¬ just serendipity 🍀 (not just serendipity)

Original article: Growth at BigTech.

I used to work in the same company as the author of the post¹, and yet I followed a completely different approach than him.

Do I have credibility? You don’t have to take my word for granted, and you should make your own conclusions. The only transparency bit I’ll reveal is that I got promoted from Junior (L3) to Mid (L4) within 1.5 year, and from Mid to Senior (L5) within 2 years i.e. 3.5 years total to become Senior. Enough humblebragging boasting already, let’s do a rebuttal of the post. Just one disclaimer: although it’s framed as a rebuttal, it’s important to acknowledge that no two experiences are the same, and two truths can be simultaneously valid.

Become the person everyone in my working radius knows.

This is important, but only if you’re well-known for good things™. Sometimes it’s better to stay in the shadow. That said, there’s virtually no downside to being well-known if your impact is generally and non-controversially positive.

Learn how a big org works, and learn to be effective in them.

This is very important. Knowledge is power. Everything is a game. Sometimes (not always, but oftentimes) the game is political. Learning the rules of engagement of the game can only bring clarity and perspective to making one play the game more effectively.

Eventually be in the room that leaders make decisions.

This is important if you’re Senior+. As a Junior or as a Mid Engineer, I would argue, this is actually worse. Engaging in politics in an early career phase is disastrous, it’s the kind of behavior that quickly degrades one’s motivation and/or enthusiasm and/or passion² for building / evolving the product.

here’s what I learned you need: Visibility. Visibility Visibility.

Again, more visibility is better than less (or no) visibility, but only when the visibility is good. This point is debatable.

Be where leaders are.

I don’t see the point. Again, staying away from politics is important to maintain enthusiasm, especially during early years. If you chase leaders (too) soon, you’ll be dragged down in the sea of despair. I believe this is good advice only when you’re Senior+.

Look where leaders are looking. Don’t work on things you think are important. Don’t work on things your users think are important. Work on things leadership thinks are important.

This is where our paths (significantly) diverge. There are two schools of thought: one is to appeal directly to those who have the powers to promote you; the other one is to do what’s best for your personal growth, aligned with your interests, whilst keeping in mind the prioritization and direction of the project you’re working on. Following the former route is akin to applying the advice from 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. Following the latter is akin to following It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work by David Heinemeier Hansson and Jason Fried.

I feel my opinion on the matter is quite clear. Nonetheless, it’s still crucial to do something useful. Moving the needle in the right direction every day (or even every hour³!) is a great way to stay in touch with reality.

Sound the alarm bells, often.

Create a problem, become the hero.

If you think there’s an important thing that needs to be solved, DON’T do it silently. Make it a priority. Get leadership on board.

And only then come in and save the day.

Oh no, please don’t.

Sounding alarm bells often is good e.g. in the form of filing tickets / reporting bugs frequently. Very few people have the enthusiasm to do so. Being one of them makes you stand out, full stop. Investing in ways to make it easier and quicker to report high-quality bugs is worthwhile.

Now, if you happen to tackle these very same bugs, that gives you visibility. Good visibility. And good visibility is great!

Don’t create problems though. Don’t be a hero. In fact: go/no-heroes⁴.

Regarding silence: In general, not every single issue one resolves needs to be echoed everywhere. This is often perceived as bragging, which is not great. It’s important to keep your manager well-informed (e.g. during weekly 1:1s, and/or in a document that accumulates all your accomplishments). And it’s a good idea to have your teammates and close leadership aware of your strengths and overall accomplishments. That said, sometimes impact is realized in a bigger fashion when accomplishments are done in the shadows.

It isn’t your work — it’s the perception of your work that’s important.

We are all humans. This is one of our cognitive biases. Can’t disagree with that statement.

Work with as many people as possible.

I must digress. Quality triumphs quantity. Exceptions: 20% projects, citizenship initiatives like readability review, mentoring, tech talks, etc. For core work, this is not important.

The more people support you, the higher your chances that you’re able to pull your weight in getting things done.

Unless you play a political role or something that involves elections or a popularity contest, having lots of people supporting you doesn’t really matter. Nevertheless, having the right / important people support you does.

Have a highly capable manager, who is great at representing you.

1000x agreed. To this date, I am grateful (and lucky⁵!) to always have had great managers. This makes a huge difference.

This means they understand what you do thoroughly, and they’re a great salesperson. Your manager represents you during promotion committee rounds where they convince others why you have to get promoted. If your manager isn’t a great salesperson, you have to make sure others know you.

+1.

Getting promoted at BigTech is one of those areas in life that isn’t based on merit.

Hard work ≠ reward. The “smart work” that actually gets you promoted isn’t about pushing your project forward; it’s about pushing yourself forward.

s/BigTech/Tech

Or, even: s/BigTech/any company whatsoever

The only bit I’ll add: motivation / passion / enthusiasm does matter, and makes a huge difference. That’s a topic for another post though.