For our parents' generation, employers actually tried to be like an academic meritocracy. People gripe about "bureaucracy", but when bureaucracy works, it's actually quite fair and effective.
In 2013, we face a world where management (rarely with competent training in anything other than not getting the company sued) blatantly plays favorites, "teams" sometimes turn on their strongest members, investment in junior peoples' careers is almost nonexistent, and firing is more likely to involve one of those humiliating, dishonest, and impossible "performance improvement plans" than a decent severance check. Imagine what high school would be like if the popular kids graded exams. That's what corporate work is like for most people.
If someone transfers through 5 colleges in 8 years before finally getting a degree, it's pretty clear that something unusual happened. That's a red flag. Colleges make a lot of effort not to be dysfunctional and to make evaluation fair, so it's a real warning sign if someone passes through 3 or 4 and can't succeed. Companies don't. They'd rather sacrifice fairness, decency, and protocol under the belief (perhaps mistaken?) that it makes them more efficient at delivering on projects. That volatile culture would be fine, if they weren't so stuck up about "job hoppers" in the hiring process.
We're not disloyal. We're just honest. Instead of sticking around and sabotaging a company that betrays us (out of fear of a job-hopper stigma, like what our parents faced) we leave. That's better for us and the companies.
"Imagine what high school would be like if the popular kids graded exams. That's what corporate work is like for most people."
This is, sadly, very true. The track to reward and recognition in a corporation crosses the popularity track over and over, even in corporate IT. I saw a very senior engineer buck this whole setup once he used it to get to near the top. He was immediately quarantined and shipped off to another, less popular team. He still has strong leadership qualities, so they won't hellban him, but he's not in line for a promotion any time soon.
This is true, but in a very Darwinian way, the system selects for people who will thrive in the system.
At most F500+ corporations, the higher up the ladder you go, the more political your job becomes, and consequently, the less directly functional or operative it is. At the highest rungs of the big corporate ladder, you are essentially a politician. And little more. You are tasked with "legislation" the way a Congressman is tasked with such. But you're spending 99% of your time pandering to the base, setting up and maintaining alliances, cheerleading, politicking, and kissing babies.
These skills are derided by those who hate corporate politics, as most of us probably do. But to get to the top, and to manage effectively from the top, you need to play the game and be damned good at it. If not, you'll be out in 6 months -- and even if not, you'll be a lame duck, unable to get a coalition to advance your agenda. This is why, at each rung up the ladder, political skill, social capital, and favor become increasingly important criteria for advancement.
You're expected to get great results, of course -- but the number of people that stand in the way of your input --> your output increases exponentially the higher you climb. Ergo, your job is more about people than it is about the input itself.
This equation isn't going to change so long as the current structure of the public corporation doesn't change. For those of us who dislike it, we need: a) to cultivate specialties or skills we bring to the table that permit us freedom from "the game," or b) to work for startups and smaller companies.
I think it's worth separating two things commonly conflated as "politics." The first is the building of alliances, persuading, and general social skills-based work you mention. That's totally fine and expected-this is the positive form of politics.
The negative form of politics is when a manager's best interests are misaligned with the company or their direct reports. For example, John may not want to promote Bill, his star employee, if it means that Bill will join a different department and Bill's successes will no longer contribute to John's success. So John is incentivized to give his best employees moderate, but not great performance ratings. This is clearly negative for Bill and for the company as a whole.
That's almost correct. What you describe is true for the relationship between CEOs and the board. Or execs and other execs, neither over, nor below them, in the management structure. Those are corporate peers.
For those under your management the relationship is more similar to a military command structure.
Luckily corporate officers can't order you to kill or die. But corporate underlings don't elect their managers. There are many more people being managed, than there are peers.
"But corporate underlings don't elect their managers. There are many more people being managed, than there are peers."
Yes, but. The higher up you go, the higher up a lot of your underlings are, and the more they start to become power brokers in their own right. They report to you, and they will follow orders, but they have their own (strong) agendas, personal and political. Some of them are even rivals, waiting in the wings.
There's a command-and-control structure on a broad level, but the higher you go, the more the pyramid underneath you becomes something like a constituency. (They don't elect you, but they can rebel, they can become unproductive, etc. If you lose their respect, you lose them -- often literally).
This isn't the case in small business. It much more about personality in the smaller business world (I'm talking under 100 employees). And that can land you in the unemployment line too, of course.
I work/part-owner in small firm were we have employees that have been with us since the company was founded (in 1997).
