Maddy Zhang

Most aspiring AI engineers in 2026 are missing a faster path to landing high-impact roles.

The engineers getting hired at $200K–$500K+ aren’t just grinding math or random tutorials they’re mastering the right skills, in the right order, and building systems companies actually need.

In this video, I show exactly what AI engineers do today and how to align your learning with real job requirements in 2026 based on actual job postings and conversations with engineers at top foundation model companies.

✅ What an AI engineer actually does (and what they don’t)
✅ The biggest skill mistake that wastes months for most beginners
✅ Why you don’t need a PhD, heavy math, or model training to get hired
✅ The exact tech stack showing up in AI engineer job postings
✅ A 4-phase roadmap to become an AI engineer in 2026
✅ The projects that signal “hire this person” to recruiters

If you’re serious about AI and don’t want to waste another year learning the wrong things, this will save you a lot of time.

👉 Watch the full breakdown here: https://youtu.be/qQ51dksl1gA

3 days ago (edited) | [YT] | 266

Maddy Zhang

This resume got me interview calls from 15+ companies, including OpenAI, Meta, Amazon, Pinterest, and Databricks.



But here’s the truth most people miss:
It wasn’t the design.
It wasn’t fancy formatting.
And it definitely wasn’t luck.

What worked was strategy.

In this video, I break down my actual resume line by line and explain the exact framework I used to structure every section so you can stop guessing and start building a resume that recruiters actually read.



🚀 What you’ll learn in this video
✅ Why one-page resumes outperform longer ones
✅ How recruiters scan resumes in ~6 seconds
✅ The exact Action → Tech → Impact formula for work experience
✅ How to quantify impact (even if you’re early in your career)
✅ What to list in education and when it should go last
✅ How to write project descriptions that signal real engineering depth
✅ How ATS systems work (and how to beat them)
✅ Why naming specific technologies matters
✅ Common resume mistakes that silently kill interviews
✅ How to future-proof your resume for today’s AI-driven job market
✅ The exact resume template I used (download linked below)

👉 Watch the full breakdown here: https://youtu.be/QDo1Fr4ZKXA

#resume #resumetips #softwareengineering #atsresume #resumereview #engineeringresume #softwareengineer #swe #techcareers #engineeringcareers #jobsearch #interviewcalls #bigtechjobs #faang #google #openai #meta #pinterest #databricks #amazon #faang #careergrowth #engineeringstudents #softwaredeveloper #softwaredevelopment #techjobs

1 week ago | [YT] | 184

Maddy Zhang

Which video should I make next

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 29

Maddy Zhang

I interviewed for a Senior Software Engineer role at Pinterest, one of the largest consumer tech platforms with 500M+ monthly active users.

In this video, I break down exactly how the Pinterest interview works—how the recruiter reached out, what each round actually tests, and what senior engineers earning $500K+ total compensation are expected to demonstrate.

If you’re targeting Pinterest or any product-driven big tech company, this video shows what actually matters and where most candidates go wrong.

🟩 How I got the Pinterest interview without applying
🟩 The full interview flow: recruiter screen → phone screen → virtual onsite
🟩 Breakdown of all 5 interview rounds (coding, system design, behavioral)
🟩 What Pinterest evaluates in coding interviews beyond just correct answers
🟩 Real LeetCode medium & hard expectations at senior level
🟩 How the system design interview is structured (scalability, caching, QPS, CAP)
🟩 Senior-level compensation breakdown & negotiation strategy
🟩 A 6-week preparation plan that works across big tech companies

👉 Watch the full breakdown here: https://youtu.be/Sb3ZPdnZ7HI

2 weeks ago | [YT] | 184

Maddy Zhang

AI engineering roles are booming, with salaries between $200k to $300k and higher. There are over 500,000 open AI-related jobs globally, and companies are desperate for talent who can actually build real-world AI systems.

But very few people understand the exact skill set you’ll need. And that’s exactly why people keep wasting months on random courses, toy projects, and YouTube tutorials that don’t make them hireable.

Today, I’m sharing my top five AI engineering courses so you don’t waste months and potentially thousands of dollars on unhelpful programs.

💡 Here’s what you’ll learn:
✅ What AI engineering really is (and how it’s different from ML theory)
✅ The core skills companies actually hire for in AI engineering roles
✅ How to choose AI courses based on job readiness, not hype
✅ How real AI systems are built, integrated, and deployed in production
✅ A clear path to go from learning concepts to building real AI applications

👉 Watch the full breakdown here: https://youtu.be/tN4Ocq5oGHw

#aiengineering #aicourses #machinelearning #artificialintelligence #llms #aiengineer #programming #mlops #python #datascience #softwareengineering #techcareers #aijobs #coding #llmops #generativeai #rag #aiagents #deeplearning #datacamp #coursera #openai #google #learnai #techjobs

3 weeks ago | [YT] | 230

Maddy Zhang

Most people spend months trying to “learn DSA”… and still can’t explain the basics clearly.

