5 ms·

My experience has been that some companies pressure engineers to want to advance. If you come into a performance review and say "actually I'm happy where I am"

My experience has been that some companies pressure engineers to want to advance. If you come into a performance review and say "actually I'm happy where I am" it's seen as a lack of motivation and will count as a mark against you. I had a boss say to me "I always want to move to the next level and I expect the same of my reports". Whatever, I guess I'm a poor employee because I like my job.

sokoloff 4y ago
I’ve openly stated that I want my retirement job to be an SWE3-ish role somewhere. High enough to have interesting, somewhat challenging work, but with negative desire to climb the ranks any further.
- ryandrake 4y ago
  Problem with that is due to inflation, you're making less and less compensation every year. Standard "you're doing a good job" raises often do not meet inflation, and certainly are not right now where inflation is higher than the recent historical mean. This is not a problem for some people, maybe including you, but I think most people have a general vague career expectation of making more when they're 60 than they make when they're 50, than they make when they're 40, and so on--even if they don't plan to be an overachieving "ladder climber".
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    I may have been unclear. By retirement job, I meant a job that I took during (read: after) retirement, not the one I’d walk away from at the moment of retiring. At that point, financial arrangements are presumably already all set.
  - throwaway_1928 4y ago
    You can always move to the same level in a different company to readjust your pay.
  - Firmwarrior 4y ago
    I agree, but this isn't as bad as you might think once you're a senior engineer at a top-end company. A lot of your compensation is in the form of stocks that will appreciate in value with inflation, so assuming you're in good graces with your director and VP, it's possible you'll fall behind the market rate very slowly
  - fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
    If you had a paid off house, and no kids to take care of, you should be able to live off a junior engineer’s salary no problem.
    - daemin 4y ago
      That reminds me of the guy getting a burger flipper job in the film American Beauty.
- bluGill 4y ago
  i want to retire as an engineer. If I went management I'd be much more likely to get to this high paying jobs in the executive suite. What I don't want is to be doing the same thing again and again with no recognition of how useful I am. If I'm not useful, then I need to get into a different position.
- kziojzwsndppqgg 4y ago
  Can confirm, it’s a great choice. Step one, convince a FAANG/MAGMA to let you work remote at the same salary level you already have. Step two, move to an extremely cheap cost-of-living area. Step three, avoid promotion at all costs, and just fix bugs. Provide value, but _never_ get promoted. Every year come review season, talk about how your goals for the next year are to improve latency/perf/whatever. It doesn’t have to be specific, just something that’s important enough to be useful, but don’t be ambitious. Just keep your head down and make enough improvements that people consider you to be a good “grunt” worker. Yeah yeah, inflation sucks and technically I’m making less because my RSU’s have mostly vested and my yearly grants haven’t made up for it, but I don’t care. I’ve saved up enough that I could retire now if I really wanted to. Every day for me, I work 9-5, fix a few bugs, provide some value, then work’s over and I get to play with my son and completely forget about my job. Then once he’s in bed I smoke some weed, watch shows with the wife, talk about the good old days. It’s heaven. (By the way, I say all this, but I kinda failed at it because I got promoted last year anyway. I got hella worried because I thought they’d start expecting more out of me, so I actually slowed down my pace even more. I just got a mid-cycle bonus last month. Maybe I’m not so great at keeping my head down after all…)
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    The demand for “reliably and undramatically accomplishes needed tasks” far exceeds the supply.
- seanmcdirmid 4y ago
  I hope I can down level myself after I go over 65 or 70 (depending on my health of course, hopefully I have that option). I think it is an option at some companies (older talent getting ready to retire but still have a lot to contribute).
toast0 4y ago
Some (many?) companies have an 'up or out' requirement where each position has a time limit to get promoted, unless it's a 'terminal position' which is ok to stay at. When I was at Facebook, this was administered by using the next level review guidelines after you had a position for N months (depends on the position), and if you don't meet those expectations, putting you into the firing pipeline (PIP, etc). One of many reasons I was happier when I stopped having people reporting to me.
- zeroonetwothree 4y ago
  Only true for E3/4. After that you can stay forever. I know someone that’s been E5 for 12 years
  - ShamelessC 4y ago
    I just want to say that I can't believe some of the smartest people in the world are willing to put up with all of this off-putting corporate bullshit. No disrespect.
    - effingwewt 4y ago
      I'd argue they are far from some of the smartest people in the world. Smart? Sure, some (many?) but I've known quite a few idiots in software. But I'd hardly compare the regular software engineer at a FAANG to some of the geniuses in the world. But they put up with it because it's a career and not a job. Many of them couldn't handle a minimum wage or working class job. No breaks, short lunches, no wriggle room for life, permanent fast-tracks to firing.
      - cmrdporcupine 4y ago
        I dunno, I would say on my whole in my 10 years at Google I really did meet some of the most talented (in terms of raw knowledge or focus or some other skill) people ever in my career. But they were mostly being paid handsomely to apply those amazing skills to really humdrum tasks -- but painting them up to be really profound -- and that's the saddest thing.
iamevn 4y ago
I've experienced managers pressuring me to either go for promo or find a different team.
kmonsen 4y ago
I have worked in three FAANG's and that was not true in any of those once you reach a certain level. This is somewhere between 4/5. The reason is that at that point the employee is considered mostly independent and can be expected to solve their task without too much intervention.
tomatowurst 4y ago
You are being pressured to get higher salary for the same level of work you are currently doing and this is a problem? Strange.

