Many questions about culture and WLB at roblox. Feel free to answer none, one, or all. Your time and feedback are appreciated in advance. Thanks. 1. What's life like at roblox post Covid? 2. Are they thinking about allowing WFH engineers? 3. How does it compare with your last gig? 4. What are some common challenges you deal with day to day (politics, bad managers or coworkers)? 5. If you were goi g to leave, why? 6. Are there interesting problems being solved, or is it scale and keep the lights on? 7. Is the leadership and management competent? 8. Are you excited or passionate about working there? 9. Is burn out an issue? 10. If you were going to leave would you go to FAANG/big tech org, or find a job in another smaller org? 11. What are the benefits like for folks with family/or kids? 12. What's the interview process like? +1 for folks in information security, but general comments from roblox current/former employees welcome. #security #wfh
Tip: don’t bombard people with a ton of questions if you want help.
Ah, pro tip don't respond with useless info. I didn't bury the lead with "12 questions" on the title.
Too many questions
These are quite a few questions... but seems like you’re asking about wlb, future of the company and culture more or less. Wlb is pretty good, info sec side of things had WFH Wednesdays pre COVID. We have no meeting Wednesdays now. The future is very bright, super low attrition. Culture is great, own it and get stuff done. I have a family and have not had any issues with flexibility.
Awesome thanks. Yes and yes. Asking about wlb and culture can be vague and nebulous. I asked leading questions with an impetus to potentially trigger one experience or another. Good info thanks for sharing.
Will the company consider 100% remote post COVID? Really interested at the company but can’t move to San Mateo due to wife’s job.
Bruh this a whole ass interview lol
Why not? Time is limited in interviews, posts can tease out some interesting facts and/or lies.
A lot of questions from the OP, but I’m also interested on what Roblox folks have to say about the culture/wlb. Thanks!
Why dont you start by telling something about yourself first! TC? YOE? Where do you work currently?
I am pretty easy to identify at my current company, so Ill keep that close to the chest. YOE: 18 TC: 160K Working in areas of software/security engineering, threat hunting, threat intel, threat modeling, reversing/malware analysis as needed, investigations, and open source contributor
Let me try to answer around wlb, growth, wfh and culture Wlb is great here. Management values wlb and understand that burning out people could do more harm than good in the long run. In fact after covid19 occured, we regularly get recharge days off every now and then, where employees are encouraged to just shut off their laptops and spend quality time with family. Atleast in my org, I see a lot of family people with kids, and they usually seem to have a good wlb. Some teams allow wfh for a day within a week. However the culture is mostly to work from office. Pre-covid, 💯 remote employees were rare. We have to see how it will be post-covid, and things may or may not change. Culture is very autonomous and you would be expected to drive things rather than waiting to be spoon fed. My experience so far has been good. My team is friendly and collaborative. People are technically good and know their stuff and know what they are talking about. Like someone mentioned, culture fit is very important when hiring, since we are growing rapidly. Since the lockdown started, we have been seing a surge in traffic since a lot of kids are at home and playing roblox. I am optimistic about the long term growth of the company. Feel free to DM if you have any specific questions.
A lot of the stuff that you’re asking you can find out online from reviews. Roblox is very picky about the way it chooses people. Being a culture fit is very important. You have to be technically strong, but that alone is not enough. Why do you wanna work at Roblox? Have you asked that question to yourself? From your questions it seems like you really don’t. And if you don’t then our interviewers will easily notice that. Keep in mind that there are two on-sites. One is a regular onsite and the other is with some of our executives who are extremely experienced managers and they ask behavioral questions. So here’s a question for you. Why Roblox when there are so many other cool companies in the valley?
Great follow-up and thank you for sharing your perspective. These boards are not very good at capturing nuance, so your presumption that I am not sure about working at Roblox seems biased. The situation is quite the opposite, so I am investing time to see if Roblox is a good culture fit for me. In general, I want to make an informed decision, because changing jobs is a very big decision for me at this point in my life. I don't live in the valley (which is why I asked about work from home), and I will never move there due to family constraints. Without knowing anything more about the culture, I would love to work at roblox for the following reasons: 0) Roblox is a social media and gaming platform, and I very much want to work for a company where the emphasis is bringing people together under the most positive circumstances. Furthermore, I want to work at a company that supports its employees as much as the employees support the company. For example, if one of my kids has brain cancer or a life altering event, I want to know the company is going to have my back during the emotional roller coaster and the balance of producing good work vs family time. I also don't want to be measured against an employee who is single and can work 2x what I can because of my family responsibilities. I bring technical and life experience along with a buffet of advanced security approaches, and my absolute output is not in attacks found mitigated but also working cross functionally to help teams rise to their security challenges. 1) Security challenge: by and large roblox's success is driven by user content, and I enjoy looking for people doing bad things in products, networks, etc. As technology companies and content get complex, the cheaters, threats, and even kids looking to have fun get creative about how the attack or abuse this system. Finding new ways to detect, identify, respond, and automate this flow is very exciting to me. 2) Growth opportunity: Right now I work in an awesome team for a mediocre company. Company performance is hard to change and this takes years, but the fact that its mediocre means there is uncertainty around the longevity of my team and this makes me insecure about my future at the company. I am also a remote employee, and my upward growth as an IC has slowed to a halt. 3) Stability: I have a family and I cant job hop to find a "cool" job. Regular jobs are just as effective as "Cool jobs" when it comes to adding absolute value to my life. "Cool jobs" are fraught with nuance (culture, work environment, etc.). Roblox is not a "cool job" for me, but it is an opportunity for me grow and have a global impact. I have global impact in my job now, but Roblox would give me the opportunity to dig deeper into the social media and gaming verticals. 4) Interests: I have long had a interest in working at a company where AR/VR might become something that is part of the product line. I read "Rainbows End" by Vernor Vinge, and it really piqued my interest. I would love to work for a company where helping develop and work on technology/security related to this type of product would be pretty awesome. I know this was long, and I appreciate you taking the time to read it.
Culture and wlb are great. The CEO is a very nice guy who genuinely cares about his employees. The leadership hosts town-halls frequently and tries to be as transparent as they can. There are politics, but keep in mind that it’s a big company with almost 1000 employees. The managers are good and if you work hard you’ll get promoted.
Thank you for sharing. The townhalls and transparency is good to hear about. The last two companies I worked at were 20k+ and the security functions > 1k, so size is not a big factor. However, I know rapid growth can seriously dilute a healthy and vibrant culture because every new hire adds to the culture, and without proper attenuation the culture can turn into a melting pot of chaos. Thank you again for sharing!
they seem decently keen on hiring remote, but I'm going for an extremely niche role
Cool. Thank you everyone for your help and comments. I applied to the senior security game engine and exploit reverse engineering roles. Both are really exciting opportunities.
Security Engineer position?
Yea. Product or enterprise. I generally like to solve problems that products can't in IR, analysis, offense, threat intel, etc.
I had a phone screen, interview with a manager then a coding round with a Leetcode medium. I think the culture is great my interview expirience was good. They said that they were very profitable during COVID.