IT/Software career thread: Invert binary trees for dollars.

Noodleface · Saturday at 6:05 PM

TJT said:
Okay boys. I got another job offer for a job I think I want. The offer is for a staff role in their data platform org. Its a rapidly growing company at $2B ARR. They are more mature in data organization but a bit behind on the tooling I prefer. This is because I had total control of data infra at my current place, or at least de facto control. I've tried to get the company to adopt the strategy of getting technically proficient data people in their business teams for years with limited success.

This company hires "analytics engineers" directly to work in that slice of the business as this is ultimately much more efficient. This is a very hard conversation to have with business teams as they never understand that value and just go with the cheaper fresh grad data analyst because he's 1/3 the price of an AE. Perpetuating the same problems. They are technically behind where I've led my current company in various ways but their org is larger and they want to update so I get it.

Having a bit of a dilemma choosing though so I am spending the weekend deliberating on it. I would appreciate any and all ridicule, insults, and maybe a kernel of decent advice you are willing to provide.

I main concern is that I am trading 7 years of seniority I enjoy and de facto total control of data infrastructure to start greenfield once again. Albeit in a much more senior role and about $50k more in income. Income being the least of reasons to take the job. I have been promoted 4 times in 7 years at my current company and I would inevitably get promoted again as we ride to $1B in revenue (prob 3 years away, maybe 4).

I am not getting any younger and I have always known my current place underpays a bit relative to the market and I never really cared. I still don't care about that. So I am looking at tradeoffs.

Current:

De Facto ownership of entire data platform.

Lots of seniority and tenure I enjoy.

SAAS company. Strong product, I would recommend it to anyone in the space it occupies.

Free to experiment with whatever and include whatever (within $ reason of course).

Awesome company, I have always loved working here.

Would be promoted again eventually.

Org is slow to adopt data modernization as described above.

Real Time data processing not necessary for the business side (I researched this for them for several years and despite their OMG REAL TIME, it had almost no impact on the business itself. It only mattered to keep the product itself functioning well).

New:

Behind on the tech a little bit, but recognize the things I have been doing recently as where they want to go.

Ahead on the organizational strategy for the company.

Very rapid growth.

SAAS/Standard service company kind of hybrid thing. Interesting product I see their value to real world stuff. Logistics company.

Real time data processing is integral for both the product and running the business itself which interests me from a technical perspective.

I explicitly asked about growth in the org and they were very direct about it (unless lying to me I guess) they wanted someone who can mentor and lead the org some which is the direction I want to go. As I am almost 40 (god damn).

I'll have to go to the office 2x a week but I am actually grateful for that as I have been WFH for 5 years now and even I need to get out of the house a bit more. As introverted as I may be.

Sounds to me like youre holding being "in charge of things" in high regard. As someone in a similar position in my company, I do feel quite comfortable. But lately I've been looking outward a bit because it also gets tiring.

IMO I'd move to the new company. It's guaranteed higher wage, seems to be moving more in the direction you'd want and if there's rapid growth probably much quicker. If you were older it'd be easier to persuade you against this, but at 40 you have plenty of time to correct your course if this doesn't pan out.

$50k is nothing to sneeze at either. Even if you're very comfortable now, I imagine +$50k can get you to retirement much faster.

Neranja · 2026-03-08T07:01:56-0400

Sadly, I think I am slowly seeing the end of the line at my current company. It's not that the work sucks or isn't interesting, it's that the company decided to reorganize the whole structure to optimize for their biggest client.

And clearly they have no idea where to put me, because in my boss' words "you know everything and have your fingers in everything". And now I am suddenly saddled with not only my boss, but also a "service manager" for that client that wants to play boss, and is now constantly talking and having meetings about how we "organize our work" with Jira, Kanban boards and SCRUM... when I'm working less than 20% for that client.

I guess I'll have to have a very difficult conversation, or update my CV. Probably both.

moonarchia · 2026-03-08T18:09:16-0400

Neranja said:
Sadly, I think I am slowly seeing the end of the line at my current company. It's not that the work sucks or isn't interesting, it's that the company decided to reorganize the whole structure to optimize for their biggest client.