sokoloff 4y ago

I’ve openly stated that I want my retirement job to be an SWE3-ish role somewhere. High enough to have interesting, somewhat challenging work, but with negative desire to climb the ranks any further.

ryandrake 4y ago
Problem with that is due to inflation, you're making less and less compensation every year. Standard "you're doing a good job" raises often do not meet inflation, and certainly are not right now where inflation is higher than the recent historical mean. This is not a problem for some people, maybe including you, but I think most people have a general vague career expectation of making more when they're 60 than they make when they're 50, than they make when they're 40, and so on--even if they don't plan to be an overachieving "ladder climber".
- sokoloff 4y ago
  I may have been unclear. By retirement job, I meant a job that I took during (read: after) retirement, not the one I’d walk away from at the moment of retiring. At that point, financial arrangements are presumably already all set.
- throwaway_1928 4y ago
  You can always move to the same level in a different company to readjust your pay.
- Firmwarrior 4y ago
  I agree, but this isn't as bad as you might think once you're a senior engineer at a top-end company. A lot of your compensation is in the form of stocks that will appreciate in value with inflation, so assuming you're in good graces with your director and VP, it's possible you'll fall behind the market rate very slowly
- fshbbdssbbgdd 4y ago
  If you had a paid off house, and no kids to take care of, you should be able to live off a junior engineer’s salary no problem.
  - daemin 4y ago
    That reminds me of the guy getting a burger flipper job in the film American Beauty.
bluGill 4y ago
i want to retire as an engineer. If I went management I'd be much more likely to get to this high paying jobs in the executive suite. What I don't want is to be doing the same thing again and again with no recognition of how useful I am. If I'm not useful, then I need to get into a different position.
kziojzwsndppqgg 4y ago
Can confirm, it’s a great choice. Step one, convince a FAANG/MAGMA to let you work remote at the same salary level you already have. Step two, move to an extremely cheap cost-of-living area. Step three, avoid promotion at all costs, and just fix bugs. Provide value, but _never_ get promoted. Every year come review season, talk about how your goals for the next year are to improve latency/perf/whatever. It doesn’t have to be specific, just something that’s important enough to be useful, but don’t be ambitious. Just keep your head down and make enough improvements that people consider you to be a good “grunt” worker. Yeah yeah, inflation sucks and technically I’m making less because my RSU’s have mostly vested and my yearly grants haven’t made up for it, but I don’t care. I’ve saved up enough that I could retire now if I really wanted to. Every day for me, I work 9-5, fix a few bugs, provide some value, then work’s over and I get to play with my son and completely forget about my job. Then once he’s in bed I smoke some weed, watch shows with the wife, talk about the good old days. It’s heaven. (By the way, I say all this, but I kinda failed at it because I got promoted last year anyway. I got hella worried because I thought they’d start expecting more out of me, so I actually slowed down my pace even more. I just got a mid-cycle bonus last month. Maybe I’m not so great at keeping my head down after all…)
- sokoloff 4y ago
  The demand for “reliably and undramatically accomplishes needed tasks” far exceeds the supply.
seanmcdirmid 4y ago
I hope I can down level myself after I go over 65 or 70 (depending on my health of course, hopefully I have that option). I think it is an option at some companies (older talent getting ready to retire but still have a lot to contribute).

toast0 4y ago

Some (many?) companies have an 'up or out' requirement where each position has a time limit to get promoted, unless it's a 'terminal position' which is ok to stay at. When I was at Facebook, this was administered by using the next level review guidelines after you had a position for N months (depends on the position), and if you don't meet those expectations, putting you into the firing pipeline (PIP, etc). One of many reasons I was happier when I stopped having people reporting to me.

zeroonetwothree 4y ago
Only true for E3/4. After that you can stay forever. I know someone that’s been E5 for 12 years
- ShamelessC 4y ago
  I just want to say that I can't believe some of the smartest people in the world are willing to put up with all of this off-putting corporate bullshit. No disrespect.
  - effingwewt 4y ago
    I'd argue they are far from some of the smartest people in the world. Smart? Sure, some (many?) but I've known quite a few idiots in software. But I'd hardly compare the regular software engineer at a FAANG to some of the geniuses in the world. But they put up with it because it's a career and not a job. Many of them couldn't handle a minimum wage or working class job. No breaks, short lunches, no wriggle room for life, permanent fast-tracks to firing.
    - cmrdporcupine 4y ago
      I dunno, I would say on my whole in my 10 years at Google I really did meet some of the most talented (in terms of raw knowledge or focus or some other skill) people ever in my career. But they were mostly being paid handsomely to apply those amazing skills to really humdrum tasks -- but painting them up to be really profound -- and that's the saddest thing.

iamevn 4y ago

I've experienced managers pressuring me to either go for promo or find a different team.

kmonsen 4y ago

I have worked in three FAANG's and that was not true in any of those once you reach a certain level. This is somewhere between 4/5. The reason is that at that point the employee is considered mostly independent and can be expected to solve their task without too much intervention.

tomatowurst 4y ago

You are being pressured to get higher salary for the same level of work you are currently doing and this is a problem? Strange.