I am normally a helpful person who dives in to help, but when it comes from above that I’ll be switching teams with no warning, it robs me of my autonomy, my investment in my team and product, and makes me feel like even more of a cog. Yes, it’s good to broaden my experience, and maybe if it was handled better it would have felt better. But my job isn’t just coding, it’s social skills and research and all of that. Especially in the remote environment, it’s hard. So this does feel bad.

Our product team failed to pull together a clear path forward, so I understand why this is being done, but it is still alienating. Is this a normal thing to expect in future roles?

  • @HairHeelEnglish
    5•1 year ago

    Thinking of instances where I’ve seen it happen:

    • they did a big reorg to avoid layoffs. Good sign it’s time to start looking. The company didn’t exactly pull itself back after that.
    • company got acquired and incompetent management at the new parent company thought we had more people than we needed. Another red flag, since they made decisions without consulting the individuals affected, and against the recommendations of middle management who knew the context.
    • an underperforming junior dev who showed potential but had clearly burned out and also had some interpersonal problems with specific people. They wanted to give him a clean start and a second chance. Given the job market at the time, it was a good deal in some ways, but it’s the same kind of red flag as being put on a pip. Better to find some place new to get a real clean start if you can.

    Anyhow, tldr, it’s never been a good thing in my experience. wouldn’t hurt to start looking for other options.