Is MA a rating to feel good about?

Yes!

Meta is a very hard company to perform at, and it's got even harder now that it is "living in an age of efficiency". It is very rare for new E4s to get EE in their first PSC, and you only had 5 months to be evaluated on for a year-long performance review cycle.

I'm glad you feel at least some happiness here, and congratulations on the good rating! I'm sure you can get EE or higher in the next PSC (especially as you will need it for up-or-out), and Taro is a great resource to help with that. 😊

I hope this discussion sheds some useful perspective as well: "How do I not compare myself to others in my career?"

The answer depends on your goals. An MA objectively means you're doing fine (no risk of getting PIP'ed). However, if your expectation was to get the E5 promotion, there is likely a gap.

It's possible to get promoted with an MA rating, but it's rare. Statistically, an MA rating puts you in the bottom 60% of people for E4. That's perfectly fine, and in some ways, that's expected since you joined the company recently. But the data does matter!

I'd chat with your manager in a bit more detail about the 4 engineering axes at Meta (project impact, engineering excellence, direction, and people) and check if that confirms your internal sense of how you were doing.

BTW, we're planning to capture this data with promotions.fyi :)