Oftentimes, a promotion means some combination of: being in a more visible position; more responsibility; possibly people or more people reporting to you; comm

Oftentimes, a promotion means some combination of: being in a more visible position; more responsibility; possibly people or more people reporting to you; communicating with higher level people more often. In these cases, it makes sense that the person showing the ability to handle that while performing their job is going to look like a good candidate for promotion. On the other hand, if a promotion just means more money, a title, and keep doing the exact same thing you were doing before the promotion, yeah you have a point. It seems legit to be able to bring results to the table. "I built the most widgets in the department ten out of the last twelve months, I think a move to senior widget builder is appropriate." It's hard for me to come up with many promotions that are entirely the second type though.