Cruise levels
Can soemone from Cruise share how leveling works? i recently received an offer for Senior level even though there are staff and principal levels. I have 10+ years of experience and in relevant industries. The recruiter tells me that Cruise has extremely high standard for levels and Staff level is reserved for someone who is likely exceptional. wanted to hear from other cruisers if this is for real or if the recruiter is BSing?
I heard on some podcast that cruise does only have 5 levels. So may be true ?
I highly doubt this. I interviewed for senior when I had 2 YOE after PhD.
I believe senior at Cruise is roughly L4 at Google, though I don't know if their senior band is wider than our L4 band.
Getting staff is easier coming from outside than getting promoted, think about it before making a call.
Why do you say that? Are promotions hard there?
Promotions depend on lot of factors. Impact, reach, leading projects technically, visibility - it’s hard to get all these factors aligned.
I thought levels at cruise were SWE I SWE II Sr SWE I Sr SWE II Staff SWE I Staff SWE II Can someone from cruise confirm?
No. They are Software Eng, SEnior soft ent, Staff Eng, senior staff ...
Staff reserved for exceptional? LOL
Do you have many staff’s in your team?
4 levels, and yeah staff is relatively rare. Lots of folks with 10+ yoe are senior.
Entry level, associate, senior, staff, principal. Not many staff level at Cruise mostly senior 5-10 YoE. Staff usually has extra interview loops and approval from Director/VP round.
This is correct. The staff engineers in my team are all truly exceptional.
We’re just starting to hire more staff levels and principal engineers. Need more strong technical leadership for next growth phase of 1000+. So likely more director level candidates and above coming. I’ve seen a couple of staff promotions internally but it’s not as common since most people are pretty new.
Senior band is super wide, ranging from 2 to infinity years of experience. I noticed there was one L7 (Sr. Staff SWE) from GG and another E6 FB joined as Cruise staffs. So the bar for Staff level is indeed quite high. It's also very difficult to promote to Staff internally.
Is the culture improving? Glassdoor reviews are dismal
I think this is really team dependent. For example, mine is absolutely fantastic, but I’ve heard enough people say otherwise to know that bad teams must exist. Its like the saying “you don’t leave companies, you leave managers”. I would suggest talking with your hiring manager first and seeing what that’s like. Hope to have you on board. 💪 let’s make this fucking car go!
I don't work at Cruise and can tell you this is BS. Most things coming from a recruiter are BS.