So I took the 8 core data structures that companies test in 90% of interviews - Arrays, Hashmaps, Sets, Linked Lists, Stacks/Queues, Trees, Heaps, and Big-O and broke them down in a way that even complete beginners can understand…in just 8 minutes.

If DSA feels overwhelming, confusing, or like a never-ending list of topics, this video will give you absolute clarity



💡 Here’s what you’ll learn:
✅ Big-O notation (the foundation of all coding interviews)
✅ Arrays: how they actually work & when to use them
✅ Hash Maps: the real power tool behind O(1) lookups
✅ Sets: the simplest way to handle uniqueness
✅ Linked Lists: pointer manipulation & classic interview patterns
✅ Stacks & Queues: LIFO, FIFO, parsing, BFS, and more
✅ Trees: binary search trees, traversals, and key interview problems
✅ Heaps & Priority Queues: how they work and when they outperform sorting

👉 Watch the full breakdown here: https://youtu.be/qec07Rm04oc


#datastructures #dsa #codinginterview #softwareengineering #leetcode #bigotechinterview #beginnercoding #programmingbasics #codingtutorial #systemdesign #techcareers #faanginterview #programmerlife #learncoding #computerscience #algorithms #techlearning

1 month ago | [YT] | 246

Maddy Zhang

Most people think working at Google is about free food, chill hours, and fancy perks.
That’s the fantasy.

Here’s the reality:

Google breaks every engineering habit you learned early in your career… and rebuilds you from scratch.

In 4.5 years there, I learned lessons that completely changed how I write code, design systems, and survive in high-pressure engineering environments.

If you’re aiming for Big Tech, preparing for interviews, or you just want to stop building systems that crash at scale — you need to hear this.

In this video, I break down the core engineering habits Google drills into every engineer:

🔹 Why “boring code” beats clever code
🔹 How to design for 10× load, not 2×
🔹 The power of stateless systems
🔹 Design docs that prevent disasters
🔹 API stability as a non-negotiable contract
🔹 Behavior-driven testing that actually protects you
🔹 Deterministic builds (and why they save millions)
🔹 P99 > P50 — the mindset that changes everything
🔹 Failure-first engineering
🔹 Blameless postmortems and deep team culture

If you want to think like a real Google engineer — not a tutorial engineer — watch this.

🎥 New video is live: https://youtu.be/E8ZlSNcVV_U

This one will make you rewrite your entire engineering mindset.

1 month ago | [YT] | 241

Maddy Zhang

Why did Amazon lay off 30,000 people?
Everyone has an opinion — AI, cost-cutting, overhiring…
But that’s all surface-level noise.

So I sat down with someone who actually lived inside Amazon for 18 years.
Steve Huynh — Principal Engineer (a level only 1.5% ever reach).

He breaks down:
• The real reason behind the 30k layoffs
• How Amazon’s culture and politics actually work
• Why good engineers get stuck or pushed out
• How to survive (and grow) even when the system is against you
• And what it really takes to reach Principal in Big Tech

If you’re in tech — or trying to get into tech — this conversation will wake you up.

👉 Watch the full interview here: https://youtu.be/5tl_e-sJPRY

1 month ago | [YT] | 95

Maddy Zhang

You probably think being a software engineer means free food, flexible hours, and coding from a beach.
That’s only half the story.

Here’s the truth no one’s showing you — what it’s actually like to be a software engineer in 2025. From the brutal entry-level job hunt to AI eating up coding tasks and the golden handcuffs keeping top engineers stuck, this video exposes the real side of tech most people avoid talking about.

You’ll see:
⚡ The Entry-Level Struggle (and why most don’t make it)
🤖 The AI Productivity Paradox
💰 The Golden Handcuffs no one escapes
💼 Why being “just a coder” doesn’t cut it anymore
📞 The harsh reality of on-call and burnout
🔥 The only skills that truly matter now

If you’re thinking about becoming a software engineer — or already are one — you need to see this before it’s too late.

🎥 Watch it now: https://youtu.be/7tvQSfHZMa8

1 month ago | [YT] | 171

Maddy Zhang

Which video should I make next

2 months ago | [YT] | 33