[giantg2]

I agree. Firing is at least more honest (or there's a lawsuit if it isn't). Being pushed out sucks. I know because it's happening to me right now for bullshit reasons (the complaint is that my throughput is inconsistent but yet my average throughput is better than the other dev of my level on the team, and I'm involved in more above and beyond work). Being pushed out is very stressful and has negative mental and physical effects, especially if you have specific disabilities (I do).

[steveBK123]

Exactly. I usually don't stick around when a team enters that phase, but sometimes it takes a 6-12 months to exit.

I've been on teams where management very clearly tries to do a good team/bad team split.

This looks like hiring some space cadets to build the "strategic solution" that will magically fix every problem with the existing system (despite being managed by the same senior management).

The existing team is told to just keep the lights on / the new thing is going to be so much better / just give it another year or five.

There's not a lot of upside to staying around because you either end up fired at the end if the space cadets succeed, or if the space cadets fail you end up holding the bag of rescuing them in X years post strategic platform failure. And sometimes a secret third thing - the company being run this poorly ends up having to do RIFs and you end up fired randomly anyway.