Career Monogamy: The Awkward Tech Sin of Longevity
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If you're doing different things within the same company every few years, and taking increasingly more challenging and essential roles, then employers will likely look very favourably upon that because having that progression shows that you will likely produce a lot of value for them.
Why? With the exception of a few niche domains (scientific research, pharma, etc), it doesn't take very many years to master a domain. The problem set can only get so varied and complex. In fact, it's quite the opposite; problems tend to get less complicated over time as they get more automated/well known. Easier to solve == cheaper to hire for.
Most people that have been with a "young" company for 20 years that hasn't turned itself over and are high value will likely have large networks and will be somewhat well known by dint of having closer ties with the founding/senior leadership.
So if you're doing the same rote job for n years, and the costs of hiring someone to replace you and train them are greater than the costs of keeping you, then you are vulnerable to "redundancy." While there is NOTHING WRONG with wanting to do the same thing forever and prioritize other things, this is the risk that comes with that. (I personally have no idea how people achieve that; there is so much opportunity in the world to make money, and being restricted by money sucks).
This was true of cotton millers, milkmen, switchboard operators, and is still true for developers and operators.
To the extent that better tools and more capable junior developers are complements to senior developers, problems getting easier to solve should mean higher compensation at the high end:
https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2002/06/12/strategy-letter-v/
The number of Internet users is only increasing, so the value of being the winner in winner-take-all markets keeps going up. And especially as the amount of money you need to raise goes down, that means more of the pie going to labor and less to capital.
> I was a Director of Product Management, working on Creative Cloud, and also a member of the Adobe Seattle Site Council.
I don't think this sounds like a rote job. Once you get to a certain organisational level, it's no longer possible to be 'promoted' further without changing to a completely different job role.
I think the idea that to progress your career past that point, you must abandon the profession that got you there, is harmful and wasteful. A rockstar tech lead won't necessarily be a rockstar head of department. Forcing your best people to choose between ditching their core competency or being regarded as 'past it' is, I believe, a large source of the apparent incompetence that befuddles many large organisations.
I'd argue many areas of tech are an exception as well, at least if you're doing some of the more complex foundational work (which admittedly many tech employees are not). For example, the people who have been working on Postgres for 10+ years understand both databases and that specific database extremely well, in a way someone who's been working on databases for 3 years doesn't.
I don't think the specialization _delirium was talking about is usually that narrow. I happen to be a long-time contributor to postgres, _delirium's example. While I obviously don't need ramp up time while changing jobs where I only work on postgres, it's not hard to find other jobs that share significant amount of knowledge. Even if postgres were to die, I sure hope not, there's plenty of other data stores which share a good chunk of the techniques. I know other people that were deep into one OS kernel, and changed into another one, and the technical background isn't the big issue, it's the difference in social processes.
This.
What is a "more essential" role? Higher in the company hierarchy? I would bet that a guy who knows how to fix 20 year old system, behind the scenes and without fanfares, is probably more essential for your business, than just another suit talking bullshit like he did in his last gig.
The problem is right here - there is no "essential". There is only work that needs to be done. It's always better to have somebody who has deep knowledge of the problem to do the job. And it takes time to get that knowledge.
There are no shortcuts, like, doing "high-level" things. No, you actually suck at your job, because you have superficial understanding, you just reframed so it wouldn't be obvious.
I am not against people doing high-level things. What I am saying is that being tricked into thinking that this is somewhat more important, though, is at the core of this stupidity. It isn't more important, it's a trade-off.
Think analyst solely responsible for communication with customer and giving tasks to multiple programmers. Think programmer being told "we need this new module" along with phone call to contact person in customer company being trusted that new module happen and questions will be asked and no customer will be offended in the process. It might mean being assigned to tasks that are really important as opposed to tasks that are less important.
There is more critical and less critical (essential) work. Who gets which one depends on trust a lot. It is not so much about deep knowledge of some tech, although that one play the role. Tech is easily learnable. Whether you are able to makes sense of vague customer, whether you can work without having hand holded is more of factor.
The problem with your argument is that you see a person "making" the decisions, and somehow you decided that he is the important guy. But if he is not a complete idiot, he is not making the decisions alone in the dark, but always goes to the more experienced (with the technology) people to get their opinion.
Of course there is important and less important work. But this has nothing to do with an importance of a job or profession, which is an ill-posed question to begin with.
And regarding responsibility.. I believe it's mostly status game again. If you don't have anything to lose, you don't have "more responsibility". A doctor or nurse, who can kill a patient and go to prison for that, has responsibility. A manager who will at worst lose the extra money and social status he gained for "having more responsibility" doesn't actually have any more responsibility - because he has in fact nothing to lose compared to what he had before.
> That's not a very realistic example. In the real world, the communication with analyst goes both ways - the programmers also have to tell him what is feasible and what is not.
Yes and many people have problem to handle that. Also, programmers sometimes lie. But mostly, you go visit customer and three people there tell you completely contradictory requirements. And they hate each other and occasionally lie. Or more likely, give you requirements that make no sense, you have to ask right questions and push them right directions. The technology is not the issue there, making sense of vague requirements and creating consistent goal is. It is harder to replace such person then css guy. Of course it is immensely important how software looks like, but that skill is easier to measure during interview.
