Career Advice About Meta

I was working with a team during bootcamp, and they mentioned that they intentionally have very low test coverage (both unit and integration). This team is more on the back-end side. Is this a bad sign or is there something specific about Meta's culture that I'm missing here?

A mixture of Silicon Valley and The Social Network is what inspired me quite a few years ago that pursing a start-up was even a possibility.

I even learnt the concept of what a "kanban" board was from Jared (played by Zach Woods).

Pursing this start-up ended up getting me into an incubator and then into a software job (after having no $ to continue the venture lol)

As someone who has never been to America, let alone the bay area and has never worked in big tech/a real start-up:

How close is the show to reality?

Met any Russ Hanneman types haha

I’ve gone through Taro's courses on communication and asking questions, which were insightful, especially in showing how juniors can learn from senior engineers with deep expertise. However, as an MLE, I face different challenges and would appreciate some insights or thoughts from Alex or Rahul.

For context, I majored in math and hold an MS in ML from a top 3 university, so I'd say I have a solid grasp of both the mathematical and practical aspects of ML. Machine Learning can be deeply mathematical, often requiring formal training to fully get it. Some SWEs who transition into MLE roles may lack this foundation, and while they might have been excellent SWEs, the gap in math knowledge can hinder their abilities as MLEs.

Here are a few challenges I face with some SWE-to-MLE seniors:

1. Sometimes, my tech lead asks questions that suggest a lack of understanding of ML basics. While directly correcting them doesn’t seem right, what’s the best way to handle this?
2. This becomes a bigger issue when they set project goals that are mathematically infeasible. Without a strong math background, they rely on intuition, making it hard to guide them away from misguided directions.
3. Their informal grasp of ML can also complicate design documents by introducing unnecessary features that don’t align with the project’s objectives.
4. As seniors, they can get defensive and dismiss alternative ideas, which is frustrating, especially when I would need to work on a project with a high risk of failing.

Now that PSC for the first half at Meta is nearing an end, do you think it makes sense to ask my manager for a raise in our next 1:1?

Or, given that Meta is a big tech company, are raises purely based on rating?

• I've been reaching out to people via DMs and public workplace posts, comments on threads/tasks/diffs, sometimes email.
• Sometimes it takes 1 week to get a response or I just never get one, despite multiple follow-ups.

Unfortunately at a big company like Meta a lot of the stack is proprietary and are essentially black boxes, so I can't just search public documentation or use StackOverflow. Sometimes the documentation/wikis are outdated, so when the team maintaining it is unresponsive I have a hard time gaining traction with my projects. Ideally I'd try to go into the codebase to figure it out myself but it's hard to familiarize myself with another repo quickly especially if it requires special setup to get things running.

I also have a sample Workplace post that shows how I'm asking questions and looking for help: [REDACTED TO PRESERVE COMPANY CONFIDENTIALITY]

Hey everyone! I just transitioned to software engineering. I got an internship at Meta and Tesla. What courses and projects should I focus on to develop my skills as a software engineer. I currently know basic data structures and how to solve leetcode problems.

I've worked at meta and stripe but in april I'll be starting a new job at anthropic. At this point i feel comfortable spinning up on new things at large companies where onboarding lasts months and the first couple weeks are just listening to presentations, but anthropic is the smallest company i'll have worked for (~1000 people) and their onboarding plan is a little intimidating. They want me to merge 1-3 diffs in my first week and to be fully spun up after 30 days.

What should i do to really hit the ground running that this new job and start pushing code from the start. I'll be on the growth team which is something im comfortable with since i did growth at meta, so mainly just looking for advice on how to learn a new codebase and company that's much smaller than i'm used to.

For the core workstream I got put on, there are a lot of potential angles to really move metrics, which I'm excited about. However, they mainly seem to be non-code solutions.

I've gotten earlier feedback that I need more coding signal, which has me apprehensive about this current workstream. I know that an E4 needs a lot of coding contribution for Engineering Excellence, but I am pushing for E5 which is more people/direction driven. Is it okay for me to take on this project or should I find something with more coding work?

Hi all, recently during Q1 roadmapping I chose to move on to a new workstream from a growth/independence point of view as part of working my way up to E4. (My earlier effort was a 1->100, this one is 0->1 and was decided by me, my TL and EM together), and I had a couple of questions about this move.

1. I have spent the past 6 months gaining context on a set of technologies and tools (internal to Meta) that perhaps only 2 other engineers on the team have context on.
   1. Should I do a knowledge transfer session or write up a doc to ensure all the context I have doesn't get lost?
   2. Should I allocate some time to supporting the team until I'm here on areas I gained context on?
2. There is some possibility of scope thrash since I'm also long-term supporting one of the projects part of the earlier workstream (I delivered the v0 and have been making iterative but small changes since then). Should I talk to my manager about this?
3. This is a very n00bish question: from a growth perspective, is it better to go 110% on the new workstream and all its nuances/open problems or go 80 and 20? As far as allocations go, I'm slated to be 100% on the new workstream as part of the roadmap.
4. Bonus question: should I do a year-in-review/look-back post in tandem with my self review? (This is a very Meta-specific question in a way, but would love to hear other views too!)

