In the case of the latter, make sure you have the goods, because your manager now must show his/her hand on whether s/he values you. Strong operations professional with a Master's Degree focused in Project Management from Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto . You are employed by Microsoft's shareholders. This is all well and good, but in 9years I've never worked in a group with a Senior IC (Windows, IE, .NET), though some architects. Facebook, Go to company page And how do you represent yourself as a leader and influencer when you are in a room with 6 other people vying for the exact same thing? Oracle. B.Sc in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics, M.Sc in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics, PhD in Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Electronics, Designing and implementing Software and Hardware Systems, Benchmarking and validating Software and Hardware Systems, Developing innovative solutions and publish papers and patents, Managing teams and keep track of progress, Predicting market trends, identifying market risks, Identifying future opportunities, preparing company roadmap. And to your skip level. No, L7 is 66-67. And we have the budget for it. The Job titles for this position are: Software Development Engineer SDE As for my own history, successful strategies have followed 3 major buckets:From 59 --> 62 (I started as a 10 in the old system) I simply kicked ass and took no prisoners. "2) Peel the onion. When she finally left the company four years ago things improved greatly. Aspects of an L63 Contributor: some random aspects that come to my mind beyond our CSPs: When I write all of this, I think back to an older piece by Joel Spolsky talking about Rosh Gadol contributors. We've negotiated thousands of offers and regularly achieve $30k+ (sometimes $300k+) increases. Unless you know for sure that your boss's answer is an immediate "Absolutely!" The scope imcreases, the risk increases and the visbility increases. Google Senior Software Engineer Salary: No Limit for a Few You will not know the difference.Steve Steve Steve given the state of the company, are you sure you don't have anything else more urgent to do? Satya Nadella. PROFESSIONAL SKILLS & HIGHLIGHTS OF QUALIFICATIONS Over 20+ years of experience working in large-scale real-time corporate environments Able to communicate concepts and details to clients, development team and testing team Excellent organization and communication skills, both written and verbal: clear and concise Knowledge of computer development software across multiple platforms . the higher you go, the bigger deal this is - at least to where i have gotten.Finally, not everybody will be good in every role. Therefore, you are an HR manager. agree with positive suggestions here. Here is a nice place to start :-)http://guestgame.com/. Microsoft Jobs and Salary Information | Ladders. Microsoft Director level role - Level 66 - what should I expect from COMP sideYOE-15Current TC- 235k Contributed and exceeded in two roles - getting G-Star, then moved to another team with clear headroom and again, exceeded all commits and moved to L64. For instance, software development engineers generally come in at Level 59,. Most are management types whose only skill is sucking up. Could be principal engineer, principal engineering manager, could even be director depending on the org. Think of the guy in the other company, the guy who is building something that competes with you, with your team. They have commitments to grow their employees. Levels at Microsoft - Blind Got two promotions - still level 60If you really got promoted twice then you would have advanced 2 levels.Either you didn't actually get promoted, or someone told you lies. Its nice to see constructive advice and stories from everyone.I'm in the 61 bucket and currently struggling with my team for many months. Lots of groundwork, considerable drama and leverage but eventually it got done. After all, if you think you are already ready, and your manager doesn't, there is probably some way you can improve that you don't understand -- this is something you want to figure out.6. Two years ago I realized that the MS treadmill (trying to become what my dysfunctional manager wanted) was making me nuts. Candidates should have a Ph.D. in Physics and a strong commitment to undergraduate education. The skip level is totally nonchalant to her ways. Help Your Manager (and your team) Be Successful: No one has more influence over whether you get promoted than your immediate mgr. Incompetent People Really Have No Clue: If youre one of the people complaing about how youre not getting promoted because your mgr is incompetent and youre just as good as all those others who got promoted you could be right. That is, its hard to define, but I know it when I see it. Eng, Go to company page Same here. You dont have the same experience or abilities to perform in a core STB senior level role. Is there any way to get to 63 w/o leaving and coming back? YES, there are people who've been promoted due to politics. I think it's safe to say that I "own" the group of people under L63 in my group, but I usually take that as