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Titles are meaningless in general. They exist just to put you on the "career ladder" type threadmill where the next title (or "level") is withheld from you unti
by m0zg 8y ago
Titles are meaningless in general. They exist just to put you on the "career ladder" type threadmill where the next title (or "level") is withheld from you until you put what your employer considers to be your "very best" to obtain it, or you're just pals with your boss, or good at self promotion. In fact I'd say that the latter two things are more conducive to obtaining a fancier title if you choose to play the game.
The corollary of all this is: pay zero attention to titles. Only two things are important and material:
1. Whether you enjoy the job
2. How much you get paid to do the job
That's it. Titles are cheap. Do not get taken by this scam. Focus on the two "fundamentals" listed above, and "titles" will take care of themselves in time. Also, don't stay with the same employer for too long unless you like to work harder for less.
- twblalock 8y agoTitles signify expectations, and expectations are far from meaningless. For example, achievements that would get a junior engineer promoted are expected to be the normal level of achievement for senior engineers.
- m0zg 8y ago>> Titles signify expectations Only tangentially, and only within a particular organization. That's how they justify the treadmill to you. It is not possible to evaluate "expectations" (or "performance" for that matter) without bias. Titles do not translate across companies. And the most senior person quite often contributes the least to the success of the project. They're often viewed as "having paid their dues", but really, they've mostly been in the right place at the right time. Exceptions are few and far between. Shit, at one point I was "led" by a CTO who couldn't architect his way out of a wet paper bag and showed up at work for a day every two weeks. Very "senior", yet totally worthless.