you can set agents to run on schedules or triggers.

130

This video is sponsored by Notion and it's the perfect time to show you how I set up my custom agents.

131

All I did was connect my custom agent to a LeetCode database.

132

Every morning it sends me a problem from the database

133

and then it updates it so I don't get sent the same problem twice in a row.

134

I'll make a full video showing you how I use Notion for my job searching process, so stay tuned for that.

135

But in the meantime, if you want to try making your own automations with Notion's custom agents, use the link in my description.

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And now we return to our regularly scheduled suffering.

137

I used to do.

138

It's that time of the year for my annual review, and it's a time to reflect on my year and what I learned and what I got out of it.

139

When I first joined, I asked the senior engineer how long it would take before I became a pro on the team, and they said a year.

140

So am I pro now?

141

No, I do not think I'm a pro.

142

Our team owns a lot of services, and I feel like I'm just scraping the surface of what they all do, and I'm still really confused by all this accounting jargon.

143

I think I know my own project pretty well and that's about it.

144

I'm more confident overall, but after all the layoffs and the recent talks about getting on the promotion path with my manager, everything is a bit shaky for me.

145

My friend Marlene joined Amazon a year before me

146

and she's already gone through the entire promotion process already

147

and she knows ins and outs way better than me

148

so I love talking to her

149

and seeing her progress gives me a lot of hope

150

because maybe in a year from now I'll be where she's at and if I am, I'm really happy.

151

It's nice to be able to talk to her about her process

152

and her time at Amazon because it definitely makes me feel a lot less alone

153

and that's one thing

154

that I'm very happy for in the last year at Amazon is the girlies that I got to meet.

155

Everyone has been so nice and it's actually made coming to work and getting through the boring days so much easier.

156

I think a lot of your experience at work is also what you choose to make of it.

157

It's the people that you push yourself to talk to, the mindset that you want to have, and I definitely need to remind myself that when I'm in my slumps.

158

I'm not sure how to make a joke I'm so cool

159

I'm just gonna get all the touch I'm gonna go on the flash I'm gonna be honest

160

You gotta call

161

me baby

162

I was

163

getting lunch with my friend today and

164

while I was waiting in the lobby I actually got recognized at work I think it's

165

so cool that people actually watch my videos a lot of the times I think I'm just like filming

166

and talking to like myself but something funny that I noticed is

167

that I only ever get approached when I'm with a friend never

168

when I'm just like by myself and I think it's

169

because I have an RBF when I'm by myself and then

170

when I'm with people I'm like smiling and laughing

171

so I think I come off a little bit unapproachable so

172

if you came up to me this year thanks it was really nice to meet you

173

and I hope to see more of you soon anyways let's get back to work

174

all right it's getting a bit late now

175

but i still have to head to one of my second one hour meetings of the day

176

so we have these meetings twice a week

177

and basically we share our individual learnings

178

or any design reviews with the team for example this year

179

i needed to do a migration from one build tool to another

180

so i wrote like a two-page document summarizing the problem how i was going to solve it

181

and all the different options with their pros and cons and then I booked this meeting with my team.

182

In this meeting they basically read over your document, they spend like 20 minutes reading over it, they annotate it, ask questions.

183

This method actually kind of makes sense because sometimes

184

when people are talking I can zone out and then when I zone back in I'm like completely lost.

185

So if I can just read a document at my own pace

186

and like annotate it I feel like I'm gonna absorb the information a little bit better

187

but then sometimes the document is like 15 pages long

188

and i already have no context about it

189

so these meetings like get me really really sleepy

190

and they also happen after lunch i talked to like one of my co-workers

191

and they've also said this feels like a nap to them it's

192

so hard to stay awake especially

193

when you don't really know what the context of the meeting is

194

because everyone's working on like their own thing anyways let's head to the meeting Alright,

195

I just got done chatting with the senior engineer.

196

They explained what I need to do for this project, so I started making some of the code changes they recommended and hopefully this will start adding more traffic to my project.

197

I just hope that this doesn't break any of my already existing code, but I really do think it probably will, so I'm just going to tweak this and hopefully it works.

198

I'm sorry.

199

What do you say?

200

We call it a night and get some beauty sleep.

201

You go.

202

I want to review my notes one more time.

203

In my last video, I was working on the annual reviews and writing some reviews for my peers.

204

So I finished up writing those and today I'll be working on my individual review.

205

You basically need to say which leadership principles you did well on

206

and maybe some you need to improve on and you want to share examples from the work that you did this year.

207

So this year I did something which was keep a work summary.

208

Basically I recorded all the work that I did throughout the year.

209

I noted down the operational work, any notable tickets that I saw, any project work that I did and the progress I made on it and the impact of all of that.

210

I also compiled all the design documents that I wrote throughout the year and what decisions that I had made.

211

A work summary is also very helpful for you later on

212

when you're going to promotions or when you want to update your resume for future jobs.