an opportunity for mentorship as opposed to an opportunity to poach someone else's cool project. Christof Wascher, MBA, M.Sc. - Senior Director, Industry - LinkedIn I say this because I have seen really smart people shunned because of 'house-on-fire' attitudes even when they were dead right. One could easily sack 4000 heads at HQ and R&D nor revenue would take a hit. I was an asshole, but I was better than my peers at getting shit done -- I was a PM in DevDiv at the time. Let's apply that stick to cronyism and punishment based management practicies. Write it down in a team-culture career section you keep in OneNote (start that section now if you don't have it). MSFT | Microsoft Corp. Company Profile & Executives - WSJ The details in front of you are just details. And don't beleive your boss if they say otherwise. While I lost a few people who drove great results in that level, overall it was good for their career and also MS over time. That is a great post Mini. but I have to disagree with this statement.While it is true that it is difficult for managers to say what *exactly* an employee should do to get to the next level, it *should not* be impossible to list what experiences/qualities/results will qualify him to be a *strong* candidate for promotion to the next level.And this should not be that difficult - it is just a matter of syncing up with the peer leads, and dev manager, and discussing what their perception of an L63 is vs l62. How do you get the right job/work that will make the impact. Repeat. Senior->principal->partner are the level bands, 63/64->65/66/67, 68/69/70. Wish I this post and comments laminated about 10 years ago after I wasn't going to get rich off stock.My comment to add is to those who are put into situations of continual reorgs and want to achieve the 'Senior'. That means, know what people think about you and what they don't. I've seen L65's who can't own a cardboard box, let alone a room. "We have a stable and relatively easy job, and as long as we achieve, we will not get fired." .css-1uhsr4o{margin-right:8px;}Get Paid, Not Played. He himself is principal for quite sometime. Feedback is not detailed or actionable. My promotion to 63 came not when I helped my group out of one of their many nightmares but when I helped an uncle. Will some new person to the team who shows high growth potential push you aside even though you've been doing really solid work for years?Sometimes I wish it worked like an experience bar in a video game where you can clearly see when you will "ding". If it is "Absolutely!" So, for those of you who are in orgs where it's 'easy' to get to L63 or L64 - think about transferring out BEFORE you get too high a level and paint yourself into a corner. great post mini. Despite the fact you may be totally right, you can inadvertently be viewed as a negative person.Although your bosses are probably aware of the problems, they might be overwhelmed by the scope of the situation, and start getting annoyed at you for being the person always reminding them about the flaws. Sometimes leaving MS is good. But on balance mgrs at MS get things right a lot more often than they get them wrong or we wouldnt be one of the most highly capitalized companies in the history of biz. If it does, are you demonstrating success at that next level already and do people know about it? But it's no guarantee that all your peers will match. That is the guy to beat. Weirder sh*t has happened before. "I'm in the 61 bucket and currently struggling with my team for many months. 83,000+ Senior Director jobs in United States (6,036 new) - LinkedIn People who get stuck at the plateau are often referred to as disillusioned learners. Wonderful. Therefore, our need for people who can collaborate across their own team, across disciplines, across org boundaries is greater than ever before. I came in at L61 2+ years ago. If you want to succeed at Microsoft (or anywhere else where you have a boss), the most important thing you can do is figure out exactly what your management wants from you and then make sure you deliver it in spades.Junior people often make the mistake of thinking this means "I will do my job to the best of my ability" and then they go off and work really REALLY hard at things their management doesn't find nearly as important as they do and so come review time these folks are *shocked* to hear that all of their blood, sweat and tears did not make the impression they'd hoped. At Microsoft, the levels start at 59 and go beyond 80. It's a $1,000-per-minute conversation - you should always have those. This is where I agree with Mini regarding taking MSFT back to the good ol' lean, mean, and efficient company we enjoyed. Then follow Mini's advice and you should be all set. You must emphasize the goal of understanding how to improve, not just tagging a higher paycheck. I used to work in the OneCare team. I know devs who got there without doing anything substantial but their manager was nice and there was no competition.In short, Level 63 to me is not important and I really dont respect 63s unless they I've interacted with them.Level 65+ is another story and are devs who have the stuff almost always.