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> At my last job, I was the primary fire-putter-outer on a number of fronts, and it was very disheartening watching new projects (that I'd put my hand up for) g

> At my last job, I was the primary fire-putter-outer on a number of fronts, and it was very disheartening watching new projects (that I'd put my hand up for) get handed off to others while I was busy fixing up the previous efforts of said others. I've seen this happen at an even bigger scale. The site I was part of was very successful, and was therefore completely unable to get any time or capital to do independent (non-contract) projects. And some of the projects we wanted to do were to improve our IP holdings within the space we were working! Meanwhile, the entire site that lost two contracts to rebids all got put on cool, independent, green-field projects. Completely bananas, and a symptom of a much larger problem of not rewarding success that eventually caused me to leave.

taneq 11y ago
I feel your pain. :( It's the Dilbert Principle in action, except that rather than less effective people/groups being deliberately selected for advancement, those groups are selected by default because they're sitting around doing nothing important. The most effective people/groups are too busy getting the critical work done to risk letting them change roles. If you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted.
brazzledazzle 11y ago
I've seen similar behavior and the theory I came up with is that managers are engaged/rewarded by being associated with successful projects and technical people that report to them are engaged/rewarded by new projects and challenges. I speculated that from their perspective someone tied down to maintaining a very successful project (that continues to make succeed or make money) is in a great position politically and those getting the new green-field projects are being exposed to risk. It reminds me of meetings–managers don't realize that they are a drain on the people performing the work because that's of course how they work and accomplish things.

taneq 11y ago

I feel your pain. :( It's the Dilbert Principle in action, except that rather than less effective people/groups being deliberately selected for advancement, those groups are selected by default because they're sitting around doing nothing important. The most effective people/groups are too busy getting the critical work done to risk letting them change roles. If you can't be replaced, you can't be promoted.

brazzledazzle 11y ago

I've seen similar behavior and the theory I came up with is that managers are engaged/rewarded by being associated with successful projects and technical people that report to them are engaged/rewarded by new projects and challenges. I speculated that from their perspective someone tied down to maintaining a very successful project (that continues to make succeed or make money) is in a great position politically and those getting the new green-field projects are being exposed to risk. It reminds me of meetings–managers don't realize that they are a drain on the people performing the work because that's of course how they work and accomplish things.