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Tech company career ladders

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Re: Tech company career ladders

#41

Post by keithnz »

mlazos wrote: post #2

I think this article unfairly paints small companies as some nirvana which is obviously not the case. I have plenty of friends at small companies who feel like their c-suite is filled with sociopaths and because the company is under the radar nobody cares how the employees of said company are treated.

I've always enjoyed working at small companies. I've worked at larger companies which have the "level" concept of employees, it's kindda funny to me now :)

In my experience at smaller companies you get treated better, you are a more significant factor to the overall success of the company and there is very little corporate crap which often has silly requirements that get justified by a mystical word of being "professional", which often actually seems to achieve the opposite of treating adults as bunch of kids that need to be managed and controlled :)

Though I know it also can go very bad for people in small companies that have mini dictators in charge.

Re: Tech company career ladders

#42

Post by sethammons »

itronitron wrote: post #16
mlady wrote: post #11

In my view a PIP is all (and only) about management expectations. A person that is being railroaded by incompetent management can outlast them by staying positive.

The parent comment is removed, but on the thought of a personal improvement plan (pip), they are often paperwork to protect the company when they terminate you.

This is not always the case, and if you can turn it around, that is fantastic. It really helps to have a manager who can help guide you. A coworker of mine was place on a PIP and, honestly, was expected to be managed out by just about everyone. However! He rose up with guidance from manager and became a _very_ productive team member. To the point now that I am very glad he is on my team and I think a big part of our latest project's success came from him. He grew a lot and is on a great path in our org now.

Re: Tech company career ladders

#43

Post by friedButter »

peterburkimsher wrote: post #30

"inhumane quasi-slavery visa situation that we do to our friends who happen to be born somewhere else" - thank you so much for this rant. I've spent the last 3 years in Taiwan sitting tight and waiting until I have enough work experience to qualify for the Skilled Migrant Category visa for New Zealand (Canada and Australia are also options, with similar requirements). Now I have those 3 years, I'm trying to get a job…

These countries seem so easy compared to US where it can take 20+ years for a residency if you're from India, and you need to live on annual visa renewals until that time

Re: Tech company career ladders

#44

Post by 49bc »

> Some companies will dangle money at you as an alternative to going on the PIP.

Can someone tell me a little about this? Is this a situation where a company pays you to quit without firing you?

Re: Tech company career ladders

#45

Post by crabasa »

peterburkimsher wrote: post #30

"inhumane quasi-slavery visa situation that we do to our friends who happen to be born somewhere else" - thank you so much for this rant. I've spent the last 3 years in Taiwan sitting tight and waiting until I have enough work experience to qualify for the Skilled Migrant Category visa for New Zealand (Canada and Australia are also options, with similar requirements). Now I have those 3 years, I'm trying to get a job…

>> and I really hope some company will notice my plight

Do you have a website? Is your story documented anywhere? It's really powerful.

Re: Tech company career ladders

#46

Post by throwaway84742 »

sudeepj wrote: post #29

What I also seen is people become victim of your their own success. If you over-achieve in one appraisal cycle it is very bad for you because you have increased your base-level of performance. It is like over-achieving sales target. I have learned the hard way that one needs to spread out the achievements. For example if you have good number of ideas then don't spew out all of them in one go. Introduce them say in ea…

That’s not really how this works. Right after a promo you’re not due for another promo. They are dividing a fixed size promo budget pie. So they rank you lower in order to be able to rank someone else higher. There’s no other reason, because it’s impossible to accurately measure engineer’s “performance”, or to even define it in the first place.

At Microsoft, for example, in the olden days at least, managers would keep around a certain percentage of deadwood on the team to give their best people good ratings and meet their firing quota if the need arises.

Re: Tech company career ladders

#47

Post by Zaheer »

tejasmanohar wrote: post #33
tomerico wrote: post #28

For those looking to compare levels between the mentioned companies, I found http://levels.fyi useful

Can anyone attest to the accuracy of this? Levels have pay ranges , right? If so, does this site portray the lower or higher end of the range? Also, are levels pretty translatable between big corps? Does level at one company have weight when interviewing at another?

There's also crowdsourced data via a Google Form they have at: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1IclsJmHUMWjZCECMKi1I...

Re: Tech company career ladders

#48

Post by peterkelly »

sudeepj wrote: post #29

What I also seen is people become victim of your their own success. If you over-achieve in one appraisal cycle it is very bad for you because you have increased your base-level of performance. It is like over-achieving sales target. I have learned the hard way that one needs to spread out the achievements. For example if you have good number of ideas then don't spew out all of them in one go. Introduce them say in ea…

That sounds horrific

Re: Tech company career ladders

#49

Post by corporateslaver »

sudeepj wrote: post #29

What I also seen is people become victim of your their own success. If you over-achieve in one appraisal cycle it is very bad for you because you have increased your base-level of performance. It is like over-achieving sales target. I have learned the hard way that one needs to spread out the achievements. For example if you have good number of ideas then don't spew out all of them in one go. Introduce them say in ea…

This is true. Huge success leads to a raise and massive expectations, which can be extremely stressful.

Re: Tech company career ladders

#50

Post by lstyls »

49bc wrote: post #44

> Some companies will dangle money at you as an alternative to going on the PIP. Can someone tell me a little about this? Is this a situation where a company pays you to quit without firing you?

It's called a severance package. The company isn't giving you money to quit - you're working at-will and they can terminate your employment at any time for any reason. The amount is usually equivalent to a few months worth of paychecks.

What they pay you for is you signing away your ability to sue for wrongful termination. Because they can't really fire you for any reason.

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