This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Michelle Nguyen, the former product marketing manager at Google, and Meta who shares her salary journey in her 6-year career. It has been edited for length and clarity.
Finally, I decided to start a club in college called Diversatech, a tech consulting club that would bring students of all majors to gain experience with companies like Google, LinkedIn, and Figma, etc. I was super passionate about the company and its mission, but I wasn't passionate about sales — I wanted to try something more strategic like product marketing. So I started looking elsewhere. $91,000 base salary + 15% annual bonus target + $64K stock package vested over four years
In 2020, I was contacted by Meta to join their privacy product marketing team for their new augmented reality and virtual reality products. I applied and successfully got the role, which provided me with exposure to early product development. I aggressively negotiated the salary and also secured a promotion. During my time there, I took on various roles, starting with building the privacy product marketing team for augmented reality and virtual reality products.
When you're starting out in your career, it's important to explore different roles and build a network in new companies. Through all these different jobs, I gained confidence and skills from sales to product marketing. That's why I quit my job at Meta to start my own startup in the creator economy.