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0 pointserulabs2y ago0 comments

I keep seeing this (anecdotally) out if the Midwest. Folks with 4 years experience doing mostly front end work who’ve never deployed anything with the title “staff engineer”.

I sort of feel bad for them because without a large step down in title they’d never get another job. Perhaps that’s the trick - title inflation to mask bad pay?

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3 comments · 1 top-level

richbell2y ago· 2 in thread

That's exactly what it is. Many organizations have strict pay bands and cannot attract talent without overly inflated titles; cue dozens of "directors" with no reports, and people with < 5 years experience being hired as "Staff Engineers" to build web apps.

tuwtuwtuwtuw2y ago

I'm not really following but want to understand.

How does inflating titles help to attract talent?

Do you mean this: let's say they want to hire a senior software engineer, but the salary for this level would not attract any candidates so instead they try to hire a staff engineer?

Mostly trying to understand if this is middle-managers tricking their higher ups or if it's the company trying to trick the candidates.

richbell2y ago

It's the former. Larger companies tend to have strict pay bands relative to the seniority and responsibility of a position. Let's say intern>junior>senior>manager>director>vp.

If the salary range for "senior" is 50-70k, this might be attractive for a customer service rep but not for a senior software developer. Thus, you'll need to inflate the title to be either a manager, director, or staff/prinicple (if HR recognizes that) to be authorized to offer market compensation for a senior software developer.

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