My Absolute truth I unlearned as a Senior developer. your knowledge, hard work and quality of work is not important. The relationship that you have with your boss and your bank account is what you need to focus on.
> your knowledge, hard work and quality of work is not important.
Bingo. I used to be that guy who'd spend my weekends fixing the code that everyone else left messed up on Friday or at the bookstore reading up on the latest framework. And I thought that someday it would be recognized with promotions or more pay or even a pat on the back.
Nope.
> The relationship that you have with your boss ...
I should have been the guy who was always socializing with management at the office and happy hours. I should have been pushing my way into positions that were closer to the money itself - like getting contracts, attending conferences with management, architecture etc.
This is becoming even more apparent as I hit middle age, and it's harder to justify my high salary when the majority of our code isn't really all that complicated.
> and your bank account is what you need to focus on
But deep down I always knew this was true, so I lived frugally and saved most of my money. I honestly don't see a great future for guys like me who enjoy programming but are too introverted or just don't care to go into management positions. There is simply too many H1Bs, foreign competition, etc to justify high paid developers in most companies that aren't doing Google type development.
This is something I've noticed early on even as a junior engineer (maybe it's my general upbringing that highlighted this well known fact of life). It becomes obvious quite quickly how little your knowledge and work matters. You can be incredibly smart and come up with wonderful solutions but it won't mean a thing if your boss(es) doesn't like you.
For a profession that has frequently professed meritocracy - it is certainly not. It's unfortunate.
You need to focus on all, not to switch between one and the other.
It doesn't matter if your work is amazing if nobody realizes it (unless you are fine being a starving artist, no judgement)
The corollary isn't that you should make everyone think your inadequate work is amazing. I don't think you personally are making that judgement but there are people who would.
