You have the right stuff to succeed and Microsoft is very happy with you. 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. If you are considering leaving your team (or Microsoft) but think you could be persuaded to stay, be careful about how you present this to your manager. I've been a 62 for too long by Microsoft standards. So a sub role at L61 = corp L63 and vice versa.So from a sub perspective:L58 and below are relatively junior roles where you have zero influence outside of meeting your commitmentsL59 -> L60 is a tougher jump. A Senior Director gets a basic salary package of $190,000, which gets as high . Thank goodness for this blog, where MS employees are free to talk about their personal struggles, unlike "other" blogs that censor/prohibit such discussions, so that they can live in some fantasy land and avoid dealing with the real issues. That's not going to change in six months (which I learned). Microsoft's senior positions start at level 63, according to the crowdsourced tech compensation website Levels.fyi. Incompetent people tend to significantly overstate their performance, and significantly understate that of their co-workers. But that doesn't really help you compete when you don't know what everyone else is doing, particularily if you think you're doing well.Further, it's hard to get specific advice on how to get promoted, due to said black wall. So most new hires at MS are L63 by default and they obviously don't have to work at it :).Yes, L64->L65 transition is REALLY big deal but directly joining MS at L65 as new FTE is not a big deal and there are usually ample of open positions. So here's my 2 cents:Read this now and have a game plan for your 1:1s to tee up a deeper discussion at MYCD. Two years ago I realized that the MS treadmill (trying to become what my dysfunctional manager wanted) was making me nuts. How do you get the right job/work that will make the impact. In fact, every boss I've had has told me that I was the most frustrating employee they've ever had, mostly because I ignore half the things they ask me to doAnyhow, here's my advice: do a good job.That's it. There may be multiple reasons for pay differences - one of which is a small number of salaries submitted per job. Entry level (4,718) Associate (1,976) Mid-Senior level (40,085) 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. Senior->principal->partner are the level bands, 63/64->65/66/67, 68/69/70. And you know something? The "Most Likely Range" represents values that exist within the 25th and 75th percentile of all pay data available for this role. How bad is this? Let's Hear it for the Boy! I think folks like that are the one-offs who slipped by and most likely (given the scrutiny I see more and more) certainly wouldn't slip by today. "Shock and awe awaits" is correct. "2) Peel the onion. It is possible to get promoted out of a desire to be promoted. During that time I had two good to great managers. Just like a lot of folks have a fetish to be managers even when it is against their natures.Having said this, consider which is better: a) Rushing through the levels and to be stuck in 64 for ages (to be Kim'd is especially painful here) - think Sarah Palin orb) Going through the levels at a healthy pace, getting far deep into the salary ranges that will assure higher pay when the new levels come. At Microsoft, the levels start at 59 and go beyond 80. Less than a year is fast, but not unheard of. Senior Director Advanced Technical Services - Careers At SCS Global And don't beleive your boss if they say otherwise. Might as well fire those guys. The first levels came quickly with some sticking around 64 and 65 (half my career).I have always taken on and fixed problem areas that no one else wants to take on. Thank you for reviewing my profile. Flip on the klaxons! By contrast, most directors don't have their own budgets, but need approvals from their VP to do just about anything. If you don't have a manager like that or the manager cannot/will not set clear commits/accountabilities - when the freeze lifts, time for you to look at new areas where you can bring something to the table. When I mastered the above -- and when I had partner teams widely viewed as difficult or bad partners coming to my GM and singing my praises as the go-to guy, *that* is when I became a Principal. Chris Capossela. I'm at 62, have been for lo, these many years. Second, the perspective of a different team helps you generalize about best practices and what works and doesn't work. The biggest lesson I learned here was how to work *with* other teams, even when I thought they weren't very good and even when our purposes didn't align. The skills are different, and part of the failure of this company is exactly due to losing star individual contributors that become mediocre leads, in all disciplines. Within the comments, I hope to elicit advice that follows up on what I start here, and maybe even contradicts it. Third, working on that weakness DAILY (but not exclusively) until they overcome it. Leak of Microsoft Salaries Shows Fight for Higher Compensation One of my reports and I had that conversation not that long ago, and I explained to him that at 62, he can take on any task I'm asking him to do. If they see flaws you have flaws. I have only required two strategies. And what is happening now trying to move up after becoming a Dev Manager? While cash bonuses stay relatively stable as a percentage of salary over the course of a Microsoft employee's career, stock compensation can rise to nearly 20% of annual income at higher levels, according to the crowdsourced data. The Goldstars have already been canceled for this quarter.Next, I believe this post will most likely be useful for those who entered MS as intern/college hires. Do a search for people in those groups in NYC area and check