MIT PostDoc -- How Much Does it Really Help Your Career?

BigStupidGuy

So, five years ago I was an unemployed musician living with my parents. This week I got a 1 (possibly 2 if I want later) year PostDoc offer from MIT to go work on robots and artificial intelligence research (mainly the latter).

Obviously, I'm fairly dumfounded, and already feel major imposter syndrome. But there's several potential drawback of me going which I'd rather not get into.

The reason I'm posting is because I wonder if anyone here has experience applying for jobs in Ireland mainly (lecturing and industry) after doing your postdoc? Is doing a one year postdoc going to be bad? (I think people usually expect 2 years, and I can't guarantee it'll go past 1 year) Also, is it even worth going to MIT? I mean, yes it's usually ranked as the world's no:1 university, so I mean, I know it makes a difference, but is the difference so extreme it's worth giving up x,y,z to go there? I guess that's a personal choice, so let me rephrase the question:

What concrete benefits are there of going to MIT (as opposed to lower ranked universities)? For example I know that people in Chinese universities are usually not offered faculty positions unless they've attended top US institutions (i.e., MIT, Stanford). So, for Chinese folk, it's worth it I guess. BUT, I'm not sure that same mentality applies to Irish universities. Moreover, I'm not sure Dublin-based companies will care (e.g., Huawei AI labs, Amazon AI labs etc.)

Assuming of course, that the postdoc looks good (i.e., you're not sacrificing what you're doing at MIT for the prestige of going there).

Thanks for any experience/advice.