u/michaelnovati replied · ★ FEATURED
Hi, I'm happy to answer questions and always like to hear what others have to think. I'll list just a couple of shorter comments to help answer, but feel free to me, I'm very open with people about if I think Formation is a good option to consider or not, and ultimately you have to decide.
1. It sounds like you are somewhat familiar with it at least, but just to clarify that we're not a bootcamp and have no fixed curriculum, lectures, classes, lessons, etc... We are a practice, benchmarking, mentorship, job hunting and mock interview platform. You do practice by yourself in in small mentor-led group sessions, you get feedback in those sessions and through benchmarkings, and you trust us to move you through topics and skill areas at whatever pace you go at, and you trust us to tell you when you are at the top company bar. So you are paying to reliably get your skills (from DS&A to System Design, to behavioral, etc...) to a top tier bar, not on any certain timeframe.
2. We have job hunting tracking tools built entirely in house, and we source hundreds of jobs a we and use AI to match them to you - 5 a day. We prepare you for upcoming specific interviews, help your strategize and negotiate with on demand career coaches that are seasoned FAANG recruiters, etc...
3. While we have a number of formal and informal partnerships with companies, recruiters, agencies etc... we don't guarantee any referrals but we do try to refer you when we can. You should NOT come to Formation as a shortcut to get a guaranteed job a FAANG companies - it doesn't work that way and no one can promise you that. We can promise to try our best to help you but we can't create jobs that don't exist. You should join to have accountability on your job hunt and get feedback from FAANG recruiters and hiring managers about your resume and pitch, but not to skip the line... if we are able to refer you that's icing on the cake.
4. **COST**. If it's worth it is up to you. The average placed Fellow increases their compensation by multiples over the program cost, according to our self-reported exit salary data we collect. So we consider Formation an investment in yourself. Like instead of investing in Snap stock or Google stock you invest in yourself and hopefully increase your compensation so much it was well worth it. **The question though is, without Formation what would your outcome be?** And that's impossible to ever know. Many people find great jobs on their own. Would their outcome have been better? Would negotiation help alone made the payment work it? From what I've seen, a lot depends on the person, and luck, so we're focused on just making sure people who join feel like they got value for what they paid, and if we do that for most people, we think the product works.