What Does It Take To Get Promoted As An Engineer?

Expectations And Axes

60% of the respondents to my 2022 State Of Data survey aren’t confident they know what is required to get a promotion. This made me re-examine what I know about leveling and skill expectations.

Seriously, what is expected at different levels?

I have found that tech companies will break down what is expected pretty clearly(even if it’s not always followed to a T ). Different levels are based on the axes they find valuable.

This could be based on axes such as the ones stated by Omar Halabieh (Head of Technology at Amazon Payment Services) which were:

• Independence

• Complexity

• Scope

• Ambiguity

• Influence

• Impact

Facebook also had a similar set of axes including impact, direction, scope, people, and engineering excellence. I would say tech companies are in the minority when it comes to having clear axes and expectations (based on discussions I have had). Most people I have talked to find that their promotions in standard enterprise companies are somewhat attached to project deliverables, years of experience, and the hands of fate.

That aside, for this article, I will be focusing on breaking down the expectations at various levels for scope, influence, impact, complexity, and independence.