Half of me wishes we just got rid of titles and just adjusted pay based on the value perceived/demonstrated to the company YoY. People would probably be more inclined to work harder and on more challenging stuff if their comp was more outcome driven like a sales type role.
Incentives make people do the weirdest stuff. It becomes pure politics at a certain point and largely a cool kids club of who you know to sponsor you and being generally well-liked. I'm not going to kiss ass for a title. I'm going to demonstrate I earned it the hard way. While most companies don't recognize that path as much anymore, it's not very hard to get the title at another company.
The people who bring the most value to each team are often the unsung heroes who don't get promoted fast either. Good leaders will take notice however.
The book "Staff Engineer" by Will Larson has some good bits on this topic.
Incentives make people do the weirdest stuff. It becomes pure politics at a certain point and largely a cool kids club of who you know to sponsor you and being generally well-liked. I'm not going to kiss ass for a title. I'm going to demonstrate I earned it the hard way. While most companies don't recognize that path as much anymore, it's not very hard to get the title at another company.
The people who bring the most value to each team are often the unsung heroes who don't get promoted fast either. Good leaders will take notice however.
The book "Staff Engineer" by Will Larson has some good bits on this topic.