- Someone at Level 62. But above L62 the talent is intense and that is good. I agree with some comments that level make no difference. Obviously a key word in my advice was explicitly. I influenced the features, I lended my expertise on them, and I learned about the customer - all this way before the spec'ing phase. He/she and you should know exactly what you need to do to get to the next level. Tech corporation VPs are execs in the have-own-budget sense, and are usually the first position on the ladder that has this kind of control. Amazon, Go to company page Steven A. Ballmer Chief Executive Officer, Microsoft Corporation. Microsoft, Go to company page I can vouch for the efficacy of this mantra.MS definitely does a good enough job on career progression and offering diverse options. Leak of Microsoft Salaries Shows Fight for Higher Compensation Chief Executive Officer and Director. Ultimately humans make decisions either by heart or brain. I also agree with the promotion-on-transfer point. Maybe Steve Jobs' psychotic approach to managing by terror is not properly described in English as "junk yard dog mode" (standing up for what needs to be done vs. mind-numbing consensus wallowing). But it should definitely keep me up in the top of the class, and getting a nice review score + kudos + a job well done with results is a reward in itself (that I crave for more than the actual promotion).I have given this suggestion to Lisa, but I have not seen any action so far. Sorry for going dark for so long. Success breeds Success: I remember reading an article about an extensive study to determine the best predictor of a stocks price tomorrow. Senior leadership team - Microsoft UK "http://www.poppendieck.com/pdfs/Compensation.pdfWorth a read, Lisa. Most of our ways of doing things have so many imperfections that you would not have any trouble to find obvious thing to improve in obvious ways. Those teams I used to despise as a L60, and only tolerate as a 63? Successful people looooove to expound upon the secret to their success. At the beginning of each FY, I always asked, "I want to get Exceeded this year. I got involved in features up front, by spending time getting to know the PM team. Taking the easy escape out like that, you are more likely to get into the same situation at other companies. Promotion budgets of 65 and above has been kept intact.Promotion and raise budgets are going to be quite tight everywhere, not just at MS. Otherwise, you start getting limited reviews and your compensation goes down.Obviously there was no advice in this post, but I thought it was an interesting observation, and perhaps the company can learn something from this viewpoint. The job level for Technical Fellow starts at 80 and goes beyond. But more likely youre displaying the hallmark of a weak performer described in the article of the same name (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2000/01/18/MN73840.DTL). Technical excellence alone will not generate success.Authority. Then L64 took two years. You want to be more efficient, smarter than him. Executive Vice President and Chief Commercial Officer. :)Then, over the next 2 years, I learned the magic of 65: it's not just about playing *well* with others, it's about making every team you work with great and helping them do their best work. What is the average promotion velocity for non-technical fields? Yes, we have tons of info on the HR websites and yes, there are steps you should take. This is the multiplier effect, or scope of influence that is often mentioned. I definitely want to read more soon.Sincerely yoursSteave Markson. BG for a big PG in a medium/large sub)L63 = director, then onwards to GM etc62->63 is a tough jump where you need to take ownership for a business segmentYou can go up to L60 pretty easily by nailing commitments year on year and showing you can thrive on increased responsibility, after that it gets harder and you need to proactively lead and drive results that impact the wider business significantly.If you're in sales, it's pretty much all about the total quota you influenceIn my experience, my advice is:- network and help make other groups successful (ideally in a win/win context)- be proactive, propose and grab new challenges and be successful with them- deliver against the CSP's/commitments for the next level up, when you have mastered the current level- make your boss look good, and make his/her boss look good. And as my experience shows, many teams do not even staff a senior. You've told me you're not willing to have the hard career conversation with me and/or that you're not willing to do what I told you needed to be done when we had that conversation. Microsoft, Go to company page You can be a genius of blinding brilliance, but if you come from a boring product team, you "don't have much potential". Punit Bhatia - Director - Sales - Apar Innosys Pte ltd | LinkedIn Nothing you do is good, all you get is criticism. While a manager can help coach you, and you can follow the advice in this post and comments (most of which are great, by the way), you have no way of knowing if there are 0 or 10 people also on the team doing the same things, ahead of you for the limited number of promotions