3 ms·

I agree with you that promo culture is pretty much the root of modern big company rot, but under your system, how do you propose an industrious, ambitious IC mo

I agree with you that promo culture is pretty much the root of modern big company rot, but under your system, how do you propose an industrious, ambitious IC move up, whatever that means? Even if you think the status is fake and dumb (and I would agree), how do you make more money as an IC?

jordanbeiber 4y ago
Exactly - what does it mean? You work on stimulating things and get paid what you accept. You’ll have a yearly review where you have your say, and pay can be increased if employer think it’s worth it. Titles are problematic in teams working to produce good stuff! We should compare ourselves to athletes more than the MBA powerpoint version of a company. I hear Tom Brady is a legend - is he an S10 quarterback? Senior quarterback? Or just a quarterback with high a salary based on performance? I believe levels are instruments for managers not employees.
- nostrebored 4y ago
  Everyone who cares about Brady is watching him and knows how he is performing. This is not true of engineers.
  - jordanbeiber 4y ago
    This is why I’m stating it’s a management tool. Poor management requires boxes. Better management actually care and help employees perform and improve. In the end it’s about culture.
- brhsagain 4y ago
  I agree with you that a level system creates bad incentives for everyone. But what they do provide is a rubric for the ambitious 23 year old who wants to climb to the top of whatever group he’s in. If you get rid of levels, what’s the new hierarchy for him to climb? If you don’t specify a hierarchy, one is going to form anyway, and then it’s even more out of your control. If you’re going to say the hierarchy should be based on people doing real work, well I agree, but that is pretty much impossible to measure in groups beyond a certain size. This groups beyond a certain size problem is the root of the problem, not levels, which are just a stopgap measure to slow the brakes on the deterioration and degeneracy that you find in any gigantic group of people.
mradek 4y ago
Impact? Someone could be an amazing mentor and mediocre at actual output, but their impact could lead to a bunch of people being able to stay leveled up and think more efficiently that lets the team ship more with less bugs. Maybe there’s a senior engineer who can consistently crank out high quality code and identify optimizations that save money. Some sort of holistic 360 reviews by peers where others can vouch for you could work. What’s the big deal with having one senior paid 180k and another 350k if their impacts are considerably different? I have personally dealt with BS like “we can’t promote you rn but also can’t give you a raise because you’re at the upper limit of your salary band”. That’s not fair, imo.
- brhsagain 4y ago
  How do you stop the measurement of impact from degenerating into exactly the same situation we have now? In fact, I’m pretty sure at many bigcos “impact” is already the official metric for promo. The real thing you’re getting at is that people should only be paid and promoted for real work, and not for bullshit work, but that’s basically impossible to measure once organizations grow beyond a certain size. Also, in orgs beyond a certain size, “holistic” peer review based evals make bullshit promo culture worse, not better. It basically ends up meaning how much people like you, and accelerates the shift toward a culture where people optimize for that instead of doing real work. And then you’re back at square one.

jordanbeiber 4y ago

Exactly - what does it mean? You work on stimulating things and get paid what you accept. You’ll have a yearly review where you have your say, and pay can be increased if employer think it’s worth it. Titles are problematic in teams working to produce good stuff! We should compare ourselves to athletes more than the MBA powerpoint version of a company. I hear Tom Brady is a legend - is he an S10 quarterback? Senior quarterback? Or just a quarterback with high a salary based on performance? I believe levels are instruments for managers not employees.

nostrebored 4y ago
Everyone who cares about Brady is watching him and knows how he is performing. This is not true of engineers.
- jordanbeiber 4y ago
  This is why I’m stating it’s a management tool. Poor management requires boxes. Better management actually care and help employees perform and improve. In the end it’s about culture.
brhsagain 4y ago
I agree with you that a level system creates bad incentives for everyone. But what they do provide is a rubric for the ambitious 23 year old who wants to climb to the top of whatever group he’s in. If you get rid of levels, what’s the new hierarchy for him to climb? If you don’t specify a hierarchy, one is going to form anyway, and then it’s even more out of your control. If you’re going to say the hierarchy should be based on people doing real work, well I agree, but that is pretty much impossible to measure in groups beyond a certain size. This groups beyond a certain size problem is the root of the problem, not levels, which are just a stopgap measure to slow the brakes on the deterioration and degeneracy that you find in any gigantic group of people.

mradek 4y ago

Impact? Someone could be an amazing mentor and mediocre at actual output, but their impact could lead to a bunch of people being able to stay leveled up and think more efficiently that lets the team ship more with less bugs. Maybe there’s a senior engineer who can consistently crank out high quality code and identify optimizations that save money. Some sort of holistic 360 reviews by peers where others can vouch for you could work. What’s the big deal with having one senior paid 180k and another 350k if their impacts are considerably different? I have personally dealt with BS like “we can’t promote you rn but also can’t give you a raise because you’re at the upper limit of your salary band”. That’s not fair, imo.

brhsagain 4y ago
How do you stop the measurement of impact from degenerating into exactly the same situation we have now? In fact, I’m pretty sure at many bigcos “impact” is already the official metric for promo. The real thing you’re getting at is that people should only be paid and promoted for real work, and not for bullshit work, but that’s basically impossible to measure once organizations grow beyond a certain size. Also, in orgs beyond a certain size, “holistic” peer review based evals make bullshit promo culture worse, not better. It basically ends up meaning how much people like you, and accelerates the shift toward a culture where people optimize for that instead of doing real work. And then you’re back at square one.