A Fascinating Q&A with Meta Employees on Blind
Right after leaving Meta, I posted an AMA (Ask Me Anything) on Blind’s Meta channel — the response was phenomenal — 5,468 views, 357 comments, spanning 100+ questions — direct, unfiltered, meaningful, and (unusual for Blind) rather respectful. I made it single-blind, i.e. askers’ identity was hidden of course, but I dropped enough hints that folks figured out who I was, e.g. one of the upvoted questions was the super-challenging “Does your name start with R?”. I did this AMA because I felt I had a lot to say about careers and culture there while still fresh in memory, and I knew that many had questions they wouldn’t openly ask. This was also my first and last active post on Blind which is personally a bit too negative and cynical to go beyond passive consumption.
Of the 100+ questions, I ended up writing non-trivial responses to about 85 of them. I spend many hours thinking and then carefully wording the responses to be useful and empathetic. Here I am sharing a subset of these Q&As that are likely to be useful in a company-agnostic manner, after some sanitization to remove company-specific, proprietary, compensation-specific, personally identifiable stuff, or personal attacks. Even filtered for these, there were so many great questions, including some plenty cynical, even controversial ones that we’ve all come to expect from the Blind crowd.
So, here are ~85 questions and answers organized into 9 buckets.
- IC Career Development
- Manager Career Development
- General Career Dilemmas
- What do Senior Leaders Even Do?
- How to Develop Specific Habits or Skill Sets?
- Cross-functional Skills and Relationships
- Asking for My Opinion on Things
- Something Feels Off About Something
- My Identity, Career, and Life Choices
Helpful References:
Engineering / Management Levels: (consistent across Google and Meta)
E4 = IC4 = L4
E5 = IC5 = L5 (Senior Engineer)
E6 = IC6 = L6 = M1 (Staff Engineer, Engineering Manager)
E7 = IC7 = L7 = M2 (Senior Staff Engineer, Senior Engineering Manager)
E8 = IC8 = L8 = D1 (Principal Engineer, Director)
E9 = IC9 = L9 = D2 (Distinguished Engineer, Senior Director)
AE = Additional Equity given to a small set of top employees.IC Career Development
What’s your advice on how to be successful as an eng in general, specifically ambitious ones? And your advice on how to be successful at Meta?
In general, I’ve always found engineers who communicate better to be more successful. It’s a bit unfair that just doing amazing work doesn’t make the cut. Otherwise PMs or other more senior eng could get some of that credit only because once they start telling the stories, leadership goes to them, and they take on that identity instead of the engineer doing the actual work. It’s not necessarily malicious on the part of these other functions, but someone needs to communicate. If engineers themselves could clearly communicate in a way that even the CEO understands, they can potentially grow faster in their career.
This advice applies to all places. Specifically for Meta, there’s a huge bias for action. Get more things done and keep hitting goals. The metaverse or any other CEO pet projects are a bit different. There, it’s disproportionately about realizing his long term dreams rather than objectively being the best thing for users in the short term.
Can you give some examples of effective communication? What channels are used, level of abstraction, tone, etc?
Effective communication means everyone quickly understands most of what you say about the progress and impact of your work, without having to repeat or someone else jumping in to paraphrase on your behalf. Then, if the experts in the room ask deeper questions, you are able to answer well and show that you have really good grasp of the area and done your homework. In terms of mode, real-time discussions in meetings leave the strongest impression.
Do you have any advice for an E6 to get to E7?
Like I wrote above, pick a problem statement your VP cares about, solve it, and be the key contributor to it. Be persistent — don’t give up easily — get it done — show clearly that it worked — keep making progress — document the progress — show regular progress — write articles about it that show technical complexity — decisions on packets by others not in your reporting chain are made relatively quickly so the complexity needs to show in seconds or a couple minutes. This last bit is a bit shitty — it is marketing but that’s the price you pay for leveling up.
How do you see the ic growth (6->7, 7->8) opportunities atm? There are just too many existing senior folks in different orgs/pillars.
I agree it’s a bit crowded and you have to stand out. For 7 and 8 promos I have always seen that the thesis for promo is a 1–2 sentence summary of something that VP+ level care a lot about e.g. single.handedly solved the performance problem with feed, or made LLM open source with regular stable releases. So you really want to pick a summary like that and reverse engineer toward it in a way that it can be primarily attributed to you. One thing is people are paying less attention to IC budget and want to encourage more senior IC growth than senior EM growth. So it’s a good time to aspire for IC growth.