available. So either keep slapping yourself or choose to wake up. Your Recently Promoted L63 Peers: let's say you have at least one peer that in the past year or so has been promoted to L63. for L63? "haven't seen nothing yet" is a fairly common construction. Getting constant feedback throughout is valuable as you can re-align and re-adjust in an agile way so that you are not shocked at review time that you have completely missed that promotion. Visiting Assistant Professor of Phyiscs in Notre Dame, IN for Saint Promotion budgets of 65 and above has been kept intact.Can somebody from HR confirm this?If true then this post is quite untimely. The general consensus is why get rid of someone who is happy doing their job and can do it better than anyone else. Great post Mini. A mentor helps tremendously. I just want to grow, and I am aware that it does not translate to a promotion always. And your manager will not hate you for thinking about switching -- if you are a great employee to begin with, he will just want to keep you around. This is a discussion to foster debate and by no means an enactment of policy-violation. :). Unless you know for sure that your boss's answer is an immediate "Absolutely!" Most of them are not. It would be the pinnacle of dumbness. Perhaps someone can explain to me how you get successfully promoted without your boss's support. All the money making groups cut 10% of the work force. Don't be afraid to ask your manager some very direct questions.Don't force the issue. How many has Live hired this year and OneCare gets cut? Thrive on it! Normally this is acceptable but right now i smell lawsuit. Thus promotions are easy to L62 - if you don't make 62 quickly, there is something wrong. The estimated base pay is $243,438 per year. Seek out local critique before you approach people above you. I have seen and known many of my own peers who don't get promoted because of potential but the number of people you know in the leadership team. The PM team loved having my technical expertise freely available, and I actually really like designing features too.Anyway, two simple things, but I think what Mini said about not doing this IN ORDER to get promoted is key. Software development at MS has become more complex and much more collaborative. For example, some are principal individual contributors that just stayed for too long in a group and became essential, but now want to move on and cannot do that, either because their skills are obsolete or because they simply cannot go to a new startup team at such high level without any management responsibility, and they are untested managers. Specifically, what did they accomplish, and what contributions do you see them doing to justify their promotion? Don't let HR lie to you, this is a stack rank exercise. Make them successful at their job. Needless to say that not many will admit this fact. The first was the barter (a position exists that I qualify for - give it to me now and I will commit to staying with the team another year. Without soft skills, you can't make 64 and certainly no chance at 65.I've seen many people transfer into MCS, level up, and then transfer out basically using it as a boost. Key member of the senior management team contributing to the formulation of the company's future direction and supporting tactical initiatives Drive the annual budget process, monthly. Shock and awe awaits. Specifically, that is a tendency to try and do everything themselves, taking too much individual accountability as opposed to building a v-team across orgs etc etc.Most managers in Microsoft - in my personal experieince - are competent managers. You must ask for a promotion when you think you are ready. Or you wait until you get escorted out.I dont know what the final outcome of my situation will be but I expect in the end, I will think it was for the better.Good luck to all in your Microsoft careers, but pay attention to the levels, CSPs and how stack rankings work. We need to grow out of this bad legacy syndrome that we still have. VPs may well number in the hundreds at a huge place . My work affected hundreds of developers in our org. microsoft senior program manager salary redmond But power plays are at work and I get smacked when I try and take on extra work.So my question to the more experienced is this - how does one get the attention of management when they are focused on their own problems, their favorite underlings (of which I am not one), and when there is not enough work to go around? When does that year start? Mini, all those aspects you list are also present at L62, L65, etc. Maybe." Flip on the klaxons! You're selling it in no less than eight different SKUs, (including the upgrades) and your marketing message is deliberately obfuscated to convince the customers to go for the most expensive one. Skilled in Surfer 8, MS Project, Primavera, Microsoft Excel, Analytical Skills, Customer Service, Customer Success Management, Vendor Management and Sales. Stop fighting which is where mapped. Good luck with that. He said this year he could only make strategic promotions, which sounded like promotions of people above 65. Don't waste it. If you have your mnanager in your pocket, you