Fired from Tesla, Indian software engineer now earning over Rs 4 crore at Meta; shares tips for writing resumes

Hemant Pandey, who is now working as a software engineer at Meta at a Rs 4 crore yearly package, was laid off from Tesla at one point in his career. As told to Business Insider, Pandey bagged an internship in his “dream company” Tesla right after he completed his graduate program in Delhi in 2018. Just after seven months of being a full-time employee, Pandey was laid off from the company.

He stated, “It was my first job and getting laid off meant having to build rapport all over again in just six months. I needed to prove myself again." He had even invited his parents to California from India.

Desperate for a job, he then worked with SAP and later switched to Salesforce, where he stayed for two years.

In 2021, Pandey applied to Meta after hearing about the “crazy” salary packages it offers on tech forums. Currently, he is working with Meta, after rejecting offers from LinkedIn and TikTok.

Pandey shared three things that software engineers should remember while writing their resumes.

Firstly, he stated, that applicants need to limit their job descriptions while summarising their work experiences. He explained, “I like to keep it very ambiguous.” He said, in an interview, “If people ask me what I did at Salesforce, I can help them know more by explaining rather than writing a paragraph.” He just uses three bullet points for each job role.

Simon Taylor, a former Disney recruiter, had previously revealed in a CNBC report that the recruiters have around “three to five seconds” dedicated to your resume. Hence, you need to write concise phrases with a sufficient amount of information.

Secondly, applicants should include their master’s GPA, even if it is not that good. He has mentioned his low GPA and being fired from Tesla. He revealed, “This makes a good growth and learning-from-failures story.”

Pandey believes that as a software engineer when you move forward in your career, your role becomes less about coding and more about leading teams and delivering projects. He said, “But if I still interview for a startup, they don't really care about how I'm leading or shipping products. They care about if I can write code, if I'm tech-savvy enough.” Hence, he recommends that applicants need to showcase their technical skills as well, along with the links to their past coding work.

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