Comment by goostavos
>empire building
I've been here about the same amount of time. Also L4-L6. I'll echo your "empire building" comment. That, above all else, seems to be the root of the evil. Managers need "scope" to get promoted. They get scope by building an empire. That leads to programs and initiatives and new processes without any connection to customer value. They only exist to be a line item on a promo doc. It is a topic of endless and open complaint that ICs get sucked up into some manager's "promo project."
The big shift seems to be that only a subset of people are talking about producing value. The majority are talking about being seen as producing value.
Well put.
I agree with that, I think earlier in the timeline there was enough work of large scope / complexity / impact that it was obvious and self-fulfilling (ie: go work on big customer ask / initiative -> get promoted). When the influx of middle management came, people started looking for ways to stand out and carve out their own teams under themselves. Multiply this across the entire company..