Background: I have 1.5 YOE as software engineer, I want to shift to ML. I am applying for ML engineer/applied scientist/research engineer positions. Most of ML and research experience is from my masters in CS and I don't have a Phd. Offers: I have offers from two big companies for ML engineer and applied scientist positions. They are not Google/Facebook/Netflix though. I applied via referral at these companies, but they keep rejecting me for these positions. Question: My hypothesis is they probably have quite high standards, and want to ML industry experience before. But do you think if they know I have other counter offers, they can will interview me? I How can I leverage those offers to get an interview? TC: 130K
This what my email looks like: "Hi .., I have offers for Research Engineer from ..and Applied Scientist, ... I also have additional referral from .. who is a Research Scientist at ... Does that in anyway help my case?" Am being too rude or questioning their evaluation process?
Nah that’s not rude at all, I’m sure people ask them all the time. How far did you get into their process? The best case is you get another shot, the worst case is they say no, so IMO it’s definitely worth reaching out.
I haven’t got an interview even, I just applied via referral and got rejected.
If you are applying to FB it will be a hard stretch at 1.5 years of exp without a PhD. Most of the hiring is at minimum 1.5 + PhD or 5 Years + Deg (Depending on level of industry responsibilities, can get away with 3.5). Most of the Entry Level Roles are filled with new grad PhD or previous Interns. If you have two amazing offers that allow you to make a fte switch from SDE to MLE then take one and do amazing work. If you have anything more feel free to dm..
Why ML?
Personally, I am really excited about RL and it’s applications to various areas. I worked on it during graduate study and also published in NIPS. I would work on that again and see it applied to real problems. I can also now understand the trade off of ML with systems, having some industry exp. Does that make somewhat sense?
Kind of, good luck! Easy to switch domain after getting into fb.
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ML at FAANG is stupid hard to get into. If you want to do ML there your going to need to either get a PhD or get more YOE. Look into ad tech companies / startups. They use ML a ton for Personalization / Email
Thanks for the perspective! But I have seen a ton of ML Engineers there without a Phd and without much experience. I think it is possible though.