213

If you watched my video from last year, I also did an annual review, but I had only been working for a few months.

214

My team was really new to me.

215

I was really new to my team, so they didn't have much to say about me, and even though I've been working for almost a year and a half now, I still feel very new to all the systems.

216

I really only know about my project which is a very small part of what my team does as a whole.

217

I think my project definitely has similarities to other services but there's a lot of low-level detail that I don't know about.

218

So my goal from next year is

219

that I become a pro in all of the services so

220

that people will start coming to me about not just my project but all the other services as well.

221

So with that I'm going to start writing my individual review

222

and we'll get back to I'm still working today even though it's getting pretty late.

223

I tried to clock out around 5 because I want to have a life outside of work, but today was a special case because I'm still wrapping up my on-call shift, I also have project deadlines,

224

and the annual reviews so I want to finish it all before I head home.

225

I don't mind working later after most people have left

226

because it's actually quite peaceful

227

and I end up getting more stuff done office can get really loud during the day and it's super distracting for me.

228

I can't help but overhear other people's conversations

229

and then suddenly I'm really distracted not doing any work

230

and then if I put my headphones I'm listening to good music

231

and I'm also getting distracted so it's just nice when it's really quiet in the office.

232

If I could choose when to come into work I would come in way later

233

and stay way later because I'm pretty much a night owl and I get more work done at night.

234

I can't do anything tonight.

235

Why not?

236

Because I have a lot of planning to do.

237

I think within the first couple of months, I started to feel like this job at Amazon isn't really what I imagined for myself.

238

It's not that it's a bad job or anything.

239

It's more that I don't feel connected to the work.

240

What stands out to me the most is how small I feel inside a system that is this big.

241

At a company like Amazon, especially as a more junior engineer, I'm really not shaping the bigger picture.

242

I feel like I'm just floating around.

243

I understand that I'm junior, but I'm doing very mundane work.

244

I'm updating packages, running pipelines, fixing tests, all for just some financial accounting software.

245

A lot of the work starts to feel repetitive and honestly pretty empty and not because software engineering is boring, it's because this version of it doesn't feel right for me.

246

I've also been having this weird realization where I worked so hard to get here, now I'm here and I'm not sure I even want it.

247

I've definitely been lingering on this feeling of leaving Amazon and that's probably just the most honest part of all of this.

248

I'm still figuring it out in real time

249

but I'm seriously starting to ask myself whether staying on this path just

250

because I don't want a job search and the market is bad is actually a good enough reason.

251

And I've been watching a lot of videos of my favorite software engineers quitting their jobs

252

and it's just making me feel some type of way.

253

I think a lot of people assume that once you land a job at a company like Amazon you should be grateful, stay, and try to make it work.

254

And there is a part of me that thinks that too.

255

Maybe I should just try to tough it out and maybe I just need more time.

256

Maybe I need to work on a cooler project.

257

Maybe it's just, you know, seasonal depression.

258

But I also think there is a bit of a difference between something being challenging

259

and something just not being right for me.

260

And that's the part I'm trying to figure out.

261

My friend Marlene gets the best snacks for a snack wall.

262

These are so delicious.

263

I sleep all day, up all night, staring at the wall, feeling light,

264

dozing off to rest my eyelids.

265

So I've wrapped up most of my work today, the office has cleared out, and I'm going to be catching the train and heading home.

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Vocabulario y notas de pronunciación para esta lección

Esta lección de conversación de nivel B2 se basa en el vídeo “A Day in the Life of an Amazon Software Engineer”. Este vídeo tiene 265 frases y 3630 palabras para practicar shadowing. La parte hablada dura 20:19. El hablante habla a un ritmo natural de unas 179 palabras por minuto, cercano a una conversación cotidiana. El 83 % de las palabras está entre las 3.000 más comunes del inglés; conviene repasar el resto antes de empezar.

Vocabulario clave de este vídeo

Las 15 palabras más avanzadas del vídeo, con su pronunciación y significado:

Palabra	Pronunciación	Significado
internship sustantivo	/ˈɪntɜːnʃɪp/	pasantía, práctica
bore verbo	/boɹ/	aburrir
layoff sustantivo		despido, recorte de personal
linger verbo	/ˈlɪŋɡɚ/	permanecer, demorar
distract verbo	/dɪˈstɹækt/	distraer, despistar
annotate verbo	/ˈæn.ə.teɪt/	anotar, apostillar
handover sustantivo	/ˈhændˌoʊvɚ/	traspaso
automation sustantivo	/ˌɔ.təˈmeɪ.ʃən/	automatización
startup sustantivo	/ˈstɑɹtˌʌp/	arranque
snack sustantivo	/snæk/	tentempié, refrigerio
stack sustantivo	/stæk/	pila, montón
wrap verbo	/ɹæp/	envolver, fajar
burnout sustantivo	/ˈbɜː(ɹ)naʊt/	surmenage, agotamiento
compile verbo	/kəmˈpaɪl/	copilar, recopilar
correlate verbo	/ˈkɔɹəleɪt/	correlacionar