I'm looking to get promoted to E4 in the next cycle, but I'm worried as my impact contribution isn't very clear. I've done a lot of work, but due to churn within my org (which includes a recent re-org), a good amount of my code isn't truly in production yet. I've documented my work in Quips and tasks to show that I did it, but I'm wondering if a lack of shipped impact will hold back my PSC.

I interviewed with Meta yesterday for a more junior role (I'm actually more senior) and they said it would kick in immediately for fertility in September upon starting a role with a program which is 18 month long (short term employee program) STE program that converts to Full Time Employment (FTE). They said stock would come then, but not upon start in September.

They said they would allow employees (STE/FTE) options to pick the perks of 4, to individually itemize 4-5 choices to make between medical coverage, which as a section on fertility and co-pays for expenses at the maternity level.

• Healthcare
• Dental
• Vision
• Therapy Stipend
• Wellness Stipend
• Family leave,
• PTO and time away benefits,
• Financial benefits (401k matching, financial coaching/planning)

How long does it take for benefits AND stock (vesting) to kick in typically at any FAANGMULA or OpenAI type of startup company? I personally don't want to wait until September, am likely to accept a more senior role at Apple FTE of course or other AI startup companies where these benefits AND stock kick in right away at an L4-L5 to L6 level depending. That role above it looked like IC4 and I was way overqualified and should be interviewing for at least an L5 position and above.

How to seek manager or TL’s support on project unblocking or career growth?

What topics I should talk in 1:1s with my manager/TL?

How to build the connections with leaderships?

As we all know, Big Tech hiring is drastically slowing down, which includes Meta. However, this means people axis sources like interviewing and being a bootcamp mentor become harder to get.

I'm also fairly new to the company, so it's harder for me to do things like mentor and onboard others for people axis credit.

All that being said, how does people axis work for me and how can I get a good rating there?

Hi everyone, I’ve spent 6 months at Meta, and I don’t have a project for next half. I want to scope out my project for next half from the roadmapping so I can demonstrate E4 level?

I’m very new to this. How do I do it, and can you share resources that can help me?

• How to get involved in strategic initiatives that align with the company's long-term goals? This could involve working on new product developments, exploring new technologies, or improving internal engineering processes.
• Where to find those projects and with sponsors?
• Building effective alliances takes time and consistent effort. How to be patient and continue to foster relationships even when immediate benefits are not apparent?

Comparing Meta to other companies, splitting between a PM and an engineer is very awkward. PMs end up doing a lot of strategy work, but when it comes to what tactics you pick, it seems like engineers have to pick there.

My PM is very senior at PM6 and their guidance is extremely high-level to the point where the concrete projects we need to work on aren't entirely clear. How do I fill in these details, so I know what to work on?

I'm in the team matching process for an E4 position at Meta. I've reached out to numerous friends at Meta for team recommendations, but responses have been limited, possibly because most of them are at the E4/E5 level and not really connected to hiring decisions. If someone asks me about if there's any good teams hiring in my current company, I'd have a hard time answering it.

I’ve started cold-messaging managers on LinkedIn but haven’t had much success yet. My intuition says it might not be too fruitful because 1) people don't check LinkedIn very often, 2) they might be hiring previously but not hiring now, 3) they are hiring for specialist positions but I'm generalist.

Then, are there benefits of reaching on my own? Are there any success stories from contacting managers versus going through recruiters? I'm not too worried about not having a match, but I'm just trying to optimize to get a best outcome.

edit: got some responses from my friends. I think I'll wait to see if any leads from my personal network can result in something :))

Meta is slowing down hiring, and they’re trying to focus on a few big bets across the company. As someone who is joining the company soon, how will this impact the bootcamp team selection process, and should this impact my team strategy?

How to avoid working closely with others on projects that does not allow you to demonstrate your skills in a team context, emphasizing collaboration over competition?

What are the common mistakes to overstep and to look like you are showing off?

How to highlight more of collaborative success that often speaks louder than individual achievement?

It seems to me that Meta has SWEs drive a lot of product decisions but I've always heard Product is better for high growth and the famous examples of Sundar and Satya

I am an E4 Machine Learning Engineer working with a (traditional) Software Engineering Tech Lead who lacks a strong understanding of Machine Learning. This gap makes it challenging for him to communicate clearly the needed technical requirements, set a clear direction for my projects, and maintain consistent priorities, which often shift unexpectedly.

As a result, I frequently feel unclear about my deliverables for this half-year and worry that this lack of clarity might negatively impact my performance review.

Do you have any advice or suggestions on how I can navigate this situation?

Example:

How to define the priority and work on your projects?

How to setup clear expectations for yourself and your team?