What does the average 5 to 6 successful promo packet look like?
At least 2 projects that look sufficiently technically complex as evidenced by design docs and notes. Overall impact looks reasonably high. Solid peer support from 7+ ICs and M2+ that basically state that they’ve seen you operate at 6 for at least 6 months, maybe more. These people ideally are not in your reporting chain. Finally, through collaboration and coordination, you uplifted your colleagues and your org.
How much does your manager play a role in your Performance rating? Given the same engineer, could manager X get them a GE while manager Y only gets them MA? What’s the variance?
Yes, unfortunately, it always happens. There are two steps. Step 1 is how convicted the manager is of a certain rating. Step 2 is how effectively they can defend that rating in a roomful of EMs who are primarily finding flaws in the packet or the argument. So the variance is at a minimum a whole rating.
Any advice for a new grad to progress faster in their career?
Engineering? Get things done quickly, maintaining high quality. Communicate effectively.
Do you have any senior IC reporting to you? If yes how do you manage them and what are their expectation in terms of driving impact? Do they work with e3 and e4?
I always did. I would give them a lot of freedom to solve hairy problems. The best ones are incredible, with very low maintenance. They want to solve big problems and they do want to work with more junior folks that are productive and efficient. That multiplies their impact.
What exactly would set these folks apart from others? do you think it’s possible to perform at those levels (I guess IC7+) without tons of experience in Meta itself?
It’s possible, but when you come in, spend sufficient time with the senior ICs in your org to get a pulse on what they do differently. Many times, external hires don’t do enough of this. They try to apply the success formula from their past job to this new job, and that is recipe for failure.
How do you make decision on E4 to E5 promo? Is it enough to have some senior IC and manager vouching for it? In ML it’s hard to always get launches as many things may just fail. How do you evaluate someone who didn’t get launches in a half but showed many iterations and learning on some projects? How important is ‘Below Expectation’ really in Performance reviews? Should we care more about it?
Unfortunately not having any launches almost always becomes a promo blocker. Learning alone doesn’t usually make the cut unless the learning led to major decisions like don’t attempt to launch a Twitter competitor. It’s safer to focus on launches that led to positive impact. Don’t rely on your manager to be able to push through a learning based promo argument.
I’m an average E5 at Meta with mixed EE n MA. What would it take people like me to reach the director level? I constantly see myself retiring at terminal IC level. I feel my skill set can never expand to what it takes even if I try hard. I don’t have that talent and I’ve met many like me. How do you suggest we can thrive?
I used to absolutely feel this way when I was e4! What you are feeling isn’t uncommon at all. This lack of confidence in your ability is going to further reduce your chances of getting there. So you have to first get over that mental hurdle. Also, 3 levels might be too much when you lack confidence. Take 1–2 levels at a time and make step jumps. Also, there’s something to ‘fake it till you make it’.
Manager Career Development
What are the top 3 things a M1 should do to get to next level given the current circumstances? Anything other than 1. Close gaps 2. Find advocates 3. Be patient ?
1. Deliver real impact that’s hard to challenge (hacked, faked, etc). 2. Retain employees and attract even more. Be a magnet for talent. Pulse should reflect this. 3. Advocate for yourself that when the opportunity arises you are eagerly willing and able to scale up via managing through managers. This self advocacy will eventually work if 1 and 2 are also met.
What are interviews even like for D+?
Interviews are not super different. Still some coding and algorithm design rounds, but a lot more on system design, behavioral, and just random chats with very senior folks Iike CxOs. For the company I am joining I think I had 12 rounds.
What are M1/M2 behaviors or preferences which you would discourage? In infra orgs, I noticed some M1 whose team maintains well established services for multiple halves. And keep claiming huge $$ impacc with nearly 0 new developments.
You gave a good example yourself. The fact that you noticed this means others also notice it, and the word spreads. My most disliked behavior is selfishness toward one’s team or, worse, ones personal growth. Everyone thinks about their career and scope, but the good ones still put the users or products above themselves, or at least are smart enough to give that impression (this is very game theoretic). Overt display of selfish behavior and/or scope protection is very common and very annoying. Another one is micromanaging your less perfomant ICs instead of coaching them for the longer term.