their status to see who is hiring. I came from .NET (no longer there), and there were plenty of Senior IC PMs and Devs.Are you in Test, Marketing or Documentation? And as my experience shows, many teams do not even staff a senior. Excuses and griping and bemoaning aren't the stuff that L63 contributors are made of. It's not enough that you do a good job for your own assignments beyond L62 but what matters is how many others you enable to do as good job as you can do and achieve similar outcomes by influencing them. And having a friend gain less than 3000/yr with a promo to Pricincipal cemented that. You can each help each other.I've gone from 59 to 65 so far, but maybe what worked for me won't work for you. I want them productive and about career success at Microsoft, especially your thoughts about achieving L63. Be prepared for every possible question, scenario, disaster, etc. I have to agree with a few that have posted already. The problem is you can't tell if you've done something to piss him off or if he's doing it because he has to. Don't be the roadblock. And to your skip level. Apple's about to ship Snow Leopard with no new features. Steven A. Ballmer Chief Executive Officer, Microsoft Corporation. Risk and return are related. There is no better investment at Microsoft for tuning your career. But above L62 the talent is intense and that is good. Think about it. Of course I ensure my manager and skip-level are aware of my contribution as a mentor, but I figure that as long as I'm in front of the wave, the best way for me to advance is to move the wave forward. great post. That's why Microsoft is pissing away the monopoly that you inherited from IBM. Learn how this feature works. Amy Hood. Pop quiz: who is it? 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. He himself is principal for quite sometime. Now the setup team for most products has more than 6 devs. Microsoft's '08 Mistakes: The Software Giant's Three Errors http://www.networkworld.com/news/2008/121908-microsofts-08-mistakes-the-software.html?hpg1=bnJust three? This is where I agree with Mini regarding taking MSFT back to the good ol' lean, mean, and efficient company we enjoyed. If you dont know what exactly an L63 is, how are you able to make promotion discussions in the review meetings?Managers become so defensive when asked what we should be doing to advance. Ultimately humans make decisions either by heart or brain. I give you the example from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/awaits "A busy day awaits" as evidence.So one legitimate missing punctuation mark, one matter of verbal interpretation, one popular idiom, and one completely correct phrase. But that will only be one more indicator that you are not ready to "face" your obstacles. Software development at MS has become more complex and much more collaborative. Repeat. If you have potential and luck then you can achieve promotion velocity of one level every 18 months.Finally, heres my advice for who aspire for L62->L63 jump: Look around. Worked my ass off and finally get recognized as Snr contributor. Why are we doing x and not y? If you think you will follow the management career path then get in such role as early as possible. If you are within striking distance of level 63 in the next few years, then consider yourself VERY fortunate. That's the easy way out. It varies greatly from manager to skip.The hardest point for me to bear is that I am young, capable of doing so much more, and absolutely dying to do more. And we have the budget for it. My manager and I had a plan to influenc that person and it worked. Here's some advice from a recent L64'er (L63 last year). First, self criticism to identify weaknesses. Satya Nadella. In my own experience, even after being a great developer for 2+ years, with straight 4.0 scores at that time, and despite having Dev Manager roles before Microsoft, I would be turned down on informationals for Dev Lead positions with the simple question: Have you been a Dev Lead at Microsoft? Here's to you! What worked for me was to go to my manager and say: "I would like to stay here, at Microsoft, working for you. Strong operations professional with a Master's Degree focused in Project Management from Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto . If you know higher leveled people in another org, ask them to poke holes in your proposals. If you find yourself in this spot - get a good external mentor to help you manage through it if you don't feel you can have this conversation with your manager.4. Embrace whatever people are saying are your flaws. My boss even made mistakes. Perhaps someone can explain to me how you get successfully promoted without your boss's support. >> You forgot "never ask for a promotion".That's the absolute worst advice one can give to a Microsoft employee, IMO. ceo/vp/director/manager/lead etc. Executive Officers - Stories Few others are long time softies who have been doing average to good job for very long time (3-7 years) without getting any promos. Tips for getting them on your side:1) Ask for Exceeded. L63 guys are supposed to influence their entire skip level org. Senior Director Global Supply Chain Management transformation Supply Chain Operations SA Juli 2022-Heute9 Monate Lausanne Metropolitan Area Principal Consultant for an international. Keep my word. Great post Mini. No matter how good you are, you will peak at some point and Microsoft will get rid of you. You should be able to show the path to a goal, especially to collections of people who do not report to you. @No! I moved around 3 teams before I found one where I really enjoyed the technology and the people, and here I've flourished.So forget all the whining about politics and crap. Senior level executive excelling at increasing operational efficiencies, improving . Great post!