Phrasal verbs que vas a escuchar

Palabra	Pronunciación	Significado
get back to verbo		responder / contestar (en un rato), volver / tornar a contactar
go over verbo		sentar, pasar
end up verbo		terminar, ir a parar
get out of verbo		salirse de, ponerse fuera de
take over verbo		apoderarse, enseñorearse
wrap up verbo		envolver, arrebujar
figure out verbo		averiguar, captar
get through verbo	/ɡɛt ˈθɹu/	aguantar, salir adelante

Frases que vale la pena repetir

Frases cortas y completas del vídeo que puedes reutilizar en la conversación diaria:

Lately, I've been feeling pretty conflicted about work.
Let's get back to work.
I'll send that to your present.
No, I do not think I'm a pro.
What do you say?

Gramática en este vídeo

Las estructuras que más usa el hablante, con las palabras exactas del vídeo:

Estructura	En el vídeo
Present perfect continuous have/has been + -ing — una acción que empezó antes y continúa	I've definitely been lingering · i've been seeing · i've been working
Present perfect have/has + participio pasado — una acción pasada que sigue importando ahora	it's been · I've always admired · I've always wanted
Oraciones de relativo who / which + oración — información extra sobre una persona o cosa	everyone who was · agents, which are · something which was
Voz pasiva be + participio pasado — importa lo que ocurre, no quién lo hace	was done · is sponsored

Pronunciación a tener en cuenta

El hablante usa 121 contracciones y formas reducidas, como I'm, I've, don't. Dilas en su forma corta, tal como las oyes.

Los sonidos de “sh” y “zh”: internship /ˈɪntɜːnʃɪp/, automation /ˌɔ.təˈmeɪ.ʃən/, envision /ɪnˈvɪʒn̩/, existential /ˌɛɡzɪˈstɛnʃl̩/, realization /ˌɹɪə.laɪˈzeɪ.ʃən/
Palabras largas — cuida el acento: automation /ˌɔ.təˈmeɪ.ʃən/, procedural /pɹəˈsiːd͡ʒ(ə)ɹəl/, repetitive /ɹɪˈpɛtɪtɪv/, similarity /ˌsɪm.ɪˈlæɹ.ɪ.ti/, manually /ˈmænj(u)əliː/

Sonidos difíciles para hispanohablantes:

s + consonante al inicio — sin añadir una “e” delante: startup /ˈstɑɹtˌʌp/, snack /snæk/, stack /stæk/, scrape /skɹeɪp/, stimulate /ˈstɪm.jəˌleɪt/
/v/ — no es /b/: los dientes tocan el labio inferior: handover /ˈhændˌoʊvɚ/, envision /ɪnˈvɪʒn̩/, overhear /oʊ.vɚˈhɪɚ/, repetitive /ɹɪˈpɛtɪtɪv/, behavioral /bɪˈheɪvjəɹəl/
/z/ — sonora, no /s/: anyways /ˈɛn.iˌweɪz/, existential /ˌɛɡzɪˈstɛnʃl̩/, summarize /ˈsʌməˌɹaɪz/, realization /ˌɹɪə.laɪˈzeɪ.ʃən/, headphones /ˈhɛdfoʊnz/

Cómo practicar con este vídeo

Escucha el vídeo entero una vez sin hablar y anota las palabras que no conoces.
Empieza a velocidad 0,75×, haz shadowing frase por frase y vuelve a la velocidad normal cuando te resulte fácil.
Grábate y compara con el original, prestando atención a palabras como internship, bore, layoff.

¿Qué es la Técnica de Shadowing?

Shadowing es una técnica de aprendizaje de idiomas respaldada por la ciencia, desarrollada originalmente para la formación de intérpretes profesionales y popularizada por el políglota Dr. Alexander Arguelles. El método es simple pero poderoso: escuchas audio en inglés nativo y lo repites en voz alta de inmediato, como una sombra que sigue al hablante con solo 1-2 segundos de retraso. A diferencia de la escucha pasiva o los ejercicios de gramática, el shadowing obliga a tu cerebro y músculos de la boca a procesar y reproducir simultáneamente patrones de habla reales. Las investigaciones muestran que mejora significativamente la precisión de la pronunciación, la entonación, el ritmo, el habla conectada, la comprensión auditiva y la fluidez al hablar, convirtiéndola en una de las metodologías más efectivas para la preparación del IELTS Speaking y la comunicación en inglés en el mundo real.

Técnica de shadowing: lee la guía completa paso a paso →

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Vocabulario y notas de pronunciación para esta lección

Vocabulario clave de este vídeo

Phrasal verbs que vas a escuchar

Frases que vale la pena repetir

Gramática en este vídeo

Pronunciación a tener en cuenta

Cómo practicar con este vídeo

¿Qué es la Técnica de Shadowing?