I’m a M1 with consistent high ratings. I was up for promotion for 3 times already but got screwed by reorg, flattening, reorg… What’s your advice for me? Or should I change team vs just ride along and see? What kind of team would you recommend me to join?
Sorry to hear. Both the above advice are good. Changing teams usually reset promo clock, and new manager will usually overpromise to get you to join. Just make really sure if 4th attempt is not a sureshot one, you might be really close. You also might be net set up for success. Find out which one it is. Next level at a different company is only actually better for a handful of companies like Google.
General Career Dilemmas
How would you tradeoff existing high TC (as M2 or plus) vs growth path given the company is doing (low) HC growth. From my POV, jumping to another company to go for path to director means cutting all existing trust with my leadership since I was new grad, and I kind of fear doing that, but I was also thinking from time to time that staying in the same company for too long will possibly make me ‘not adaptive’ to any other companies.
We are all ridiculously replaceable in large companies. It takes managers hours or days to find backfill for coveted roles or to create growth scope for an adjacent M1. The company will run just fine without many of us. Don’t burn bridges when you leave, just respectfully give notice and leave on good terms. Broadening your experience will pay off over time.
How do you find what you really want and balance — money/title or level/ technology/ WLB/etc. Some of my friends wanted growth crazily and they work like 70hrs a week and pick IC/TLM path to optimize for it. For me, I was only thinking that I did enough IC work when growing to 6 and pick org lead path to have some experience. And often times I feel a bit lost in daily work without thinking from the big picture to figure out what I really want, etc.
Title is all fake and inconsistent. Even within one company, the bar changes over time, let alone across companies. That eliminates one dimension. But i am biased because I have the titles. The one thing that title dictates is respect. Money is real in that it’s a currency of worth across all jobs. Money trades off against daily peace of mind, respect, and WLB. Ideally, you want a good mix of money and WLB, and a minimum bar on respect and mental health, which you shouldn’t go beneath. One suggestion is not to think too far out. Planning to work your ass off for many years, then relax or retire — this is a fallacy. There is always something unfortunate or unexpected such as the economy or your health. Limit your planning to at most 5 years, preferably 3 (or less).
I’m wondering if it’s worth becoming a director or better to start IC7. Is it true that there are more IC7 roles compared to M2 and D roles in general.
Between IC7 vs. M2 at Meta, right now, there are many more opportunities in the IC track. But you should do what you are best at.
As also someone who has roughly similar tenures at G and FB, except on the IC track (L7 TLM for a year at G but ran back to IC), I’m curious how you think about IC8 vs D1 as career choices. My current assessment at 8 is that impact is easier than it was at G, but still feels like your career is subject to org whims. Management seems to be able to weather these whims by changing orgs… I’m too specialized now to do that. I can’t just roll into Ads or product from Infra at 8, but I’ve seen many D1 do it. Management also though seems more likely to hate their lives, so it’s hard to see how I should manage things in the future.
This is a tough one and hard to give advice for these more senior levels without knowing the specifics. But I agree with the general premise that senior ICs are going to find internal mobility harder, while D+ is often moving around if the primary responsibility is people support instead of technical expertise. Not all managers hate their lives. The most important thing is to pick an area that you are passionate about, and find out via informal chats how much drama you are expected to deal with.
In terms of career/job stability, is it better off being going into a people manager path or stick to IC path? I think I can do well in both paths, but I’m more concerned about the fact that if I change a company, is being a manager easier to grow than an IC.
The number of opportunities is higher in the industry for ICs. This year and the last, the industry has shifted toward more builders and fewer managers. The ratio is shifting toward higher ic to manager ratio. All else being equal, I would stay IC in the tech industry. The caveat is if title is important, it’s near impossible to make VP via the IC path, if that’s your aspiration. That’s the main downside.
Have you ever got yourself thinking “what’s next”? Everytime I achieve a goal either getting the promo, certain financial goal, the euphoria did not last long and I immediately get myself thinking “what’s next”? Where does it end? What is the end goal in life for you?
This is a very philosophical question. That specific feeling of being underwhelmed after hitting a big milestone is extremely common. It is almost always underwhelming. I personally focus on the present moment and the near future and make the most of my days and weeks. I expect less from the long term because things are very unpredictable. This wisdom took me a decade to arrive at. Ymmv.
When is the right time and signs to switch teams and companies?
