The Best Companies Hiring PMs Right Now (Exclusive Levels.FYI Data)
The Best Companies Hiring PMs Right Now (Exclusive Levels.FYI Data)
Exclusive offer and salary data on the PM jobs market with a deep dive into Meta and Google. Plus, the top 5 companies by PM compensation aren't what you think.
Dear subscribers,
Today, I want to share some data on the PM job market as we close out 2024.
PM hiring has been hit hard, but there are signs of hope.
I partnered with Hakeem from Levels.fyi (the #1 jobs and salary database) to answer:
Are companies hiring fewer PMs overall?
Which PM levels are in demand (and which aren’t)?
How is hiring trending at Meta and Google?
What companies are paying PMs the most?
This is exclusive offer and salary data you won’t find anywhere else. Let’s dive in.
This free post is brought to you by…Product Faculty
Miqdad Jaffer (product lead at OpenAI) is teaching another cohort of his popular AI PM course on November 9. I took the course earlier this year and learned alot about building AI products with real hands-on experience with OpenAI APIs.
Are companies hiring fewer PMs overall?
As expected, new PM offers have been trending downwards since late 2022, but there’s been an uptick in Q3 2024.
Here are the top 30 companies by new PM offers for October 2023 to 2024 vs. October 2022 to 2023:
Here are a few trends to call out:
Meta slowed down PM hiring significantly (-48%) during this period.
Amazon, Microsoft, and Google remain the top 3 companies for new PM offers. Amazon hired fewer PMs, while Microsoft and Google hired slightly more.
ByteDance jumped from #23 to #8 and almost doubled their PM hiring despite facing legislation looking to ban TikTok in the US.
Apple, Tesla, LinkedIn, Disney, and Goldman Sachs are picking up PM hiring.
X (Twitter) dropped off the map (I believe there are less than 5 PMs left at X).
Which PM levels are in demand (and which aren’t)?
Here’s the distribution of new PM offers normalized to Meta’s PM leveling system for 2023-2024 vs. 2022-2023:
The most noticeable change is a rise in senior PM offers (L5) and a decrease in principal and group PM offers (L6).
Unfortunately, we can’t easily separate principal PM from group PM offers in the data. But a quick search on LinkedIn shows <100 group PM vs. ~800 principal PM job openings. So, my gut is that group PMs and directors (to a lesser extent) are being hit hard as companies trim middle management.
To see how Meta’s levels compare to other companies, check out the Levels.fyi leveling ladder.
Meta: Fewer PMs, conservative new offers, and a meteoric increase in stock price
Let’s do a deep dive on PM hiring at Meta. As you can see in the chart below, Meta hired 50% fewer PMs across all levels year over year:
This is unsurprising, as Zuck started the company’s “year of efficiency” in 2023 before making the changes permanent. Meta’s new offer total compensation (TC) has also remained relatively flat year over year:
Total compensation for PMs who joined Meta a few years ago is much better. Meta’s stock grew from ~$100 in late 2022 to ~$550 today. The chart below takes Levels.fyi’s new offer and existing employee data (including stock growth) to compare the TCs:
As you can see, Meta employees who joined a few years ago are making significantly more. I know friends making $3M TC as an L7 due to stock appreciation.
Google: Hiring more mid-level PMs and paying principal and group PMs more
Unlike Meta, Google increased PM hiring year over year at the PM2 and senior PM levels and slightly reduced hiring at the group/principal and director levels:
Despite hiring fewer group/principal PMs, Google seems to have significantly increased TC for this level. However, Google's new offer TC is below Meta across all levels.
ByteDance: All in on growth
ByteDance (TikTok’s parent company) grew PM hiring by an incredible 118%, mostly at the mid to senior levels:
It’s also giving these PMs decent TC packages:
The TikTok ban doesn't seem to affect ByteDance’s PM hiring spree.
What companies are paying PMs the most?
FAANG companies don’t necessarily offer the highest TC packages for PMs. Here are the top 5 companies by median PM total compensation over the past year:
Companies like Roblox, Dropbox, Databricks, Coinbase, and even Snap could pay more for new PM offers than Google. So, if you’re looking for a PM job, cast a wider net instead of just recruiting for FAANG.
Wrap up
Here’s what this data means if you’re in the market for a new PM job:
Look beyond FAANG. Companies like Roblox, Dropbox, and Databricks often pay more than Google for new PM offers.
Don’t just try to be a PM manager. Group PM roles are being cut more than other levels as companies trim middle management. Consider principal PM roles instead, which have 8x more openings.
Amazon, Microsoft, and Google remain the mainstays in PM hiring, while Meta has greatly cut hiring.
Thank you to Hakeem and the content team at Levels.fyi, for working with me on this post. If you want to better understand how to benchmark your company salaries, take a look at the benchmarking tool or reach out to the team at hello@levels.fyi.
Let me know what you think about all this data in the comments!