The bright future is waiting

The future of engineers in TAC is the same as the future of engineers in any other group:

Begrudgingly get promoted up to GL 10 - 11 with multiple years in between.
Do the best they can to keep you pigeon holed into a specific technology hoping you will ride it down the tubes so they don't have to replace you and train a new person.
As product revenues fall with the corresponding service revenue slowly weed out the more expensive older employees.
At some point just axe the group you are in entirely and let you scramble to find a new position or ignore you as you walk out the door.

This is a repost from @LUmw7hP-3ypq , OP nailed it.

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Cisco has unique problems, but the OP's bullet points don't get to any of them. The realities:

1) Cisco has TLs coming out of their ears and most are not capable of performing at that level. Even the extremely good at most companies won't be making jumps to both Senior and Principal Engineer (what Grades 10 and 11 would be at other companies) in units less than years.

2) As the old joke goes, "I lost my contact lens over there but I'm looking for it here because the light is better." Cisco manages by automated dashboards which use data that is easy to collect, not data which is useful. This combined with incompetence are far more in control of your destiny than any master plan to harm the employees.

3) This just demonstrates an inability to understand capitalism.

4) I'm guessing none of you have ever known anyone at some of the larger defense contractors which would routinely lay off groups for days or weeks between projects rather than invest in training during the short down times, or people at commercial competitors like the original HP which would have 5-10% pay cuts on top of everything else. Think of it as a self selecting process - if you really were "that good" you would have seen the final outcome early enough to transition ahead of it.

Definitely resist you moving on in technology because the young'ens don't want to touch it.

Nicely beg you to nurse the product into the twilight, with nudge, nudge offers about the next steps.

Then outsource it to Aricent and LR the loyal follower as soon as the last TOI is done.

Seen it many times here...

Thread regarding Cisco Systems Inc. layoffs

The bright future is waiting

2 replies (most recent on top)

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