cna achieve greate heights in life. These turtles gets promoted eventually just based on time spent at MS and because they werent doing anything wrong even though they dont really meet CSP criteria. I've been at the same level for 3.5 years (since I joined MSFT), and while I spent three of those in a group where almost noone at all got promoted (a group which has since essentially dissolved), I'm concerned that my level stagnation reflects poorly on me, even though I've been the major contributor on products that have earned 10x my total compensation package for MSFT. It's a matter of human nature for most people not to want someone else to pass them up. They are 100% star material. After that, I was given a team that was in trouble quality wise 6 months before shipping. Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer. Then they start pinging the manager on why and putting pressure on them to do something, move them up or out. I spend a lot of my time these days working with partner teams to help them solve their own problems or create wins for their teams even if it only peripherally touches my area. Will a L63 have direct reports and/or manage v-? First let's set the expectations right for this quarter and possibly the next: The budgets for promos are shrunk almost everywhere. This number represents the median, which is the midpoint of the ranges from our proprietary Total Pay Estimate model and based on salaries collected from our users. Ill answer first question later in this comment. Entry level (428) Associate (378) Mid-Senior level (3,385) Director (2,581) Done . Bowl Leader. I sat there at L64 for 5+ years. Leadership: pro-active leadership that convinces team members of the future direction and even helps to . Why does the company reward and keep these numbskull managers that hold people back? It inspired me to write the following dissertation on the subject in hopes that it will be helpful. you need to hit the pause button for one big time-out regarding where you are, where you're going, and what needs to change. However good your manager is, she or he is still a human with insecurities and ego. Show me you can do this and want to learn more and you'll be on my radar as a possibility.6. No matter how good you are, you will peak at some point and Microsoft will get rid of you. It's usually too late at that point. The way to get to a higher level is to increase the scope of your contributions.In our group (somewhere in STB), L63 seems to begin with having at least 2 reports. For the folks on the path to L63, I want you to first understand your boss's opinion of you, your opinion of yourself, what it takes to succeed in your team, and then ways you can step up and be on the right path. He is a very, very smart guy.For many people, what made them successful as a level 62 IC will kill them as a level 62 manager. There are not a lot of options at that point. Know where you are in the stack and understand how you will rank higher next year.BTW, forgot to mention I was a manager for the second half of my career. The L64 guys should be able to influence their skip level orgs plus one or two groups outside of the skip org. Whenever his lead would ask him to do X he would refuse and insist on doing Y instead. I made sure I was the fastest, most efficient, and best bug fixer. If you push too hard or threaten to leave, you will be written off immediately. "This is the lament of every person in every big company everywhere it's usually a combination of truth (most of us are capable of more than the roles we're currently filling) and hubris (if I had a nickel for ever junior person who over-estimated what they were capable of I'd be retired). At this point many people will ask how can I influence others if Im not their manager? In the beginning, I volunteered for these tough areas that no one else wanted and over time, my brand became the fix it guy. There is no better investment at Microsoft for tuning your career. When (if) you are then promoted to 62, you are not expected to continue performing at a level 62 level, but rather a level 63 level.The reason that you have to perform at a new level before reaching it is to avoid the Peter Principle, being people promoted up to their level of incompetence. weeks to find another position within the company, otherwise they are laid off.Think that's known as a "RIF" not a "layoff" butwhat do I know? I heard that promotion budgets are significantly reduced at below 65 level. Given that quite a few Microsofties are going to find themselves locked into their current group for a while, the ability to succeed by swinging on the vines to a new group is going to be rare. When I was an IC, it was tough technical problems or simply critical problems that no one else wanted. This past year I had what I thought was an outstanding year, was given a 20%, but not promoted to L63. Second, the perspective of a different team helps you generalize about best practices and what works and doesn't work. I call B.S. The CSPs are a good attempt to define each level, but anyone who is looking at the CSPs and saying I do that, and that, , but Im not getting promoted is almost certainly missing the point.