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Posting anon for obvious reasons. It can get really bad. I joined a Series A startup. Me and all my peer engineering directors got down-leveled to entry-level

Posting anon for obvious reasons. It can get really bad. I joined a Series A startup. Me and all my peer engineering directors got down-leveled to entry-level titles within a month. Product Mangers, Sales People, others got up-leveled from Entry Level --> Manager --> Director --> Sr. Director. The company is on a dying breath, because these shenanigans caused so much acrimony. Who the fuck cares about a company that fucks you over a month into joining the company? Half the engineers were working on side projects and the company has basically died.

jack_riminton 5y ago
What sort of CTO would allow this?
- taway99121 5y ago
  two lessons learned 1. check linked in. if you a dozen of kids out of undergrad in Marketing/Product/Sales/Strategy/Finance with Director+ titles a year or two out of college....and others out of industry with entry level titles, RUN. There is obvious inequity. You wont be able to motivate people to work hard with such a setup. 2. avoid companies with split executive offices. Our engineering group was 95% on the East coast while the "business" office was in SF. CEO/CFO/CPO/CRO all in SF. CTO on east coast.
  - jack_riminton 5y ago
    Holy hell, red flags abound Lemme guess the CEO/CFO/CPO/CRO all come from wealthy backgrounds and post inspiring tweets/linkedins whilst the company piledrives into the ground?
multiplegeorges 5y ago
> Me and all my peer engineering directors got down-leveled to entry-level titles within a month. Wow, they demoted you post-hire!? Yeah, I'd immediately start interviewing elsewhere.
- taway99121 5y ago
  my mistake was staying and thinking it would be fixed. It didnt get fixed for three years. By then, out-of-undergrad business team members were already Senior Directors while PhD engineers with 15yrs continued to be entry level. the result of the changes was a half-dead demotivated engineering team that never revived. titles were fixed three years in, but it was too late. business teams had moved onto bigger and better jobs by then. good luck trying to get hyper-growth when you've screwed over all the engineers
deleted 5y ago
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jack_riminton 5y ago

What sort of CTO would allow this?

taway99121 5y ago
two lessons learned 1. check linked in. if you a dozen of kids out of undergrad in Marketing/Product/Sales/Strategy/Finance with Director+ titles a year or two out of college....and others out of industry with entry level titles, RUN. There is obvious inequity. You wont be able to motivate people to work hard with such a setup. 2. avoid companies with split executive offices. Our engineering group was 95% on the East coast while the "business" office was in SF. CEO/CFO/CPO/CRO all in SF. CTO on east coast.
- jack_riminton 5y ago
  Holy hell, red flags abound Lemme guess the CEO/CFO/CPO/CRO all come from wealthy backgrounds and post inspiring tweets/linkedins whilst the company piledrives into the ground?

multiplegeorges 5y ago

> Me and all my peer engineering directors got down-leveled to entry-level titles within a month. Wow, they demoted you post-hire!? Yeah, I'd immediately start interviewing elsewhere.

taway99121 5y ago
my mistake was staying and thinking it would be fixed. It didnt get fixed for three years. By then, out-of-undergrad business team members were already Senior Directors while PhD engineers with 15yrs continued to be entry level. the result of the changes was a half-dead demotivated engineering team that never revived. titles were fixed three years in, but it was too late. business teams had moved onto bigger and better jobs by then. good luck trying to get hyper-growth when you've screwed over all the engineers

deleted 5y ago

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