So many different factors, but among the feeling of boredom, lack of excitement, lack of respect, lack of financial growth, lack of learning opportunities, if at least 2 apply to you, it’s probably a good sign. Sorry, this is not very scientific, but it’s one way to build a decision framework around this very important question of yours.
What is that one way to grow levels that nobody tells? I have heard things like growing scope and skills.
Ask your manager and skip what would get them promoted and help them get there.
[Edit: Probably not directly — probably via some euphemism like “What would make you successful” or its variant].
Is staying in the same team vs switching around internally a better strategy to build skills and optimize for long term growth? (For E6+)
Instead of measuring by time, measure by milestone. If you hit 1–2 very meaningful milestones and maybe a promotion, you should consider what new things you would learn or skills you gain by staying on. Don’t immediately switch teams but at least consider it. On the other end, don’t keep changing teams when you don’t see success. That might label you as someone who meanders from failure to failure.
What’s the opportunity to survive if I’m searching for new teams now with Meets All + Below Expectations ratings? Will there be a targeted layoff or silent pip?
I think you should move quickly to another team and reset your relationship before it is too late. The new manager has to want to champion you. One trick is to apply to a boring area where the EMs are struggling to get any reachouts.
What do Senior Leaders Even Do?
What exactly are directors supposed to do? I can’t think of even one instance of value that my director has provided, I mean, except for posting about constantly changing direction.
Is this a serious question? What is your level? How much visibility do you have into your direct manager’s contributions? In general all of senior management is deciding on direction based on internal and external signals. Communicating about it is just the tip of the iceberg.
The direction seems to change a lot every 3–6 months. Often the new direction pretty much cancels the previous progress. In these cases I would say the value provided is very small. Or does this happen only in my shitty org?
There’s lack of transparency on why direction changes. Sometimes it’s simply because a key sponsor of a project left the company/org, and the new leaders don’t believe in that area. At other times it’s some emerging external signal such as — we are losing users in Brazil. I do feel bad for engineers who are impacted by these. There’s not enough empathy for impact at the grassroots level. I don’t have a good solution, but I hear you.
As D(1?, 2?) what’s the depth of introspection you have into your org? E.g. “I know all Ms, 6s, 7s, 8s and what they’re doing. I don’t care about 5s and below”
I’ve paid relatively close attention to 6+ and always paid close attention to 5->6 promos. However, I care less about levels, more about what work they do, how clearly they communicate about that work, etc. I have been quite impressed with several E4s and E5s and would happily work with them closely if time permits. Likewise some E6+ are not that effective, especially some external hires. I used to stay away.
Did you try to coach such external E6s ?
With a busy job and lots of interests outside work, I no longer have time for regular mentoring of external folks.
What does “happily work with them closely” mean? Like what is a D going to work closely with an E4 on? What is it that impressed you about lower Es and how did you notice it with everything else going on
If anyone pinged me on workplace and had something interesting to share I mostly responded and chatted with them regardless of their level. So it’s not super systematic because most folks never reached out. I also used to attend technical design whenever possible. Those were my favorite meetings. There, the presenters were all sorts of levels. I asked questions out of curiosity and often got a good sense of depth from their responses.
I still cannot understand the importance of M2 and D in this company. My team had > 12 reports to M1 but M2 and D has so little reports. Can you explain to me what leadership at that level do? Are you busier or more free at that level.
They choose their own adventure at this level. Not all D+ are equally busy for sure. If you want all your areas to be successful, staying on top of progress across each area can keep you incredibly busy. Some entirely delegate to their reports and are hardly busy or useful. Most choose to be somewhere in between. They pick a few top priorities to focus on and delegate the rest. For those who aren’t doing much, it’s very rare to hold them accountable if their teams are getting a lot done.
How to Develop Specific Habits or Skill Sets?
What does “managing up” mean? Examples?
Put simply, it means frequently connecting with skip to as high as you can get access. Bridging the gap between junior folks and senior. More subtle things like becoming more visible, giving leaders assurance that the work they are asking to do will get done, and that you can be held accountable for them. It gets increasingly political when selfish desires kick in.
How would you recommend learning how to manage up gracefully? How did you learn?
Ask successful senior leaders to privately share their own instances of effective upward management. Some of them will oblige.
I’m 5 and how to setup 1:1 with D without my M and skipped feeling bypassed
Just ask directly via wp chat for a monthly 1:1 and give a justification. If they are good, they will agree, may adjust frequency. Still good. If they are obnoxious or read and ignore, probably wasn’t worth it. Such 1:1s may not have helped.