And clearly they have no idea where to put me, because in my boss' words "you know everything and have your fingers in everything". And now I am suddenly saddled with not only my boss, but also a "service manager" for that client that wants to play boss, and is now constantly talking and having meetings about how we "organize our work" with Jira, Kanban boards and SCRUM... when I'm working less than 20% for that client.

I guess I'll have to have a very difficult conversation, or update my CV. Probably both.

Good luck!

Haus · 2026-03-09T00:23:41-0400

I'm in a situation right now that sounds like a ton of the conversation here.

I'm in a job I know I could coast at probably for a good while, at least a few years, and be close enough to call it a career and do part time and consulting until official "retirement."

But it's basically draining my will to live. I had an opportunity here to get into a mentorship/training role basically shaping kids we were getting fresh out of college, even asked to apply for it by the director of the group. Only for him to come back and tell me that he was made aware that one of my peers that was also going for the position and was pretty neck and neck with me for it was going to get RIF'd if he didn't land this position and the director didn't want to be responsible for him being jobless.

I know the guy in question, he is a good guy, and I wouldn't want him to be jobless either. Just sucks that it was one of maybe 2 roles in the org I can see myself actually enjoying moving forward because the changes they've made to my role are not working out well for any of us in the role (a huge chunk have left, and everybody else it seems like is actively interviewing).

Which brings me around to a conversation I had with one of my younger co workers Friday. Our company is his first job in CyberSecurity, I've been trying to be the "old seasoned fart on the hill" for him, and he told me he needed some "Consult with Yoda time". Then fires off "When should I start listening to the recruiters who have been reaching out to me?" And I told him that being in his 20's if there is a good time to get aggressive and take some (well considered) chances now was the time. Even reflected to him how I probably lost 10 prime earning years when I was younger because I was content and "comfortable" in a job which wasn't treating me right.

Since that conversation I've been trying to justify telling him that while I'm grinding away by just saying "Well, he isn't in his 50's and obviously at the tail end of act 2 of his life". But part of me is calling BS in my head over it.

Control · 2026-03-09T01:41:34-0400

Haus said:
Since that conversation I've been trying to justify telling him that while I'm grinding away by just saying "Well, he isn't in his 50's and obviously at the tail end of act 2 of his life". But part of me is calling BS in my head over it.

Eh, if I tell someone exercise is good for them, it doesn't stop being true just because I'm fat.

TJT · 2026-03-09T06:01:29-0400

Going to talk to my manager today and see what happens. I am willing to stay, maybe. I am bad at self-advocacy in general. For the last promotion I got to staff engineer my old manager (who has since left the company and wasn't my manager at the time) had to goad me into asking for a promotion because it honestly never occurred to me to just ask for one myself. I asked and received. I don't mind negotiating and planning and so on but I am generally terrible at office politics for a variety of reasons. Biggest one being my natural bluntness and abrasive personality that people take the wrong way. The other being my total inability to bootlick for any reason. Not even a little.

For those who remember when my old manager was fired I was unable to capitalize on it despite the CIO asking if I wanted to be the manager. I even said yeah I was up to it but it didn't happen for whatever reason. Not sure how I fucked that one up entirely.

After analyzing the situation here I have built the entire data platform from nothing in my 7 years here. They had a half-assed contractor solution that I tore down in 2019 and have since replaced the entire ecosystem. But while that has been really cool and I am proud of what I have accomplished and my latest feats were creating our FEDRAMP solution from nothing (which wasn't that interesting after all of the architecture hurdles were sorted that out TBH) and another company acquisition. The 4th one I have done since I have been here. So its just another day ending in Y at this point.

I benefitted greatly from understanding end to end every single business process the company operates on and how it interacts with all systems. As nobody had spent more time digging through all of our systems than me. Recently this led to my inclusion in product development as I have de facto owned all telemetry of the actual product we sell for like 5 years. Used both internally and externally. Simply because as a small company someone had to do it and the product dev team itself was so focused on growth they sidelined it entirely. So I had inadvertently created the company's billing and metering systems. This led to my indirect support of other customer facing data services we have.

