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‘Dumbest thing you can do…’: Meta engineer questions job hunt norms, reveals how he got 83 recruiters to DM him

The Meta techie shares that he tried connecting with 1,000 recruiters, without bagging any opportunities.

3 min readNew DelhiUpdated: Jan 15, 2026 01:54 PM IST

Meta techie explained how he focused on the “biggest impact” by making friends and connections (Representative image)

A software engineer employed at Meta caught the internet’s eye after he shared unusual advice, challenging the conventional job application process. In his post on X, Marmik Patel flagged job applications as “the dumbest thing”.

Based in San Francisco, Patel’s stance stemmed from his experience of applying for several roles and trying to connect with 1,000 recruiters without securing any opportunities. He explained how he focused on the “biggest impact” by making friends and connections to build products and content.

“Applying to jobs is the dumbest shit you can ever do. i learned the hard way. dmed a 1000 recruiters/engineers. did 670 apps. didn’t get me anything. cause its not equally distributed: the top 10% of people take 90% of the jobs. it’s the same everywhere else. the hottest girl gets 90% of the guys. the largest artist gets 90% of the streams,” Patel wrote.

“So this past year I stopped wasting time on applying and started doing whatever gave me the biggest impact. Did hella trips to SF/NYC, built products, did content, made friends,” he wrote. He further shared that between January and May last year, 83 recruiters reached out to him.

Patel concluded by saying, “And soon the dynamic flipped. jan-may, 83 recruiters dmed me. ai labs, yc companies, unicorns. It’s a winner-takes-all world. you have no choice but to become the winner. or waste away your life fighting for scraps.”

See the post here:

applying to jobs is the dumbest shit you can ever do.

i learned the hard way. dmed a 1000 recruiters/engineers. did 670 apps. didn’t get me anything.

cause its not equally distributed: the top 10% of people take 90% of the jobs.

it’s the same everywhere else. the hottest… https://t.co/gEpcaViXS1

— Marmik Patel (@Marmik_Patel19) January 12, 2026

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The post quickly gained traction, drawing a range of reactions. “the job market is just a dating app where everyone’s swiping on the same 10 profiles,” a user wrote. “Cold applying isn’t dead, but leverage compounds. Build proof, relationships, and momentum first—then inbound beats outbound every time consistently eventually,” another user commented.

“This applies to building apps too. You can cold email 1000 users or you can build something people actually talk about. One takes forever, the other compounds. Most people pick the one that feels like work but doesn’t actually work,” a third user reacted.