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I've always fought to stay a developer as well. It seems that as soon as I know a codebase well enough to be really productive, there is a "team lead" or "scrum master" role waiting. Once or twice I've even fallen for it but the result have always been more meetings, less customer interaction, more responsibility and somehow less power over the product. Pay has stayed the same of course.

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If pay stayed the same, then something went wrong. And I get it. I've had some friends go through this, where they'd get offered a lead position but technically it's 'Lead in training' so he gets the old pay while they evaluate him etc.

Complete BS. If they offer it to him, they think he would be a good fit and they're just trying to pay less. Contrast it with my experience, where I just stepped up to fill the gaps whenever I saw them, my boss noticed, offered a lead position including pay bump.

I've always believed and practiced this too. You get the promotion & bump because you're already essentially doing the job. I'm OK with a trial without the promotion, but many (most?) seem to think you should get the opportunity to succeed or fail, with the rewards up front. I do't get this viewpoint.

This is mild exploitation widespread in employment, and I think you're identifying with the exploiter.

It's not the rewards up front, it's the rewards as-you-go. Or it's the rewards at the end of the previous rank.

Always having your pay 1yr behind your responsibilities is wrong. You're doing the job, you get the pay.

On day 1 of being a lead, you've never been a lead before, but you are now. Year 1 leads get lead pay.

"You've done great, you're at the top of your rank! No, I can't reward you for it yet, just start at the next rank and we'll wait and see pleasethankyou." No. We saw. Pay me.

This is like a playbook for hollowing out an organization's talent via the Peter Principle.

For this to be true, then it must be true that trial-run promotions very frequently fail, so they keep the person in the role they perform best in. I think that's not the case. I think trial-run promotions lead to promotions about equally as often as no-trial-run promotions.

The same people end up at the same end rank, they just take lower pay for a year to get there. And that one year drag compounds because raises are %.

Anyway we're likely disagreeing in an entirely vague way. Of course my leadership skills should be evident if I'm going to ask to be Lead, so yes day1 leads aren't starting from 0. But a company's surest bet for who to hire as Lead is me, so why should I put up with them telling me they just aren't sure yet? All hires into new roles are very uncertain, and I'm the most certain, so I get the role. Someone more certain than me is a person with 2yrs of Lead on their resume, but they get Lead 3 pay, and I'm not asking for Lead 3 pay. You're hiring a Lead 1 and I'm sure surest bet (inside the org or out) and we all know it.

Or go ahead whisper promises of a promotion in the ears of two on my team and watch them butt heads as they try to act out the phantom authority you've given them. A politicking horserace like that has a vastly worse impact on the company than just pulling the trigger and naming one of us Lead 1 even if we're obvious greenboots for a year.

I'm so glad I've found this comment. It's REALLY strange to me that this is the first time I've read someone talking about this phenomena and on how exploitative it actually is and, like other comment noted, this is a very convenient co-opting of the Peter principle in order to get more senior people for cheap in the guise of "trials" and similar.

When exactly did this extortionary tactic started? There are so many things that go unquestioned...

I think it's quite a difference whether your boss already knows (or thinks) you can do the other job and still tries to not pay you the bump and you doing the extra work to get noticed.

In my case it wasn't even to get noticed. I just care about stuff. My current boss is actually trying to make me 'care less'. Like I can't leave it alone if I see the PMs do a crap job and I try to fix it. I can't not say something when I see the DevOps guys not taking care of the dev envs and dev experience.

Also when did this start? Like hundreds of not thousands of years ago. Why?

I've always found it difficult to come up with OKRs (goals - insert company BS euphemism here) that were acceptable but didn't force me towards a management position. It is just assumed that the goal in any company that a person should want to herd cats as a living.

Then on the other hand, you have unusual guys like me who are trying over and over to get into management, but 20+ years in I'm still at the bottom of the totem pole. It's always the same need-experience-to-get-experience catch-22: "Well, [JOE] already has management experience and you don't so [JOE] is now your manager." It's always a struggle: If you want X and don't want Y, somehow you're always going to be offered Y and have to fight for X.

I’m right there with you - despite feeling like I’d be more passionate about being the more managerial and less “hands-on coder” on every team I’ve ever been on, including having a biz/IT degree vs pure CS, and having worked in a variety of industries in a variety of roles ... it’s always “well we want you to be the dev because reasons” and I can’t quite figure out what I’m missing. I have a feeling it’s just that my resume doesn’t say I’ve already been a manager and that when I interview, I don’t lie and tell people how I’ve managed teams of direct reports. That doesn’t mean I’m incapable, or that I wouldn’t be great at it, but I guess orgs see management as high risk so they never want to take a chance. Either that or I’m always doomed for some sort of “BUZZWORD-Ops” role

Have you had the discussion with your manager that you want to get into management as a long term goal? Your manager should help you plan out a track to a management promotion. If your manager is not helping you develop along your intended career path find a new manager. If they do when one becomes available you should be prepared to interview for that role.

Don't ever agree to move up unless you are paid more.

Or unless you're actually looking to get that kind of experience

I guess I could amend it to "Never move up when someone else wants you to unless you get a pay bump."

If you want to move up and someone else is iffy on it, sure, skip the raise to help convince them.

It's a matter of who is prompting the move, and what extra responsibility is required and such. If your boss asks you to take on more responsibility, ask for more money. That's really all I'm saying.

Interviewing for my last two jobs, I told them very explicitly that my career goal was to never become a manager.

I don't think I've ever interviewed from the same angle but I have been clear with my managers that I want to avoid moving into any sort of people management. It hasn't been an issue and when you've marked yourself out as a long term developer you can get more momentum behind technical pushes that might have a long project lifetime since the company will be less concerned about putting a big weight in your hands - they can trust you to carry it through[1].

1. I mean - assuming no life changes which you should never feel guilty about making to suit your own interests.

Yeah, I didn't use the term, but I mainly meant "people management". Bluntly, people are not a core strength of mine...

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