At what level do you think it makes sense to start talking to your skip/d1/d2/vp etc. Specifically — does a 4 have any business reaching out to these people? And what should I even be asking?
Yeah, should sync with skip manager regardless of level. Regarding jumping to someone high level for the sake of it, consider what would be of interest to them. Let’s say you are in an all hands and some D+ told your team that they are very excited about solving some important user or revenue problem. If you genuinely had some good ideas or wanted to directly contribute to it, you can ping that particular leader right after the meeting about it. Only very egotistical jerks wouldn’t respond. Leaders pay most attention to the people that solve their problems. Go with the mindset of giving, not getting.
Many team members are about to be burnout but a lot of pressure on goal. Any ideas for handling this?
The source of burnout is typically either fear of the worst or being unable to achieve a self-imposed bar on success, and you have deal with it accordingly. I find it useful to think in terms of “what’s the worst thing that can happen to me if the team level goals are missed?” The whole team can’t be let go, right? Very unlikely. On the latter, if you are having one bad half, consider being more patient and find ways to turn it around in the following halves.
Cross-functional Skills and Relationships
As an engineer, thoughts on the non-engineering / xfn in the co?
My greatest respect is toward more junior DS and DE, many of whom are so good. They are getting real work done. Speaking only of the facebook side. PMs are a hit or miss. The really good ones do help eng focus on building while they communicate upward and outward, unblock, push the projects in the right direction, and so on. A few TPMs are really good, but most aren’t adding value beyond spreadsheet calculus. Designers add very direct value. UXR bring great insights, but in a data driven company, they are often ignored by Eng and PM.
What about the few good TPMs you’ve met that are “really good”? Curious to know what makes a tpm effective in your eyes
During the execution phase of complex multi org or at least multi team projects on a tight timeline, the best TPMs would become the enablers of efficient execution. They are orchestrating the progress and the final delivery of results. They are communicating frequently, helping unblock pxfn, resources, and so on, and connecting the dots. They also understand the tech well enough to be able to explain and make some local decisions on prioritization. They also know the difference between PM and TPM and don’t pretend to be the former. And even if they have that aspiration, they hide it very well during this execution phase. Ultimately, people should believe that the project would have moved slower or even not gotten competed had it not been for this TPM. Because all this is a tall order, it is rare. There are, of course, other models of success.
What behaviors/characteristics/qualities did your best XFN demonstrate? I’m most interested in examples of PM, DS/DE and PD.
I wrote about TPMs above.
PMs: The best one shielded the eng team from thrash by respectfully pushing back on lower priority stuff while pushing the eng team on hipri stuff. They would unblock teams from experiments and launched whenever possible, they would understand the tech sufficiently to know when to speak and when to yield to experts, and they would take care to communicate upwards the best work the team was doing, giving proper credit to the hardworking folks. There are some other good things, like betting on the right direction and correcting course if it’s not working out.
Have no nuanced opinions about PD and DE, except that they were essential and got less visibility than they deserved.
DS: The best ones are deeply knowledgeable statisticians who bring surprising insights to the table in a way that changes the direction for the whole team if needed. They are also able to follow up with eng and PM to keep pushing this direction if the evidence is clear, and not give up after writing a note about it. Usually you need to keep repeating the message before it takes full effect. Finally, they maintain a high bar on goals measurement and don’t let a/B tests or longitudinal measurements to be miscalculated or misrepresented. They are the gatekeepers of data based truth, and people respect them for that.
Asking for My Opinion on Things
Do you believe in the Metaverse vision and direction? Do you think RL is doing the right thing?
I think there’s something to high quality AR that feels a lot like really good visually aware heads-up displays in cars that can be incredibly useful if done right. It can save lives. The problem is people’s line of sight is often so visually complex and unpredictable that solving the general vision problem is still a couple years out. This is also why self-driving cars are taking forever to be widely available. Otoh VR is going to remain more niche as a gaming++ device. But I could be wrong. Kids spend many hours on iPads — they could switch to lightweight VR devices given sufficient payoff. Zuck is smart. He is not 100% sure these will take off, but he wants to own platforms. He wants to be the Android of AR/VR *if* these did take off like mobile did. So he’s betting.
But (all said and done), nobody cares what I think about this topic.
