Why I kept my startup job for seven years (and counting) | nicole@web

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2024-07-08 12:00:05

Software engineers typically don't stay anywhere for very long. If you're not moving, you're losing out on opportunities1. And yet, I've made the choice to join and stay at one company for seven years. That's more than half my career to date. Why did I do that? And would I do it again?

When I look at why people typically change jobs, it's very clear why I've stayed at this particular company. I don't think I'd have a better job anywhere else.

Here's what we've done to build that department such that I didn't want to leave, and so that few people do leave the company: our turnover has been remarkably low for a software company, especially one hiring very good engineers2.

I've not set salaries, since my one stint of management still had my direct reports formally reporting to our VP for compensation purposes. But I've played the Salary Game3 with coworkers past and present, and I've had deep discussions with my various bosses about compensation strategy. Unlike many companies, we understood from the early days that if you don't raise salaries as market conditions change, many of them will leave for those other roles4. For me, while the pay isn't what I'd get at a big tech company, it's always been enough that pay wouldn't be a driving factor for me to leave.

The same is true with promotions. It frustrates me to no end that at many companies, the best way to get promoted from mid to senior, from senior to staff, etc. is to change companies. You've build all the knowledge already at your current role, and that knowledge walks out the metaphorical remote-work door when your employee shuts her laptop for last time. All because another company recognizes that yes, she is a senior software engineer now, and yours didn't.