All this to say I don't know what technical hurdles there are left to solve. My team hasn't expanded, we are only 3 stateside, 2 in India, and a manager. I am wrangling 6 contractors right now for this acquisition but I don't really see our org expanding. Leaving me to ponder where I would be in a few years.

The biggest reasons for this after thinking about it are that the org as a whole simply is not geared to leveraging a true data platform. So all of my improvements are good and all but they get no surface area in the company and nobody really knows they're there. The big reason for this is that its always cheaper to hire generic analysts than technically minded ones. I get that this kind of data literacy is very slow to change C-Suite opinions on because an analytics engineer on the Customer Service team is a $130k+ salary you have to justify that doesn't actually do any Customer Service work. So I get it, I do. We have moved to the point of hiring analysts who can read SQL, which is a massive step forward I know.

All that to say where would my trajectory take me staying here? Knowing the organization challenges that exist. I know it would be a slow grind, I get that and I can tolerate it. I know that this company pays a little under the market rate and I have always known that. But I absolutely love the company culture and everything despite all of that so I stuck around.

Thank you for reading the ramblings of a retard. Meeting him later this morning so we'll see what happens. I am a little excited.

TomServo · 2026-03-09T09:13:10-0400

TJT said:
Going to talk to my manager today and see what happens. I am willing to stay, maybe. I am bad at self-advocacy in general. For the last promotion I got to staff engineer my old manager (who has since left the company and wasn't my manager at the time) had to goad me into asking for a promotion because it honestly never occurred to me to just ask for one myself. I asked and received. I don't mind negotiating and planning and so on but I am generally terrible at office politics for a variety of reasons. Biggest one being my natural bluntness and abrasive personality that people take the wrong way. The other being my total inability to bootlick for any reason. Not even a little.

For those who remember when my old manager was fired I was unable to capitalize on it despite the CIO asking if I wanted to be the manager. I even said yeah I was up to it but it didn't happen for whatever reason. Not sure how I fucked that one up entirely.

After analyzing the situation here I have built the entire data platform from nothing in my 7 years here. They had a half-assed contractor solution that I tore down in 2019 and have since replaced the entire ecosystem. But while that has been really cool and I am proud of what I have accomplished and my latest feats were creating our FEDRAMP solution from nothing (which wasn't that interesting after all of the architecture hurdles were sorted that out TBH) and another company acquisition. The 4th one I have done since I have been here. So its just another day ending in Y at this point.

I benefitted greatly from understanding end to end every single business process the company operates on and how it interacts with all systems. As nobody had spent more time digging through all of our systems than me. Recently this led to my inclusion in product development as I have de facto owned all telemetry of the actual product we sell for like 5 years. Used both internally and externally. Simply because as a small company someone had to do it and the product dev team itself was so focused on growth they sidelined it entirely. So I had inadvertently created the company's billing and metering systems. This led to my indirect support of other customer facing data services we have.

All this to say I don't know what technical hurdles there are left to solve. My team hasn't expanded, we are only 3 stateside, 2 in India, and a manager. I am wrangling 6 contractors right now for this acquisition but I don't really see our org expanding. Leaving me to ponder where I would be in a few years.

The biggest reasons for this after thinking about it are that the org as a whole simply is not geared to leveraging a true data platform. So all of my improvements are good and all but they get no surface area in the company and nobody really knows they're there. The big reason for this is that its always cheaper to hire generic analysts than technically minded ones. I get that this kind of data literacy is very slow to change C-Suite opinions on because an analytics engineer on the Customer Service team is a $130k+ salary you have to justify that doesn't actually do any Customer Service work. So I get it, I do. We have moved to the point of hiring analysts who can read SQL, which is a massive step forward I know.

All that to say where would my trajectory take me staying here? Knowing the organization challenges that exist. I know it would be a slow grind, I get that and I can tolerate it. I know that this company pays a little under the market rate and I have always known that. But I absolutely love the company culture and everything despite all of that so I stuck around.

Thank you for reading the ramblings of a retard. Meeting him later this morning so we'll see what happens. I am a little excited.

