Pinterest vs Apple
Pinterest: - Level: L4 - Year 1 TC: 410K Apple: - Level: ICT4/Senior - Year 1 TC: 390K YOE 4 Torn between these two offers. With Pinterest, I got to work with my old-time manager (we are very close and have deep trust) on the same domain as at Twitter (server-side real-time machine learning infrastructure). I am personally passionate about the domain as I like to build large-scale distributed systems, and it makes my resume a coherent story. Talked to the skip manager too, they seem very genuine and value my talent, promised fast promo to L5. With Apple, the team works on on-device ML. There is some ML infra work but more of a applied research team than a ML infra team. The challenges are different from server-side ML (user privacy preserving, device energy efficiency etc.), and so is the tech stack (iOS/Swift/Objective-C). Not sure how transferrable they are to other domains/companies. They tend to work with product teams on risky bets prototyping new ideas, if there is traction give the project away to product team to scale/productionize. To me, Pinterest has higher upward potential because of potential faster promo within the same domain, while Apple has less downward risk since Apple as a company is very stable. I’d love to hear your thoughts 🙏
In times like these, definitely apple 🍎
Cannot deny the stability of Apple amid this economy. How would you rank that against domain/tech stack though? I do think Pin team's tech stack is more interesting to me and more transferrable to other companies/domains, plus I heard it is not very easy to switch teams within Apple.
I have had friends work at both of these places. Apple as a company is more top down, hence more stability. Pinterest being mid size, more ownership and hence expect fingers pointed at you if things go south. IMO, with llms taking a lot of attention and momentum, going with apple makes sense since they tend to be way behind the ml trends compared to g, fb or MSFT. Apple has all the resources to turn it around if it really wants. I think they would. Maybe they don't care about LLMs. Rumors are that they are working on their own search engine too. So the company's scope is great. Since you have a great rapport with your old manager at Pinterest, start at apple and go back in a year if apple isn't exciting.
How do you feel about the apple management? IMO going to somewhere where you have a really good relationship with your manager can help a lot towards being able to work on the projects you want and develop your career
Agreed. Re Apple management, the manager looks solid, has research experience in on-device ML field and management experience at other FAANG, but pretty new to Apple (joined half a year ago). The skip is a distinguished engineer and feels very friendly.
Stability = Apple Fun and thrill = Pinterest Choice is urs
On point, thanks!
Pinterest - is it remote or hybrid? Which location.
They seem to be pretty remote-friendly, no enforced RTO. I am based in the bay area.
I would vote for Pinterest provided you are getting what you love working on. My question would be, does it give you a path to domain expert in this job ? How widespread is that domain across industries? If both have a positive answer money can be dictated by you in future
Thanks, those are very thoughtful questions. I do think it provides me with a path to domain expert, although the domain of large-scale ML Infra in general is pretty big. The domain is pretty widespread within the industry, currently seeing the most success with recommendation systems (e.g. content/ads ranking), with large language model / AI generated content applications rising up as well.
Congratulations on the dilemma !! How are refreshers at both the companies? Personally I would go with Pinterest given the flexibility with work location and existing relationship you have with the manager.
I chose a good relationship with manager because it provides better stability. Most people don’t last a year or two at a job. So temporary stability for me makes more sense over broad company stability. You can’t control macro but you can control micro. I would go with Pinterest. You sound more excited about it and maybe the idea of working for Apple sounds cool, but without excitement you might do well?
This. Quality of life is more valuable than 20k increase in comp. But to each their own
This is poor advice. Manager to meet mandatory pip quota, good relationship goes into gutter. This can more likely happen at non apple at this time especially a mid size company.
Op, Do you have a MS? Could share the breakdown at Apple?
Factor in the fast promo and discount with your probability assessment. Note that Apple operates in silos on purpose and teams don’t talk. The benefit of working at Apple is Apple scale (400+B revenue), but a lot of the things you learn at Apple are unique to Apple and somewhat non-transferable.
More money is always better. I think the worst had already passed.
Pinterest could half after an earnings call, apple won't ever..
The worst is definitely not over