But as I told, the real difference is how much supervision you need, how likely you are to create organizational mess and so on.
A single programmer can not do all that much damage and there are processes to mitigate that risk. The point of contact can make a lot of damage. That is why it is more essential - your failure has bigger consequences for the whole project/company.
> And regarding responsibility.. I believe it's mostly status game again.
It is not. Responsibility is not about being punished nor height of that punishment. It is about being reliable without there being the need for threat of punishment over your head. If you don't work unless there is daily standup to report progress at, then you can not be trusted with larger more important tasks - no matter how genius you are.
If I am manager and tell you "this is half written requirements and the phone number" can she or he just go back to the office expecting you to communicate/do the rest? Or does he/she needs to visit you every week and ask you right questions and remind you to send important mails? That is the responsibility and that is what many people fail at.
> But as I told, the real difference is how much supervision you need, how likely you are to create organizational mess and so on.
Yeah, but this is true for any skill. Anybody who has skill doesn't need supervision. It does not by itself prove that some role has "bigger impact".
> Responsibility is not about being punished nor height of that punishment.
I am talking about "having responsibility", you're talking about "being responsible". Those are two different things.
Because I felt like moving I talked to my boss and he agreed I start a part-time phd in the company. So chances are high that I'll stick around a few more years to achieve that. If after that a company is dumb enough to reject my CV based on a "to long in same company metric" that will be their problem, not mine...
PS: In the long run I think we agree. The problem is that there is no absolute metric or Machine learning trickery to evaluate experience and value of an employee. Company that believe in or sell such metrics are the main problem IMHO.
Of course. It's like asking what is more important in a car, the engine or the wheels? But people do want to play this game, for status reasons.
If staying long in your company makes this to people, the issue is not longevity vs job hopping. It is that company management that rewards the above behavior. The people who stayed longer are the ones acculturated - if they are stagnating then it means you reward stagnation. If your people needs to leave in two years or they become passive, then maybe you should stop punishing active people.
> "He identified a prevalent mindset with employees who were working more to secure their jobs than to take the risks necessary to forge a bright future."
I do not know what he means by risk. Learning new things is not risky. Employee does not need to be personally in risk if he/she works on project with low chance of success. People lately use the word risk a.) as it would be something inherently good which it is not b.) in relation to behavior that puts you in no danger.
> "These were the folks who would listen intently at employee meetings for the names of the projects or products that executives mentioned, and then eagerly try to find safe passage aboard what they now perceived to be safe areas of the company."
What exactly are "unsafe" areas of the company, what will happen to me if I work there? And wouldn't it a good idea to make working there less risky if that is what you want from your employees?
Obviously it is, since you can go from something you know are good at, and can deliver results (and draw on experience), to something unknown that you have to learn -- this can make you misjudge potential issues with the new stack, miss estimates and fail to deliver correctly or on time, or even find it to be unfit for the desired tasks in the end. All of those things are gambles.
>Employee does not need to be personally in risk if he/she works on project with low chance of success.
Only if the higher-ups also see it that way. Else, if they blame the employee, that would constitute risk.
>What exactly are "unsafe" areas of the company, what will happen to me if I work there?
Areas with high probability of not delivering? Areas with death marches? Areas with bad managers? Etc?
Areas that don't have the general support of the higher ups in the company. Areas that are seen as unimportant or a burden. Areas which have a reputation for not delivering
what will happen to me if I work there?
You'll get passed up for promotions, raises and bonuses. You might also find yourself 'marked' and have a hard time moving to other parts of the company.
So jumping ship seems worse than taking a risk - it's more like a total gamble.
I'm just going to jump every year or two until I'm in top 10% of engineer salary in my area. Then I'll sit back and become a lifer.
It's too bad nobody gives decent raises, it's most of the reason young devs jump from job to job. People have told me it doesn't work but every time I've jumped I've gotten at least 10% more. One time I got offered 20% on the spot to not leave and I said no because I had a job lined up for 50% more.
For example, one year I went and interviewed at a number of different companies, got some offers that were significantly higher than what I was currently making, then went to my manager and made the case based on the highest offer I received. At the same time, I made it clear that I liked my current job and didn't want to leave.
What have you done already in this area?
Having done the same thing, I didn't automatically take the other job because I liked the job I had. I liked the people, I liked the challenges and I liked the domain, all I didn't like was the salary. In my case they ended up meeting me about halfway between my current salary and the best offer I'd received, and I was happy to take it since that job with the better offer didn't sound as interesting.
I have noticed, however, that as my career has progressed into more senior levels, automatic raises beyond typical inflation adjustments (2-3% per annum) have become rarer. Thus, I've had to negotiate for raises between promotions.
He is the product of getting far too comfortable early on, and being afraid of change. Once you let that sink in, then you get stuck and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. I don't see him getting another job soon, and if he gets laid off, I think he's seriously fucked.
