5 ms·

This is interesting. On the one hand, you have been promoted to a new role, so you have reached a compatible level of expertise. You can put that role on your

by realo 8y ago

This is interesting. On the one hand, you have been promoted to a new role, so you have reached a compatible level of expertise. You can put that role on your resume and sell yourself. On the other hand, you never, ever actually performed in that role, with the new responsibilities. How can you list that on your resume ! I am not sure what is the right answer here... but as your new employer I would take your last promotion with a big grain of salt. A resume is not a score sheet of levels accomplished in a game, it is a list of things your have actually done.

drewg123 8y ago
At least at Google, the whole point of a promo is that you've been working at the new level for some time before the promo cycle. And the new employer was not really in the equation, I'd already received my offer from them.
sulam 8y ago
There is a very clear right answer here provided you consider promotion from a clean point of view. A promotion is a _recognition_ that you are _already_ operating at a given level. It's an acknowledgement by TPTB that you deserve a given title. Anything less than this leads to a result where you may not actually be performing at the level the new title requires, which means you could conceivably be promoted and immediately fail to meet expectations in the new role.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- chii 8y ago
  > promoted and immediately fail to meet expectations in the new role. aka the peter principle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle)
rinchik 8y ago
I'm not particularly familiar with the system at Google, but at any somewhat decent tech company in order to get a promotion you have to already perform as you would in your "future" role for some time, with higher-level expectations and responsibilities. For example, is someone with level I is up for level II promo, she/he has to match level II criteria long before actual promotion is due.
- kamaal 8y ago
  That's general HR pep talk. In reality promotions mostly happen in organizations due to political lobbying with the powers. Even in these 'decent' tech companies you will see some people getting rapidly promoted and moving up the hierarchy, while genuine performers are stuck in the process and minutiae. Its just what kind of leverage your manager has with the upper management.
  - ironjunkie 8y ago
    This. I think everyone should at least experience once to what length a company can go in order to keep someone they really need that threatens to leave. It happened once to me: in a 150k people company that had a well defined promotion model very similar to Google. I gave my resignation notice and suddenly all the HR pep talk was out of the roof. I gained two levels and was promoted to director level.I still left but felt stupid I didn't threaten to leave earlier. It made me realize that there are two types of workers. The ones that will play fair game and believe the HR pep talk, as we just saw in the previous comments, and the ones that realize that the fastest way to go is to bypass this and play politics in order to fastrack it. It is another type of skill.
    - kamaal 8y ago
      A big thing to note in these political systems. People tend to emphasize your interface to the systems as 'Company thinks X about you', 'Company values your work' etc. Companies are not living systems and in general its just people making decisions. I've been walked over many times now, but once, after all the work, I was nominated for an award the company's annual meet. My manager, his manager and all the way up assured me that based on what I had done the award was coming my way. I was even asked to prepare a small speech to give on the stage, they even asked for a photo to put up on slide deck with a small bio. Two days before the meet, my manager and the director called me into a meeting room to tell me that I wouldn't be getting the award, and they didn't want it to be painful surprise to me during the meet. And they had tried everything they could. Eventually my manager told me during lunch later that big time political lobbying had gone into this, and VP making decisions had no option as he would be cornered politically on other issues, if he didn't relent to demands of rewards from other corners. Google or any other company. Performance has nothing to do with how you get paid/rewarded in any company.
skj 8y ago
At Google, you ostensibly must have been performing at the new level for at least six months in order to get the promotion. The span at the level lower than your performance is accommodated by an excellent bonus and stock refresh.
lolsal 8y ago
> On the other hand, you never, ever actually performed in that role, with the new responsibilities. For what it's worth - that's not necessarily true. Several places I have worked gave promotions in retrospect - after you have been performing the additional responsibilities for a while. It's sort of like a 'dry run' - they want to make sure you can do it before officially thrusting it on you.

by realo 8y ago

drewg123 8y ago

At least at Google, the whole point of a promo is that you've been working at the new level for some time before the promo cycle. And the new employer was not really in the equation, I'd already received my offer from them.

sulam 8y ago

There is a very clear right answer here provided you consider promotion from a clean point of view. A promotion is a _recognition_ that you are _already_ operating at a given level. It's an acknowledgement by TPTB that you deserve a given title. Anything less than this leads to a result where you may not actually be performing at the level the new title requires, which means you could conceivably be promoted and immediately fail to meet expectations in the new role.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
chii 8y ago
> promoted and immediately fail to meet expectations in the new role. aka the peter principle (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle)

rinchik 8y ago

I'm not particularly familiar with the system at Google, but at any somewhat decent tech company in order to get a promotion you have to already perform as you would in your "future" role for some time, with higher-level expectations and responsibilities. For example, is someone with level I is up for level II promo, she/he has to match level II criteria long before actual promotion is due.

kamaal 8y ago
That's general HR pep talk. In reality promotions mostly happen in organizations due to political lobbying with the powers. Even in these 'decent' tech companies you will see some people getting rapidly promoted and moving up the hierarchy, while genuine performers are stuck in the process and minutiae. Its just what kind of leverage your manager has with the upper management.
- ironjunkie 8y ago
  This. I think everyone should at least experience once to what length a company can go in order to keep someone they really need that threatens to leave. It happened once to me: in a 150k people company that had a well defined promotion model very similar to Google. I gave my resignation notice and suddenly all the HR pep talk was out of the roof. I gained two levels and was promoted to director level.I still left but felt stupid I didn't threaten to leave earlier. It made me realize that there are two types of workers. The ones that will play fair game and believe the HR pep talk, as we just saw in the previous comments, and the ones that realize that the fastest way to go is to bypass this and play politics in order to fastrack it. It is another type of skill.
  - kamaal 8y ago
    A big thing to note in these political systems. People tend to emphasize your interface to the systems as 'Company thinks X about you', 'Company values your work' etc. Companies are not living systems and in general its just people making decisions. I've been walked over many times now, but once, after all the work, I was nominated for an award the company's annual meet. My manager, his manager and all the way up assured me that based on what I had done the award was coming my way. I was even asked to prepare a small speech to give on the stage, they even asked for a photo to put up on slide deck with a small bio. Two days before the meet, my manager and the director called me into a meeting room to tell me that I wouldn't be getting the award, and they didn't want it to be painful surprise to me during the meet. And they had tried everything they could. Eventually my manager told me during lunch later that big time political lobbying had gone into this, and VP making decisions had no option as he would be cornered politically on other issues, if he didn't relent to demands of rewards from other corners. Google or any other company. Performance has nothing to do with how you get paid/rewarded in any company.

skj 8y ago

At Google, you ostensibly must have been performing at the new level for at least six months in order to get the promotion. The span at the level lower than your performance is accommodated by an excellent bonus and stock refresh.

lolsal 8y ago

> On the other hand, you never, ever actually performed in that role, with the new responsibilities. For what it's worth - that's not necessarily true. Several places I have worked gave promotions in retrospect - after you have been performing the additional responsibilities for a while. It's sort of like a 'dry run' - they want to make sure you can do it before officially thrusting it on you.