How a DJ Without Degree Became Tech Lead at Meta, And Then Got Laid Off: The Unbelievable Journey of Henry Chen

WHEN HENRY CHEN, a DJ-turned-techie, was laid off from his job at Meta Inc. after 13 years, to say that it came as a shock would be a bit of an understatement. The 38-year-old worked at Facebook on an engineering contract before becoming a tech lead at Meta. Over a decade spent dedicating his time and efforts towards the tech giant led to Chen being laid off on a random Wednesday in May 2026. In an interview with Business Insider, Henry Chen, a resident of the San Francisco Bay Area, chronicles his journey as a self-taught techie, and how he joined Facebook on a contract, transitioned into a tech role at Meta, being laid off by the tech giant.

“After I left college, I worked as a DJ for a few years, taught myself to code, and eventually found my way to Facebook," Chen stated to Business Insider. “I'm grateful for everything I learned during my time at Facebook, later Meta. Overall, it was a very positive experience. But after the company's major layoffs in late 2022 and early 2023, things started to change,” he added.

From DJ to Facebook: How Henry Chen Got His Start 

Before landing a job at Meta Inc, one of the biggest tech giants in the world, Henry Chen worked as a disc jockey (DJ) after he left the San José State University, without completing his degree. Initially planning to become a teacher after attaining his degree, Chen had to abandon that plan and took up DJing as a profession.

Afterwards, Chen landed an audio-video (AV) engineering contract at Facebook in 2012, where the skills he learned as a DJ came in handy. Over time, his initial part-time stint at the social media platform transitioned into a full-time commitment. He progressed from inspecting conference rooms to building them and, in 2015, became a full-time operations engineer working on collaboration technologies that were used across Facebook's offices.

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“I didn't think it would turn into a career - I saw it as a way to earn some money while figuring out what to do next,”  Chen recalled.

Becoming a Tech Lead at Meta 

When the company began expanding its scale of operations, its need for more conference rooms also increased. Another career breakthrough came for Chen in 2015, when he began tinkering  with Python programming language to solve problems related to scaling the conferencing technology. “I wrote a script that made it much faster to update conference room technology, and it changed the direction of my career," he told Business Insider.

In the coming years, as Chen’s technical expertise advanced, he eventually transitioned into the role of a software engineer and became a Tech Lead at Meta.

What Changed After Meta's 2022–2023 Layoffs 

In late 2022 and early 2023, a series of lay-offs commenced at Meta, and that's when things changed for Chen at the tech giant. Continuing his interview with Business Insider, the techie remarked upon the office environment at Meta and how the tech giant’s priorities came to a change. “Before then [the lay-offs], I felt our teams had the resources to build ambitious projects," Chen said, adding that the focus shifted towards “doing more with less” after the layoffs. 

About a year and a half after the lay-offs, Meta’s priorities shifted again, but now with a renewed emphasis on building innovations. “Between leadership changes and shifting priorities, it became harder to know where my team was headed and what we should prioritize,” Chen said.

From August to December 2025, Chen was on paternity leave, and coming back to his job seemed even difficult to cope with as the company introduced even more changes. With an emphasis on using artificial intelligence (AI) amidst shifting leadership and priorities, Chen remarked that he felt that the “whole company had changed” during the months he was away.

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Life After Meta: Family, Severance, and a Career Coach 

On May 20, 2026, Henry Chen was among several of his colleagues that were laid off from their jobs. Even though Meta had hinted before that budget-cuts and lay-offs were expected, Chen was still surprised at finding himself among those who were affected.

Life after Meta wasn’t as bad for Chen. The techie immediately launched himself into the job market to look for his next opportunity. However, Chen decided to pause his job search and started spending more time with his family. His severance package from Meta, reflecting his ten years worth of commitment towards the company, provided him with a stable financial net to sustain himself and his family for a while.

Henry Chen is currently working with a career coach to improve his understanding of industry-standard system design and to prepare for interviews. He has also been searching for jobs on LinkedIn, reaching out to his network, and applying for positions. Despite the layoff, Chen remains optimistic about finding his next job opportunity. 

Reflecting on his career journey, starting off as a DJ without a college degree and then becoming a Tech Lead at Meta, Chen said his biggest lesson was to “say yes to problems and look for opportunities to solve them.” “Every challenge I took on became a stepping stone to the next opportunity, and that's ultimately what helped me grow from a DJ to a conference room technician to a tech lead,” Chen concluded.

(Edited by Harsh Pandey)

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