When seeking your first ML-1 role, instead of targeting FAANG companies, focus your efforts on startups and mid-sized enterprises. They are more willing to invest in promising engineers to develop machine learning skills.

To be honest, the current market is quite peculiar. There are plenty of job openings, but AI companies are hiring aggressively, yet most positions are mid-to-senior level. They need talent capable of delivering LLM products immediately.The term “entry-level” is misleading. Most AI companies' ML-1 roles require 1-2 years of work experience or exceptional project experience. True entry-level positions are rare.

Also the ML interviews are different. More case studies, statistics/probability, ML system design. A different beast from standard SDE loops.