Beware of technical ladder roles

Technical ladder is getting hot (Sakkath hot, magaa, as Radio Mirchi FM channel in Bangalore would say). Look at Economic Times devoting almost of a full page on tech ladder in the article “Grooming technical leaders” a couple of weeks back. The article presents TI’s technical ladder, its broad characteristics and how it helps as a motivational tool for engineers. In fact Santosh Kumar, head TI, India Software Council and a Senior Member of Technical Staff quotes in the article that ““It serves as a useful tool to see how you are growing in the company; it provides a reference point when you go out and say that you were on the technical ladder people can immediately understand your contribution”

For those who may not be aware, TI’s technical ladder process and its implementation in its India center is supposed to be one of the most mature in the industry (especially among the IT companies in India). TI has been leveraging “mature tech-ladder" brand for a while now. See, for example, how technical ladder is described as an important tool to motivate talent in this article when TI, India was declared No. 1 in “Great places to work” survey in 2004. Similarly, in the cover story “Texas Instruments: Taking charge of the Indian electronics environment” appeared in Dec 2007 from Smart Techie magazine, Dr. Bobby Mitra goes at length to explain how technical ladder is at the heart of innovation in TI, India.

If you were to take this story and extrapolate it to the rest of the IT industry in India, you will be grossly mistaken. Remember that TI, India is the oldest MNC to set up a shop in India. Moreover, first full product called Ankur came out of this center way back in 2000. However, HR in IT companies is getting really impatient and running out of ideas to attract and retain talent. Hence, it is not surprising that many organizations are advertising for roles such as “Architect” or “Technical Specialist” to attract talent.

This is the story I heard from a co-passenger in a train from Kolhapur to Bangalore earlier this month. His friend changed his job as he was being offered an Architect role (with, of course, significant raise). In fact, the company had advertised multiple Architect positions. It has been 6 months since the fellow has joined and he has no work.

It is true that “technical ladder” can be a good motivational tool for engineers passionate about technology. However, it can’t be sustained without a fundamental business need. If you are considering such positions (internally in your current organization or externally), you should ask the question, “Does the business really need this role at this point?” You may take up such a role in spite of business need not being clear. In which case, you are taking the responsibility of influencing the senior management in demonstrating how this role adds value. This may be an uphill task. But, hey, who says life is easy?