[lucumo]

Over here it's mostly just the tech companies that do Staff+ titling.

The oher big organizations, home-grown agencies and similar, usually go from junior and medior to senior. Juniors aren't hired, because "what we do is too complex for them".

After senior you sometimes have an architect role, and sometimes even a senior architect, but that's about it for ICs. Architects are generally not expected to code, or even know how to code. It's more about landscapes of applications.

In practice, senior engineer is a terminal level, though I don't think these companies ever really made a considered choice regarding terminal levels. Up or out would run into problems with employment law very quickly after two years, so it's not a policy that will work well here.

People looking for raises can get them. There's a band for salaries and people can get a few percent raise for performance. Always too little of course. In general, once you reach the end of senior you can eiter do lead or management functions, or do the architect thing, or leave to be a rent-a-dev. Though employment law has recently made that last one harder, due to union pressure.