TL;DR - Got a SWE offer from FB (MPK). Worked at Google before, didn't like it. Currently in GS, I like it. I feel that I would not enjoy FB since it's similar to Google. Is moving to FB worth it? Long version: An FB recruiter reached out to me so I decided to do the interviews since I haven't experienced pain in a while. I "accidentally" passed because the questions I got were variations of problems that I have seen before. I also used STL to do almost half of all the code logic for me. My system design question was literally one of the first things Google teaches Nooglers. I think it was "Life of a Search Query" or something. Moving to FB would be a no-brainer if I didn't have the impression that it is very similar to Google. Let's face it. Both companies are just swapping each other's employees. The C++ work I'm doing now in GS is much more fun compared to Google which uses a crippled variation of C++. Google employees also spend a disproportionate amount of resources on SJW stuff which don't add anything to the bottomline. WLB is also a concern for me since I have seen a lot of FB horror stories here in Blind. My WLB at GS is actually pretty sane. Our trading desk starts at 7:30AM but the time after market close is ours (5PM onwards). There is no BS oncall rotations where SWEs get paged at 2AM because you don't have SRE headcount. Reputation-wise, FB and GS probably stand level with each other. But at least GS does not waste resources trying to do virtue-signalling unlike FB/GOOG. So I guess my question is, are there any redeeming factors of FB that I haven't thought of yet which will persuade me to take the job? #interview #fb #facebook #goldman #google #tech #swe
What's your TC? How on earth you rank tier 2 shit like GS below FAANG? As Microsoft I think I'm also above you in tier. Wtf.
GS Engineering division is shit-tier. GS Securities division (trading desks) is tier-1.
Oh didnt know there was a diff. TC comparable? VP level can hit $450k? I'm benchmarking that to L5
What is STL?
C++ Standard Template Library.
Facebook and Google are very different. Google is an engineering first company. Every problem boils down to some engineering principle you need to apply. Facebook is a metrics first company. Everything boils down to a number you need to move. Day to day and work will feel different. Facebook has much worse wlb than Google, and the stress level is much higher as pips and being managed out is common and people around you of all levels will keep getting fired. If you are ok with that, you will do fine
Yeah I also did not like that aspect of Google as well when I was there. I can imagine myself getting roadblocked by code reviewers just because I used reinterpret_cast or some C++20 template metaprogramming feature. At least FB and GS move at a more favorable pace for me.
Ok how often do you actually see ppl getting fired is what im curious about now
TC?
There is only one good engineering role at Goldman: the people who work on low-latency distributed trading system using C++. This kind of role is Tier 1 in tech ( on-par with buyside ) OP is one of those good ones. The rest of GS engineering are all shit, including quant strats (strats are not real quants, only slang code monkey)
you bumped a year and a half old thread. OP took the job at Meta and after the stock crash now makes less than the mailroom at GS.
Poor guy. Meta is no longer what it used to be. I’d love to refer him back to GS if he’s looking to switch
Are you a quant at GS or swe? Feel free to dm
Sure. I'm a strat so kind of in between but my day-to-day work leans more towards SWE.
These are different roles. I am assuming you are in the sec div. If you didn't like G my bet is that you don't like SWE work. Strats is a very different ballgame and you can't expect any good amount of overlap between strat and swe