My thoughts about the Principal role

Post by hallway_monitor » Sun, May 23, 2021, 4:24 AM UTC

bradleyjg wrote: post #104

baron_harkonnen wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still quite strange to me that we're at a point in tech where technical skill becomes a penalty. This is not to say that non-technical skills are not important and often more important, but for both myself and friends "getting paid well" and "working on hard problems" have become conflicting goals. There was a brief while, at the beginning of our current tech boom where strong technical skills were extremely val…

This is generally the way things go. That it wasn’t true at some point is the anomaly. The generalized version is that anything widely desirable about a job other than money acts to push down wages. For example, if a position is widely respected, well most people like to be respected so wages are going to be less than if it wasn’t widely respected. Similarly, if there’s a lot of people that enjoy spending time with c…

Post by cudgy » Sun, May 23, 2021, 5:03 AM UTC

Post by cudgy » Sun, May 23, 2021, 6:16 AM UTC

mavelikara wrote: post #114

cudgy wrote: post #113

“If after one year, you can't leave a team without impact, you've failed in your work.” A top managerial professor I knew defined a manager’s role to be exactly this. Principal or manager or whatever you are called doesn’t matter in the end, since once you go beyond “senior” level positions your role largely should be facilitating, empowering, and advocating for the members of your team. In reality, these roles unfor…

> In reality, these roles unfortunately deteriorate into countless meetings with other managers and political struggles within a strong current of corporate compromises. It is unfortunate that talented programmers turn their backs on leadership roles requiring inter-personal skills, propagating the stereotypes that prevent programers from progressing in their careers. > In my opinion, a true, technical principal role…

Post by Raptor22 » Sun, May 23, 2021, 8:03 AM UTC

spenczar5 wrote: post #92

wikibob wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the reply! If you had it to do over again, would you chose to go into the area that you’re especially interested in and sacrifice ever getting the high FAANG comp? Or do you feel that having that savings invested has given you the long term security to feel comfortable, but perhaps if you’d made ~80% less over your career you’d be less satisfied?

That’s something I think about often. Sometimes I do wish I had plunged towards passions, but I know a lot of people who burned out by doing that. I think my path was probably a good one; it really is very psychologically nice to not worry at all about money and be able to advance my career in any direction I want now without feeling like I am being selfish, or neglecting my responsibilities as a father, or whatever.…

Post by wfhbata » Sun, May 23, 2021, 10:39 AM UTC

sgerenser wrote: post #59

wfhbata wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you been able to maintain a similar level of compensation? I started my career in scientific computing, and was paid a pittance compared to what a PE is paid at a big tech company. I’m wondering if moving to scientific computing is a luxury afforded by putting in time at AWS.

If one started at Amazon before 2016 or so, and put in a full 4 years to get 100% of their new hire stock vesting, they’d easily have more than $1 million just in stock. That plus all your other savings from the time you put in can make relaxing in a lower paid role for the next N years until you’re ready to retire an attractive proposition.