[georgemcbay]

> Rather than vilifying "upper management" and quitting and being bitter about it, can you have a constructive conversation with someone up the chain to help you AND the company out?

While this may theoretically work in some situations and is arguably "worth a shot" for someone with so little to lose, I've seen workplaces similar to the ones the original post is describing and the times I've seen this happen talking things out with management was not fruitful.

In my experience (admittedly anecdotal and a relatively small sample size), in a company that goes sideways as described by OP you have 1-3 levels of manager on top of you who are just as frazzled by the whole situation as you are. They will commiserate, throw their hands in the air and tell you they've tried pushing for changes, realistic release dates and/or hiring more resources and have been denied by levels above them. Talking directly to their managers (VP or perhaps higher at this point) ends up in a pleasant conversation about vague, nebulous reasons why things can't change right now and everyone has to buckle down to help the company toward the brighter future that is right around the corner. They will rarely-to-never give you direct reasons, eg. the company is running out of money and seriously can't afford any extra resources, and the next release is a hail mary attempt to save the business and that's why it needs to be out on date X because the runway is totally gone at X+Y where Y is a laughably small number if you ever actually learn it.