Should I join Meta?
I went through the interview loop at Meta, and currently in TM phase. I had initially interviewed (phone screen) for the E6 SWE role, but got down-leveled to E5. Went through the interview loop for E5. The recruiter came back with an offer for E4 (got down-leveled again). Does it make sense to take up the offer? Would it be a setback career-wise to accept an E4 role in spite of having 12 yoe?
![Senior Software Engineer [E5] at Meta company logo](/_next/image/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffirebasestorage.googleapis.com%2Fv0%2Fb%2Ftech-career-growth.appspot.com%2Fo%2Fcompany_logos%252Fmeta.jpeg%3Falt%3Dmedia%26token%3Da7a5bcc0-e178-4b5b-b71e-09bf6c6aefae&w=48&q=75){kind=small}
![Mid-Level Software Engineer [E4] at Meta company logo](/_next/image/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ffirebasestorage.googleapis.com%2Fv0%2Fb%2Ftech-career-growth.appspot.com%2Fo%2Fcompany_logos%252Fmeta_logo.png%3Falt%3Dmedia%26token%3Db5f837b1-c74f-4e2f-848b-1599f05624c5&w=48&q=75){kind=logo}
Discussion
(4 comments)- 212 days agoTech Lead/Manager at Meta, Pinterest, Kosei
What are your other options?
I think you should take the Meta offer if:
- If you are unemployed and need a job
- The pay is substantially higher than your current role (as Thoughtful Tarodactyl says, 30% is a good benchmark)
- You don't have a similar caliber company on your resume already.
No one in the future has to know that you were aggressively downleveled at Meta. If you join and do really well, you could get promoted within a year. Then any future job will be at the E5 (Senior) or E6 (Staff) level.
- 0
7 days agoTech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course HeroEven in this economy, I'm happy to say that many people in Taro have gone from E4 -> E5 in a year (they've thanked me for it!). You would be better positioned than most.
- 1
12 days agoThoughtful TarodactylTaro CommunityWhere have you previously worked? The rule of thumb is take it if its atleast 30% boost in comp.
Meta despite down leveling tends to pay higher than a lot of other companies for that same level
- 07 days agoTech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero
At a surface level, getting an E4 offer with 12 YOE sucks. However, it's hard to tell what to do here without knowing where you currently are.
What I will say is that Meta compensation is very, very high within the industry. Even among FAANG, it tends to pay the highest in the aggregate. With proper negotiation, you can get an E4 offer to around $400k TC (assuming you live in the US). In comparison to one of my prior companies, I know many Staff Engineers at PayPal who are very far from making $400k/year, being closer to $250k.
If there's a major compensation boost, you don't like your current job too much, and you've never worked for a FAANG company before, a strong Meta E4 offer has a good chance of being worth it.
All that being said, the first step here is to follow the advice from the negotiation course to bump up the offer as much as possible, maybe even return it to E5: The Insider's Guide To Negotiating Your Tech Salary And Compensation