Meanwhile in 27 years, I've had over 10 jobs. I have no problems learning new technology, or jumping into a codebase and making code fixes the first day. I have a long trail of friends from all of my previous companies that I could call up and go for lunch with that day, and I still feel energetic about coding and learning the newest and latest. But I haven't been there long enough to effect change the way other long-timers have, and hence why I'm still a programmer as opposed to a tech lead or architect, etc.
In hindsight I see longevity as a mistake - because this bias exists and it limits opportunity even when misapplied. Also I find it does take more work - or at least more attention - to stay current when you aren't being pressured by your job.
There is of course nothing wrong with doing one thing for years. Japanese built a successful, innovative economy just around that.
It's just another form of self-deception. You have 1 year in 20 different skills, therefore sure you must be more productive than the human that has 20 years in one skill.
Guess what - likely not.
This is just life in general.
I think the most valuable thing about capitalism (well, depends on exact definition, maybe better would be talking about Western societies/democracies/free markets/whatever) is that it breaks down the monopolistic hierarchical social structure that exists in most societies and replaces it, at least, with a variety of such structures.
Different western societies attribute quite different values to having knowledge VS having formal education VS becoming wealthy. Even more so throughout history.
The point is whether you actually have X or can convince someone that you have X. In most cases, convincing is enough, as that means you effectively have X in regards to the person doing the judgement.
There is an interesting dichotomy in thinking, which again points to the social status game. People who we deem to have low social status (e.g. blue collar workers) we relegate to this taylorist idea that they must be super-specialized, otherwise they are useless. On the other hand, people who we think should have high social status (e.g. managers) we categorize that they need to be flexible and have broad (rather than deep) skill set, and indeed, we consider being deep a disadvantage.
But in reality, both sides benefit from the mix of skills, both sides often have the mix of skills (especially the productive people), and it has not much to do with their actual day-to-day jobs.
So I think the question is how refined you want your skill to be in that long tail of refinement approaching 100% but never getting there.
And again, HN continues to connect all the ills of the society to that mythical 'capitalsim'.
Do you have any knowledge, for example, of how were promotions and salary raises distributed on a typical soviet factory?
Edit: since HN' genius anti-spam system prevents me from posting new comments after a couple of downvotes, I will use this comment to reply instead. (If you're annoyed at this, welcome to the club).
> You shouldn't prop an utterly corrupt system built by perverting an impossible fantasy as proof that we can't do better.
Let's put aside the argument that "USSR wasn't communist/socialist" (which is bullshit, but for different reasons). Let's imagine that USSR was, actually, something else - because it sure as hell wasn't capitalism.
From that, we can infer that the same problem with promotion and corruption happened in vastly different economic and social systems, and, therefore, is not specific nor especially connected to the idea of capitalism.
> I am not in any way related to HN (I am just a regular user), but it's a stab at the claim of some that there is "meritocracy", or that these things are somehow valued, when in fact, they are not.
Being a user makes you related to HN in a sense that you make up HN community - which is exactly what I was referring to.
> In many ways, the societies were less meritocratic, and in some ways more equal
They certainly were - that's exactly what I hate about them and why I embrace capitalism instead.
I am not in any way related to HN (I am just a regular user), but it's a stab at the claim of some that there is "meritocracy", or that these things are somehow valued, when in fact, they are not.
Can't speak for Soviet, but I can somewhat speak for communist Czechoslovakia. In many ways, the societies were less meritocratic, and in some ways more equal. I like to say that whatever was good about communist regime (you would find couple things) was mostly copied from the West in the 50s and 60s. For example, research institutions where there was a big freedom to spend time on research, without being constrained too much by grants and academic performance. (Actually the similar thing was true in the industry, because of the essentially lifetime employment.) Some used it to do good research, some used it to slack off, sure. But it certainly provided somewhat an option to spent a lifetime in one field only, if we return to the topic of the article.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socio-economic_mobility_in_the...
On the the other hand, increased meritocracy is double edged sword, at least depending on what really "merit" is.
For example, no one would want to have their salary decreased based on current performance. Yet it would be meritocratic. A true meritocracy would be perceived by most people as a cold psychopathic dystopia.
Many of the best people I know have been at Amazon or Google for years.
Offtopic, but I'd prefer a slap to the back than a knife to the face. It's more about slap vs knife than about back to face.
Adobe is not a non-profit organization. Profits are the sole reason of their existence.
If you think their products are too expensive, don't buy them. It's not like there's some human right saying that "everybody must be provided access to professionally grade design and publishing software".
PS: I'm not affiliated with Afobe in any way. Besides pdf readers I don't know of using any of their software anymore (not even flash, because I have the flash plugins disabled in my browsers)
Nevertheless profits being the sole reason for their existence doesn't put anyone or anything into a good light. Even if making per profit isn't a bad thing.
At least in the current day and age that appears to be true. Probably too philosophical for this thread though. ;)
Actually just wanted to say that giving background about the author still is interesting. How you value them morally is a different thing.
http://www.adobe.com/corporate-responsibility.html says otherwise. Either the company is not following what they preach or they are "bending the truth" in that page. Both options are not good.