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Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

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Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#81

Post by ianrathbone »

I remember starting as a developer wanting to be respected by my elders, and just looking to become senior as soon as possible. I got it and didn't feel very different.

I jumped at an opportunity to manage the software department and enjoyed the managerial side and representing the team within the rest of the company. I didn't like the politics and I didn't like knowing what I started to know about the company itself. A pretty big weight that took it's toll.

Most of all I missed coding, I wasn't doing it enough and I started to fall behind on the industry.

The idea of a Lead role is something I courted but then realised it may not be rewarding. I'd like to know how other lead's find their role...

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#82

Post by tomduncalf »

jasonkester wrote: post #49
wjossey wrote: post #22

I’ve been reviewing a lot of career path documents recently for different engineering orgs, and every one is fairly uniform in that you either progress into management, team leadership, or architecture (or some blend of the three). If not, you’ll stagnate at a pretty high level, but stagnate none the less. I’ve been noodling on this for a while, and I think maybe a fourth track at a lot of organizations should be spe…

A better fourth path is to transition to running your own business. You still get to write the code, and you remove the salary cap. People sweat about all the “Business Stuff” you have to do in addition, but I find it’s not really any more of your day than the normal boring admin stuff of being a rank and file developer. Certainly less than being a manager at a bigco. It also does away with ageism concerns.

I don’t know how it works in the US but in the U.K. becoming a contractor can provide a good half way house between being employed and running your own company.

You’re not an employee so no performance reviews or line management and you are responsible for running your own company, but at the same time many contracts will be working with teams of permanent staff for 6 months or more so it’s not like you are off totally on your own having to invent new products or hunt for projects. I’d guess the remuneration can match that of a manager after you’ve been doing it for a while, but you’re essentially a technical expert who’s expected to be able to hit the ground running quickly and add a lot of value at each client.

My impression is that demand for good contractors outstrips supply right now (it can make sense for companies with fixed budgets or tight timelines to hire contractors despite a higher per-day cost) and the business side really isn’t that complicated, so it is a fairly well trodden path by good developers at a certain point in their career. Of course, if you are someone who feels like they benefit from having the company structure (eg in terms of management, training, etc) or doesn’t like changing company fairly often it’s probably not for you!

Edit: forgot about this guide posted to HN a while ago: https://github.com/tadast/switching-to-contracting-uk/blob/m...

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#83

Post by ukoki »

neilv wrote: post #70
wjossey wrote: post #22

I’ve been reviewing a lot of career path documents recently for different engineering orgs, and every one is fairly uniform in that you either progress into management, team leadership, or architecture (or some blend of the three). If not, you’ll stagnate at a pretty high level, but stagnate none the less. I’ve been noodling on this for a while, and I think maybe a fourth track at a lot of organizations should be spe…

I was in a group a bit like that. It was small product-focused R&D team of ~6 people, charged with figuring out an emerging disruptive industry change, and building a new product line for that. (The rest of the company was directed not to even allude to our existence, since that might interfere with sales of the current products, and we even had a stealthy group name.) Except for me, who was the token enthusiastic ki…

> charged with figuring out an emerging disruptive industry change

And did you? — I'm really curious as to whether there ended up being a positive ROI from dedicating those top engineers to that task.

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#84

Post by aetherspawn »

tomduncalf wrote: post #82
jasonkester wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A better fourth path is to transition to running your own business. You still get to write the code, and you remove the salary cap. People sweat about all the “Business Stuff” you have to do in addition, but I find it’s not really any more of your day than the normal boring admin stuff of being a rank and file developer. Certainly less than being a manager at a bigco. It also does away with ageism concerns.

I don’t know how it works in the US but in the U.K. becoming a contractor can provide a good half way house between being employed and running your own company. You’re not an employee so no performance reviews or line management and you are responsible for running your own company, but at the same time many contracts will be working with teams of permanent staff for 6 months or more so it’s not like you are off total…

How do you, as a contractor, find this sort of work?