I think it's all about job atmosphere. I'm not saying pay and benefits don't matter. They do. But a few of our longer term employees get offers from much bigger firms all the time, and all of them stay.
We offer a competitive wage, vacation, sick days, medical, retirement plans, etc, - like all the rest. But a small company also offers something that enterprise can't. And that's valuable.
You know, come to think of it, we haven't had anyone quit in like two years. We've fired a couple though. But that's another thread.
> That volatile culture would be fine, if they weren't so stuck up about "job hoppers" in the hiring process.
I've hopped more jobs than anyone I know, and I've never had a single word mentioned about my average time of employment. I don't understand this notion that companies give a damn how long you've been at places, and I know I'm not so lucky as to have avoided it in the last 3 or 4 jobs I've applied for (and gotten).
I think it is highly dependent upon the industry and job.
I've interviewed and hired dozens of other developers and never met one that knew the first thing about the industry we're in. We have a complex suite of products and to get someone up to speed will take investing a not insignificant amount of time. So when I see a large succession of sub-year stints I'm going to ask. I've hired many people who were contractors in the past, or who had issues with past employers, but I'm certainly going to want to know what the issues were so I can be sure they aren't going to have them at our company.
Both employer and employee want to minimize the risk of a quick exit as the hiring/job-seeking cycle is financially and emotionally expensive.
It depends who you work for and where you work. I work for a large aerospace company in the Midwest, and people still routinely work here for life. Many of those who don't stay in the same area, in the same industry, and work for contractors for the same company.
How many did you never hear back from after they looked at your job history?
I.e. how can you know this, unless you get jobs entirely through networking, in which case you're probably bypassing that sort of gatekeeping to begin with?
Most I talk to simply see it as the changing climate of employment, especially in the tech sector. We're all explorers and we like to move from thing to thing. It may just be a product of the industry, but I doubt I'm simply an outlier.
I didn't say I agreed. I just said that that mentality existed. I think long stays in established areas leads to organizational rot and lore accumulation as information and expertise is sunk into an individual (this could be mitigated by migrating around a company every couple years and forcing lore to be written down and documented).
Projects that require large amounts of code stability do make a large amount of effort to be non-dysfunctional and provide appropriate growth opportunities to team members at all stages of their careers. Engineers are often too expensive to simply burn out and discard.
Some colleges just filter people through too many too large classes, and then reduce the curriculum when people aren't doing well. On top of that, most college students are in their late teens/very early 20s and may need to make changes.
In any case, there are bad college programs and nurturing work places. There is nothing wrong with leaving a bad workplace, but there is also nothing wrong at staying at a great one for many many years.
Projects that require large amounts of code stability do make a large amount of effort to be non-dysfunctional and provide appropriate growth opportunities to team members at all stages of their careers.
Shouldn't all projects have code stability? I can't imagine software instability being a good thing ever.
There is nothing wrong with leaving a bad workplace, but there is also nothing wrong at staying at a great one for many many years.
Absolute agreement on that one. I don't want to change jobs every 6 months-- or even every 5 years. I'm sick of that shit. However, I've observed that a large number of employers treat their employee badly and those deserve no loyalty.
People aren't happy, even in places with relatively less politics, favoritism etc - probably because we are trying to optimize for efficiency in everything we do (and maximize short term profits). If we optimized for happiness instead (wherever possible), work places would be a lot better. What is the point in having ruthless efficiency (and huge profits), if no-one is happy?
In 2013, we face a world where management (rarely with competent training in anything other than not getting the company sued) blatantly plays favorites, "teams" sometimes turn on their strongest members, investment in junior peoples' careers is almost nonexistent, and firing is more likely to involve one of those humiliating, dishonest, and impossible "performance improvement plans" than a decent severance check. Imagine what high school would be like if the popular kids graded exams. That's what corporate work is like for most people.
If someone transfers through 5 colleges in 8 years before finally getting a degree, it's pretty clear that something unusual happened. That's a red flag. Colleges make a lot of effort not to be dysfunctional and to make evaluation fair, so it's a real warning sign if someone passes through 3 or 4 and can't succeed. Companies don't. They'd rather sacrifice fairness, decency, and protocol under the belief (perhaps mistaken?) that it makes them more efficient at delivering on projects. That volatile culture would be fine, if they weren't so stuck up about "job hoppers" in the hiring process.
We're not disloyal. We're just honest. Instead of sticking around and sabotaging a company that betrays us (out of fear of a job-hopper stigma, like what our parents faced) we leave. That's better for us and the companies.