I'm praying the best for you man. I hope our collective trauma has informed your opinion! joking aside, you know best and are a smart dude. I used to be much more like you 10 years ago. Blunt, driven and it cost me jobs and promotions a shit ton. I had to do alot of reflecting on it personally for my reasons why. Managed to cross that bridge and turn that same truthfulness into a more palatable delivery and holy fuck its like the same people now see it as a favor. lolz

Deathwing · 2026-03-09T12:53:59-0400

Annual review today. Got a small bonus, no raise. Instead, compensated with European-amount of vacation days. Approximately 5 weeks.

I can't remember the last time I spent the entirety of my vacation nor sick days.

TJT · 2026-03-09T13:43:53-0400

It went okay. My director called me a 10X engineer which surprised me I guess. I know it'll be hard to replace me so I feel for him there. But I asked what I could expect to happen in the next few years and my analysis was pretty much correct. Expansion is unlikely on the team but he thought I could make Principal by 2027.

Not really a compelling reason to stay as the org is much larger at this new place and they have had insane growth in their industry. I see a lot of potential there. He said he would try for a counteroffer but just not sure I want to do that again, the last time I did get a counteroffer I really wanted to stay. This time I don't want to stay but I do love the company still.

Khane · 2026-03-09T15:02:11-0400

Titles past senior are completely meaningless unless you plan on working at very large corporations where HR controls everything, including pay bands, and bases it entirely on arbitrary metrics that allow you to be "deemed" level 4 or level 5 or staff or principal.

I would let that lead you honestly. I'm an engineer 4 at my current company despite having both an architect and team lead title at this very company previously, because of regime changes. I also make more money than almost all of the staff and principal titles here.

moonarchia · 2026-03-09T16:10:51-0400

Khane said:
Titles past senior are completely meaningless unless you plan on working at very large corporations where HR controls everything, including pay bands, and bases it entirely on arbitrary metrics that allow you to be "deemed" level 4 or level 5 or staff or principal.

I would let that lead you honestly. I'm an engineer 4 at my current company despite having both an architect and team lead title at this very company previously, because of regime changes. I also make more money than almost all of the staff and principal titles here.

Yup. Never care about titles, just the pay scale. You can call me Bitch Tits if you are paying me 6 figures to keep servers and circuits working.

Noodleface · 2026-03-09T17:40:33-0400

Deathwing said:
Annual review today. Got a small bonus, no raise. Instead, compensated with European-amount of vacation days. Approximately 5 weeks.

I can't remember the last time I spent the entirety of my vacation nor sick days.

Take your vacations dude, what are you doing

Deathwing · 2026-03-09T17:48:24-0400

Noodleface said:
Take your vacations dude, what are you doing

It's not that I don't take vacation, it's those singular days off never get entered because I'm almost always 50+ hours a week.

fred sanford · 2026-03-09T18:36:27-0400

moonarchia said:
Yup. Never care about titles, just the pay scale. You can call me Bitch Tits if you are paying me 6 figures to keep servers and circuits working.

I’ve been telling my boss for years that I don’t care about titles or shifts in my duties. I usually end my spiel with “I’ll clean the bathroom if you pay me enough”

Cad · 2026-03-09T18:38:29-0400

Deathwing said:
It's not that I don't take vacation, it's those singular days off never get entered because I'm almost always 50+ hours a week.

Do you not take planned time off like 5+ days?

It's really important to get away from work and de-stress.

Deathwing · 2026-03-09T18:41:07-0400

Cad said:
Do you not take planned time off like 5+ days?

It's really important to get away from work and de-stress.

Yep, Christmas, Thanksgiving, maybe one other week. With the previous years leftover days rolling over, I almost always have 5+ days unused.

TJT · 2026-03-09T18:45:46-0400

Khane said:
Titles past senior are completely meaningless unless you plan on working at very large corporations where HR controls everything, including pay bands, and bases it entirely on arbitrary metrics that allow you to be "deemed" level 4 or level 5 or staff or principal.

I would let that lead you honestly. I'm an engineer 4 at my current company despite having both an architect and team lead title at this very company previously, because of regime changes. I also make more money than almost all of the staff and principal titles here.

I absolutely agree titles are meaningless. But they are market signals no matter what so having them is actually worth money. It just is what it is.

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IT/Software career thread: Invert binary trees for dollars.

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Control

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TJT

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