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This is all very good advice, but I would caution anyone asking the question at the start of the essay that they probably shouldn't be a Staff Eng. Unless you'

This is all very good advice, but I would caution anyone asking the question at the start of the essay that they probably shouldn't be a Staff Eng. Unless you're at a company where that title is simply a rung on the ladder that doesn't have differentiated responsibilities (there are lots of those out there). Every person I've worked with who's been successful as a Staff+ Engineer, promoting them was normally more of a formality since they were already clearly doing the work. Every person I've seen 'rise to their level of incompetence' was striving to get the title/pay bump and looking to 'play the game' to get there. If your motivation for solving people's problems is that it will get you a promotion, instead of the fact that you like solving problems, then it's probably not the right job for you.

sebastos 24d ago
I suspect you might hear a lot of push back on this take, but I for one fully agree. I would go as far as to say that in my workplace, this a nearly inverse relationship between quality of work and how actively that person is thinking about / talking about / acting-as-if-they-are-owed a promotion.
- teiferer 23d ago
  I came here to say exactly this. Thank you. The people in my workplace that I respect the most and that are the most competent are the ones least interested in career politics and promotions. Heck they even often reject management responsibilities. They just want to do good work and management gets that and gets out of their way. In contrast, there is this guy constantly thinking what he could so to make an impression and talks about compensation and RSUs and cliffs and he is stuck where he already was 6 years ago and nobody would consider him for promotion ever.
FridgeSeal 24d ago
I suspect this is partly a function of your organisation. Some places, do not care terribly, about what you _could_ achieve, or they have garbage internal practices which prevent you from doing this work effectively no matter how much you _care_, or maybe they’re just a garbage workplace but you need the job. In these cases, you may as well ruthlessly go-for-the-title, because they’re not going to change, so you may as well get something beneficial while you’re stuck somewhere shitty. Now, if it’s a decent org, which looks after its people, produces a product it cares about, has actual career progression, sure, you can afford to do the work first and earn it properly, but let’s not pretend that’s amazingly common, and attempting to do this, in some places will just get you exploited and burnt out, with no pay or title bump to show for it.
NewsaHackO 23d ago
The issue is stuff like job security and layoffs; it’s easy to not care about what position you have until someone is looking to fire 20% of non staff engineers and suddenly you are afraid of being on the chopping block.
Drew_ 23d ago
In my org, you’re not allowed to do work like this without the title.

sebastos 24d ago

I suspect you might hear a lot of push back on this take, but I for one fully agree. I would go as far as to say that in my workplace, this a nearly inverse relationship between quality of work and how actively that person is thinking about / talking about / acting-as-if-they-are-owed a promotion.

teiferer 23d ago
I came here to say exactly this. Thank you. The people in my workplace that I respect the most and that are the most competent are the ones least interested in career politics and promotions. Heck they even often reject management responsibilities. They just want to do good work and management gets that and gets out of their way. In contrast, there is this guy constantly thinking what he could so to make an impression and talks about compensation and RSUs and cliffs and he is stuck where he already was 6 years ago and nobody would consider him for promotion ever.

FridgeSeal 24d ago

I suspect this is partly a function of your organisation. Some places, do not care terribly, about what you _could_ achieve, or they have garbage internal practices which prevent you from doing this work effectively no matter how much you _care_, or maybe they’re just a garbage workplace but you need the job. In these cases, you may as well ruthlessly go-for-the-title, because they’re not going to change, so you may as well get something beneficial while you’re stuck somewhere shitty. Now, if it’s a decent org, which looks after its people, produces a product it cares about, has actual career progression, sure, you can afford to do the work first and earn it properly, but let’s not pretend that’s amazingly common, and attempting to do this, in some places will just get you exploited and burnt out, with no pay or title bump to show for it.

NewsaHackO 23d ago

The issue is stuff like job security and layoffs; it’s easy to not care about what position you have until someone is looking to fire 20% of non staff engineers and suddenly you are afraid of being on the chopping block.

Drew_ 23d ago

In my org, you’re not allowed to do work like this without the title.