Software engineering under the spotlight

Think of a tech company as a giant, dimly-lit factory. Work goes on throughout the factory as components shuffle back and forth, and finished products get steadily carted away, but the coordination and efficiency of each section is fairly low. Some parts of the factory get jammed up and don’t do anything for days. Other parts are manically producing broken components which are thrown away unused. However, the factory manager - i.e. the tech company CEO - has one tool to combat this problem. That tool is the spotlight.

There is a giant spotlight mounted on the rafters, like the bat-signal, and at any moment it is pointed at some part of the factory. When a part of the factory is lit up, it operates more in line with the factory manager’s desires. Employees work harder and more efficiently. But the spotlight can only cover one section at a time. When a section is lit up, all other sections are in the dark. Because of this, clever use of the spotlight is the most important part of the plant manager’s job. Keeping it pointed at the most crucial work (without letting any part of the factory sit too long in darkness) is a delicate balancing act.

Tech companies have limited focus

The spotlight represents what the company is actively focusing on. Tech companies can only focus on one or two things at a time, because “focus” means “the CEO is actively supervising this”. Everything else muddles along. In functional companies, the spotlight makes the difference between highly-focused work and regular, still-successful work. In dysfunctional companies, the spotlight makes the difference between work that happens and work that simply does not happen at all (in other words, work only happens under the spotlight). Specifically, being under the spotlight means:

• The CEO is asking for daily updates, which imparts a real sense of urgency down the org chart
• Blockers will be removed by force, if needed (e.g. if team Y is dragging their feet, expect their boss’s boss’s boss to come down and sort it out)
• Agile processes (estimations, planning meetings, retros) are often abbreviated or removed entirely

For software engineers, the spotlight is a time of high-pressure and high-reward. Your manager and skip-level manager will never pay you as much attention as when your team is under the spotlight. Projects you’ve done under the spotlight will be five to ten times more impactful in your promotion packets - assuming you’ve visibly done a good job on them. If you’re never under the spotlight, it’s hard to get the kind of exposure you need for promotions (especially to senior or staff roles).

It’s a really good idea to optimize for working under the spotlight: for instance, make your baseline 80% or 90% effort, so that you can flex up to 110% or 120% for short periods when the spotlight is on you. This will help you show off, but it’ll also help you avoid damaging mistakes. Screwing up under the spotlight can stain your reputation at a company permanently.

Chasing the spotlight

Some engineers spend their careers chasing the spotlight. This can be a virtuous cycle: if you distinguish yourself under the spotlight, you’re likely to be moved to the next area that the spotlight points to. In effect, you can become part of the spotlight itself, by becoming one of the tools that your company leadership uses to focus on specific areas. When senior leadership thinks “we need to get this project right”, they’ll also think “we should transfer engineer X to it, they’re reliable”. For obvious reasons, this is a good way to get promoted.

However, chasing the spotlight is exhausting. Not only does it require working harder, but the constant transferring and project-switching can be tough to adjust to in itself. You tend to work with a lot of different people instead of staying with a single team, which makes it more difficult to build the kind of long-term colleague relationships that make work much more pleasant. And frankly, as a senior+ engineer, you’re being paid well but definitely not on the same level as the C-staff and SVPs whose priorities you’re enabling - and whose bonuses you’re securing! It’s not necessarily a good deal to opt-in to the CEO schedule full-time.

Avoiding the spotlight

Other engineers spend their careers hiding from the spotlight. Sometimes this is because they’re incompetent and don’t want to be put under pressure, but plenty of skilled engineers just prefer to do good technical work as far away from executives as possible. These engineers typically get a lot of intrinsic motivation out of writing code itself (as opposed to delivering shareholder value). They’re also typically not ambitious - either the positive ambition of wanting to push for more power and influence, or the negative ambition of being terrified of being sidelined or laid-off.

There’s nothing wrong with this, but it does mean you’re likely to be under-rewarded for your effort. Your hard work just isn’t going to go as far. One month of grinding in the spotlight is worth one year of grinding in the dark. For good reason! Companies reward engineers who work to achieve the company’s goals. If you’re not working on anything in the company’s top priorities, the company is going to (probably) reward you less for it. That might be a deal worth making, if you really do like working away from the spotlight - but you shouldn’t then complain about the consequences.

Summary

• Tech companies can only focus on one or two things at a time; this is the “spotlight”
• Engineers who perform well under the spotlight get more visibility, rewards, and career growth
• Some engineers chase the spotlight and become known quantities to leadership, at the cost of stability
• Others avoid the spotlight and do good technical work quietly, but tend to be under-recognized
• Either strategy can work, but you should be honest about the tradeoffs