[manigandham]

At all? I don't know what you mean by "underclass" developers but it is common to see many devs who spearhead projects get higher titles and progress faster. There are many such examples just in SV companies.

Part of it is making sure contributions are measured and noticed. People can't act on what they don't know.

[theshadowknows]

I started out at my company building HTML emails. I started seeing places things could get better. Better code base so I built it. More sophisticated tooling and build chain so I built it. Problems with the Econ site so I helped find and fix them. Possible places to integrate and become more efficient so I helped build them. 3 years in, 3 raises (I’ve more than doubled my starting salary) and 3 promotions now I’m a Systems Architect. I recently presented to the owner of our parent company and (feel at least) that I’m valued and make real contributions. I work on big projects and am seen as a leader. So it can happen.

[lukeholder]

That's great and I am in no way diminishing your achievements; but a work of caution for others reading too:

It's most likely that you were severely underpaid in the first place, the raises have just slowly brought you up to industry standard, just spread over 3 years.

Your title increase is also great, but keep in mind, having you feel like you are a leader is also a great retention tool for you to keep working for them, producing good work.

I recommend looking in the marketplace for a new job to really see where you can be in your 4+ years. Don't feel like they have been so good to you that you couldn't increase your salary again by 30% by switching employers.

[theshadowknows]

That’s sobering but good advice. It’s easy to fall into the “hey, they do care” trap just for some more money. Good advice also on looking into other places in the same industry - I’m still 3-5% too low for median!

[CalRobert]

"it is common to see many devs who spearhead projects get higher titles and progress faster"

True, but if we're going with anecdata I'd point out that it's also common to see devs (and managers) who are taller get higher titles and progress faster too. My own experience is that the correlation is at least as strong as that with getting stuff done.

[a_imho]

I mean the blue collars sitting with other developers at lunch. We can pretend there is a meritocracy out there, but that's simply not true.

Sure, in theory it might be possible to progress as a developer but in practice the roi of putting in enormous effort is simply laughable compared to the alternatives. A few percent raise realistically. Getting to the top? Not a chance.

[manigandham]

Blue collar (in the US) refers to manual labor positions, not software developers.

There are a rare few who are extremely talented and productive individual contributors but most are not, so try to maximize output by working with others. Even small teams have managed to make big impacts in massive companies so I reject the notion that you can't do anything.

But regardless, many people have gotten very high up in many organizations through persistence and patience. It's not easy, and each level will get harder because you have more intense competition for fewer slots, but saying "not a chance" goes directly against the fact that many have done just that.

[village-idiot]

It’s absolutely not a true meritocracy, that’s true.

But if you’re claiming that individual contributor devs never get promoted for good work, that’s just clearly and utterly wrong.

[a_imho]

I claim no one gets to the top for being a hard working developer.

Also claim quality engineering is only loosely correlated with advancement, it is one of the less efficient ways to secure a promotion/raise. In fact, managers often have no idea who is doing a good job.

[village-idiot]

As an absolute statement that is factually incorrect. My former CTO started as a senior developer at the company 16 years ago.

If you want to make the weaker statement that growing from engineer to CTO almost never happens, you’re going to need statistics.

Realistically, humans are mortal and C suite types are made, not born. While not every engineer will become a CXO just due to disparity in job openings, someone needs to be promoted to take the CXO jobs once the previous crop has aged out of the work force. Some of them will be advanced because they’re good workers, others because they’re good at politics. You’ll need some statistics to back up any claim about what percentage are good workers and what percentage are politicians in business clothing.

[manigandham]

You can't get to the top doing the same job. The responsibilities change. There is no CTO who is a day-to-day developer in any sizable organization. The higher you go, the wider the impact.

Some people don't want that change and are happy where they're at. Others cant make that change. But that's what it takes. You can definitely climb the levels by excelling at what you at that particular level. If you still disagree then I would point to the generations of millions of immigrant families that arrived with nothing and earned their way to the top primarily through raw technical merit.

And yes, as stated, impact needs to be measured to be judged. If you do something that nobody knows about, then there's not much you can say.

[C1sc0cat]

By definition developers etc are "professional" grades.

Unfortunately those who are the first in their family to go to uni and go into a professional job don't always get the support and informal knowledge passed to them.

One example would be read a proper newspaper - I can recall when being asked which newspaper you read was a common interview Q in the UK