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#85

Post by ido »

ianrathbone wrote: post #81

I remember starting as a developer wanting to be respected by my elders, and just looking to become senior as soon as possible. I got it and didn't feel very different. I jumped at an opportunity to manage the software department and enjoyed the managerial side and representing the team within the rest of the company. I didn't like the politics and I didn't like knowing what I started to know about the company itself…

When I worked as a lead most often I would:

* sit in a lot of meetings with management/other departments

* try to filter company politics from my team (thus absorbing it myself)

* would try to find what work would be most suitable and rewarding (considering interest & future growth) for each of my developers, thus in practice ending up with the most boring bug-fix & other maintenance tasks myself

* participating in a lot of project-management as well as people-management of my direct reports (weekly one on ones, conflict resolution, planning career growth, etc)

In practice I found the role of Principle Developer much more rewarding.

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#86

Post by neilv »

miemo wrote: post #72
neilv wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was in a group a bit like that. It was small product-focused R&D team of ~6 people, charged with figuring out an emerging disruptive industry change, and building a new product line for that. (The rest of the company was directed not to even allude to our existence, since that might interfere with sales of the current products, and we even had a stealthy group name.) Except for me, who was the token enthusiastic ki…

How did you find working in that environment compared to some other projects with clearer direction?

I loved it. I think the team lead managed it well. It helped that we already had insight into the old problem domain, and how it was changing. And experienced engineers can generally collaborate effectively, as well as work self-directed.

It's not that different than any project with a novel component. Some projects ("Uber, for cats!") are mostly a matter of executing in some well-understood ways as soon as you hear the idea (set up your tools, use these frameworks, on this cloud configuration, and have frontend and backend start grinding through the tasks, while you're plugging them into the plan, and scheduling for demos or MVP launch or whatever). But other projects have more upfront domain knowledge to acquire, brainstorming, requirements analysis, market analysis, prototyping, figuring out possibilities, deciding what you will do, etc. In the latter, eventually it probably turns into a conventional fairly predictable project (although there might still be tricky problems to solve in the pieces, but you have a good idea where you want to go and what the pieces are).

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#87

Post by TheSpiceIsLife »

wjossey wrote: post #22

I’ve been reviewing a lot of career path documents recently for different engineering orgs, and every one is fairly uniform in that you either progress into management, team leadership, or architecture (or some blend of the three). If not, you’ll stagnate at a pretty high level, but stagnate none the less. I’ve been noodling on this for a while, and I think maybe a fourth track at a lot of organizations should be spe…

I wrote a way more verbose response, but deleted it and substitute this:

> down to the woman who worked the front desk

Maybe she's on to something.

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#88

Post by lugg »

billions wrote: post #74
Aeolun wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then what is the point? Are you just there to gather your paycheck? I mean, to an extend, yes. But you need to be able to excert some positive effect.

big companies do not innovate. (counter examples welcome!) unless you’re in a 1-20 person startup, your impact is -5% to +5% as a division. Essentially you’re stroking egos: yours or management’s. best to choose the latter and try your hand at changing the world in after-work projects.

Funny how the uncomfortable truths get downvotes.

Would like to see those counter examples people seemingly have.

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#89

Post by blub »

heipei wrote: post #40
blub wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...or move into architecture or management. That seems like the more reasonable thing compared to playing the start-up lottery.

Yeah, but parent mentioned "autonomy" as the driving force for people who'd want this track, and I'm very much in the same situation. Management or architecture won't give you the same level as autonomy as working in one of these small "Tiger teams" (thanks to sibling for pointing out that term)

You really think that you can spend most of your time designing and coding as a contractor or start-up founder?

You are literally a one man marketing and finance department.

Re: Why Good Developers Are Promoted into Unhappiness (2007)

#90

Post by DanBC »

lugg wrote: post #88
billions wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

big companies do not innovate. (counter examples welcome!) unless you’re in a 1-20 person startup, your impact is -5% to +5% as a division. Essentially you’re stroking egos: yours or management’s. best to choose the latter and try your hand at changing the world in after-work projects.

Funny how the uncomfortable truths get downvotes. Would like to see those counter examples people seemingly have.

Xerox.

Arpa / Darpa.

3M.

AT&T / Bell labs.

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