Working for big tech companies can be a big dream for many. However, these jobs can at times cost your mental health and life-work balance. A recent social media post from a current employee at Meta explains this concern. In the post, he denotes the raw portrayal of the tech giant’s internal culture, fear-based management, and low morale stifle creativity and punish risk.
“This company has a weird way of sucking up ALL of your mental energy,” the post reads. “I thought it could be my golden ticket to earn well for a few years and then retire early. But I severely underestimated just how bad mental health can get here.”
Meta’s toxic work culture
The employee criticises Meta’s allegedly toxic internal culture, calls it as “zero-sum” and rife with passive-aggressive behaviour. According to him, employees are forced to fight over project scope and credit, often leading to failed initiatives that harm performance reviews. “Most projects just end up flopping tbh,”* the post states. Risks are punished unless they turn out to be successful across the board.”
The poster believes both Meta’s hardware (RL) and AI efforts are fundamentally misguided as it has poor leadership and a stifling internal environment. The employee also draws comparison with innovation-driven startups like OpenAI and Anthropic, arguing that Meta lacks the culture needed to retain and empower top-tier AI talent. “The culture stifles innovation. Bringing in more innovators within this cutthroat culture will not lead to more innovation, it will lead to more stifling,” the post concludes.
“I don’t think even Google has the culture now”
Netizens poured their opinion on the work culture in big tech companies. A user noted, “I don’t think Google has the culture now to innovate and monetize that innovation effectively any more.”
“Wow…the things you described about culture, for a moment I thought you were talking about Amazon,” added another. I was really bummed out after passing the full loop and then finding out there wasn’t headcount for IC4 in Product. After reading countless posts like this, I can’t help but feel that it was Gods plan to use Meta to get me to prep for interviews (as they reached out to me when I wasn’t looking) and have me land at another company with better WLB. It’s funny because I was only interviewing at other companies besides Meta to avoid a lowball from them. The offer I’m taking has better scope, more senior level, and competitive TC (although meta would’ve been slightly more). Thank you lord,” said another user.
“Another fear mongering post from an insecure meta mate desperately trying to scare away new hires who will likely replace them next perf review cycle,” added another user who had a different opinion from the poster. “Meta is basically a better paying amazon — I have worked for both,” claimed another.
