I’m Michael. I was a principal engineer at Facebook from 2009 to 2017, where I was the top code contributor of all time and also conducted hundreds of interviews. I recently co-founded Formation.dev, an engineering fellowship that trains and refers engineers directly into big tech. Ask me Anything!

Hey, it is indeed! I'll go by interview types: 1. DS&A bar is the same. Often times more senior engineers are a little rustier, but they need to be at the bar. 2. System Design. The candidate needs to have a very strong performance. Both in terms have have many alternate solutions for many parts of the system, but also communicating the solution with clarity and appropriate depth. 3. Technical Behavioral. The candidate needs to very clearly demonstrate that the scope of their responsibilities was on par with a typical Facebook E6 engineer. Typically a higher level engineer or manager would be running this interview. Overall, a staff engineer doesn't walk in off the street randomly, they have a lot of experience at one or more companies. So very critically evaluating that experience, and checking with references if necessary, will be crucial. Often times someone who claims to be at the E6 level will be down leveled to an E5 (which comp at the high end of the band) if they can't very definitely prove their case. It's always easier to quickly promote to make up for a mistake, than it is to demote or fire.