There are too many managers/architects/scrum masters, relatively to the number of people doing the actual work.
Too many non-productiive people leads to a fat company fighting endless covert political games.
The management in the software departments are usually clueless about what defines a good quality work.
Managers mostly get hired externally, from outer-space. They are easy to recognize as they are usually are clueless about technology and never ever dirty their hands with technique.
Thus, most managers can't tell the value of an engineer.
Consequently, as an engineer, if you want a good mid-year review, you'd better lick their boots, and obey.
You can sense their insecurity. This implies low-esteem for engineers ...
There are architects everywhere. Yet, I haven't observed any architectural break-through for a few years.
This is easily explained, as with so much politics, the architects simply cannot take any significant/bold decision.
That would be way too dangerous for them.
There is no point in doing great technical work (software that is easy to maintain and that exposes very very few defects) since the credit will go the the managers/tech leads etc...
Anyway, if you produce work with very few defects, it won't ever be noticed, since there is nothing to fix later on.
It will be taken for granted, and then forgotten. It just works.
There are a few people, obviously, who are recognized for their technical talent, but they're the exceptions.
Great stepping stone, but not a place to build a career if you are a hard-core engineer at heart. It's not a place where hard-working competent engineers can expect to grow.
Great place to be if you:
- are clueless about technology (and peopleware),
- want to be a hand-off manager or certified scrum master that comes from outer-space with a dubious CV,
- dream to spend your time monitoring what technical people do.