I saw your LinkedIn post comparing Meta and G. While you acknowledged that Meta is very metrics driven and G is driven by product experience, I didn’t see discussion on the downsides of Meta’s approach. I think it’s a huge factor. Don’t you think Meta’s approach to Performance Reviews and short term metric hacking has huge long term costs? Do you attribute any part of Meta’s success to this culture? I think the network effects of FB and IG are so strong that the products survive despite the bad culture, not in spite of it.
That’s fair. I hit the word limit. I hope to write a longer blog post that should cover this. I did imply this by listing it under ways i prefer G.But believe me, there is no perfect answer when it comes to deciding how much to balance short vs long term when it comes to strategy. I think Google also has it all wrong too often. They take 2 years to overhaul infrastructure focusing on the long term, only to realize it wasn’t worth it, or it’s too costly to migrate, and a year down the line, they reinvent again. These are all very situation dependent, and that’s the boring answer.
Can you name a product/infra/model change you personally think the most impressive and why it is successful?
OpenAI’s chatgpt was a game changer in terms of making AI a household thing even if the technology was not new. No, I am not going to be working there. I also thought Snap’s AR software was ahead of its time. I actually got ghosted by them a few years back when I applied. No regrets though.
O how about inside meta
The deep NN based image segmentation algorithm that came out of FAIR recently was incredible. Open source Pytorch and Llama were also good software combined with game-changing moves (commercial use for free).
Something Feels Off About Something
Many managers feel that ICs are treated far better than managers by leadership — better growth plans, more chance of AE, more forgiving on mistakes. Success is attributed more to ICs and failures to EMs. Do you concur with that or is that a biased view?
I don’t buy this Generalization, but yes people at senior levels are quite judgmental — so was I to some extent. They look at the pool of EMs and ICs and invariably group them as strong vs. Not strong, and assign the most mission critical projects to a combination of strong ICs and EMs.
Do you feel like the velocity of our developers are lower than it used to be?
Yes, because the company has grown to the point that folks are spending more time on alignment than doing actual work. It’s actually the fault of senior leaders such as myself that we weren’t able to keep things nimble and anticipate redundancies. When a company announces only 6–7 priorities, everyone wants their work to be associated with just those ones. And thus a 67K person company start to feel too big. I bet Google feels worse now with 180K employees even after the layoffs.
Why is there so much fascination with diff count?
It’s not fascination, but it’s literally the only objective measure of productivity that is comparable across teams and orgs. It’s quite imperfect, e.g. not all lines of code are equally impactful, can be gamed, and so on. What I found to be a useful signal was the outlier values. Close to zero diff counts need an explanation — what were they doing? Likewise, very large.diff count and zero impact is also questionable. But large impact, complex project, and moderate to large diff count do add up to tell the same story.
Why do you think people in our industry are fake and not trustworthy? Is it purely money/greed or something else?
I don’t know that I buy the premise in general, but by fake if you mean being extra careful and not being direct, a lot of it has to do with fear. Fear of losing a job, fear of making career limiting moves, fear of visa situations, etc.
Serious question — does ‘scapegoating’ happen in Performance Reviews, in order to deflect blame by leadership? Never been in calibrations but I get the distinct impression this happens.
In my 4 years of Performance Reviews, I have never seen sinister behavior like this. e.g. an M2’s ratings due to their team missing goals couldn’t be saved by saying some specific IC6 didn’t perform well if thats what you were thinking. Other folks in the room would pounce at that because they have no incentive to protect that M2. They’d say this is a problem for the M2 to have solved one way or another.
Is there accountability at D2+ levels for directions? Does senior leadership have any idea how to run a company and engineers where revenue isn’t growing XX%+ a year?
Not much accountability, unfortunately. You are not wrong about this. But to get another job they do call up colleagues, bosses, and reports for feedback, and truly incompetent leaders will find it hard to get their next amazing gig.
They check references without informing the candidate? Thought that was illegal.
They can informally ask whoever they want, if they know those people. You can’t do much about it. Starvation — don’t confuse an official reference check with an unofficial conversation with former people you used to work with who I know too. The industry is smaller than you think. Don’t be a jerk, it can come back to hurt you later.
So basically once you make it to the top ranks, it means you’ll stay there as long as you keep your relationships sane, regardless of how good you’re actually at managing engineers?
I think terrible managers do find it harder to get coveted roles, and during a squeeze, they do get impacted with higher probability. That’s the most one can expect. What are you expecting, they will get banished to the jungle and get eaten by lions?
Can you share your view on bad EMs and how often they are PIPed, flattened, or otherwise punished? I suspect the community’s view of a bad EM is different than yours, and shedding light on that might be helpful for folks.
Not often enough, in my opinion. But this is not unique to Meta. It is universal in the industry. EMs can hide behind the success of their team.
My Identity, Career, and Life Choices
I have seen your shitpost and also your posts on linkedin. Thanks for being different than we typically have seen directors.
Thanks. The company has been surprisingly tolerant of my shenanigans. I think others hold back for no good reasons.
Unlikely it is him. Someone pretending to be him.
Haha I am not famous enough for someone to impersonate me. The incentives are super weak. But believe what you want to believe, if the answers are helpful that’s all that matters.
What would you have done differently during your time here?
Lots of things. For starters, taken more initiative to start new projects and workstreams. Took a more proactive role in reducing overlaps. Also managed upward much more much sooner. It took me a long time to understand how the game is played. Many of my peers were managing up like crazy from early on. Not saying it’s a good thing but it’s how the game is played. There are many others.
Why choose to depart now? Do you anticipate more headwinds?
Long time coming. No known headwinds. Have been thinking for months. Wanted to wait for the vest and take care of Performance Review Cycle.
Nice, so what’s next, heading home or taking a new role outside?
Salaried job locally. Don’t have enough passion to build startups or move (physically).
What’s your plan for the future? Any job line up? Or a small personal break before getting back? How’s the market nowadays for director level?
Market for D+ is never great. Too many people want these jobs and not enough open roles. I plan to take up a job at a smaller company.
What are you hoping to get at the smaller company that you did not get at Meta?
My only expectation is that things will be different and I will learn some new things. It’s also somewhat predictably going to be more money.
Sincere question to learn, not judgemental — how did joining Meta as eDir work out without previously having a similar title (as per linkedin)? We often downlevel management hires (ie ex-CTOs as M1s), but you seem to have cracked a nut there
I joined as an M2 and got promoted. Not upleveled. But I did get there quite fast.
D1/D2 are Meta are seriously big deal. What’s your next move? Is it still TC, or title, or WLB semi retirement?
No retirement but want to be closer to actual products and features development. Title is nice for leverage but gets old very quickly. TC didn’t have to be compromised to be able to do that. Smaller companies have bigger upside.
At which point did TC made a difference in your life? E.g from IC5 to 6 was a big jump that made life much more comfortable.
The move to Facebook as an M2 was a big jump and meaningfully changed my lifestyle.
Was it because you were underpaid at google as L7? Or was fb just paying really well?
I negotiated and got a very good deal. At G, I was well above median for L7 so that wasn’t an issue. I had an amazing recruiter who fought for me.
How much shit did you get from other D/VPs for your LinkedIn post from 6 months ago about calibrations and leadership cherry picking credit from their teams?
Surprisingly, none. Nobody told me anything, not even HR. The only one was that the head of performance reviews and someone on their team set up some time with me to understand this and said they would incorporate this feedback in future cycles, which I thought was a good move on their part. That’s it.
What has been your biggest and worst contribution to Meta over last 4 years?
Biggest contribution was always pushing for what felt right even if it pissed people off. Worst was not paying enough attention to concerns brewing, instead relying on layers of management.
In your career did you ever face or felt any racism?
I never faced overt racism in the bay area or even Seattle. These places are very diverse. I witnessed some very odd behavior when I was in Pennsylvania. e.g. at a bar, someone asked me how come i got a job at google while citizens aren’t getting them. He had no way of knowing if I was a US citizen or not (I am). There’s always unconscious bias everywhere, but nothing that made me too uncomfortable.
Why are you not retiring, and choosing to go to another job?
Retiring? In the bay area? Will take years. Zuck and I are similar age range, he’s not retiring either.
How do you make investment decisions as director to deal with the large amt. of $META?
Very bad at it. Nobody should take investment advice from me. Though I do believe that outside a small number of instruments like index funds and CDs and Bonds, its all a gamble.
TC and yoe?
100K and 2yoe {false}
{TC stands for Total Compensation; base+bonus+equity}
TC?
The answer is 42. It always has been. {false + classic reference}
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