Consequences of Turning Down a Promotion?

The Fun Guy asks: "I'm part of a research team, doing interesting work on an important topic. However, I've been getting some signals from various superiors that I might be put in charge of another team; the trouble is, that team is dysfunctional, unproductive, and the focus is not as cool as what I'm working on now. I do have career ambitions to move up the ladder of responsibility and authority, and even recently applied for a job three rungs up, mostly as a way to get noticed by the big wigs. It looks like they noticed, but that project looks like a minefield. I really think I'd rather be second banana on a great project than top banana on a lousy one. How bad would it be for my long-term prospects if I say 'Thanks, but no thanks, I'll wait for a better offer'?"

Commander Riker syndrome

[PeteyG]

Go watch The Best of Both Worlds parts 1 and 2.

Commander William T. Riker turns down another promotion, a captaincy on another starship. He turns it down because the Enterprise is the best ship in the fleet, he's doing some great work there, and he is comfortable with where he is. But when Commander Shelby comes gunning for his choice position... he has to think about why he's choosing to stay in the same place for such a long time.

Admiral Hanson: "This is the third time we've pulled out the captain's chair for Riker.
He just won't sit down."

Shelby: All you know how to do is play it safe. I suppose that's why someone like you sits in the shadow of a great man for as long as you have, passing up one command after another. (To the turbolift computer) Proceed to deck 8.
Riker: When it comes to this ship and this crew, you bet I play it safe.
Shelby: If you can't make the big decisions, Commander, I suggest you make way for someone who can.

Picard: "Will, what the hell are you still doing here?"
...
Picard: "Will, you're ready to work without a net. You're ready to take command. And you know, the Enterprise will go on just fine without you."


Now, Riker stayed as 'second bananna' on the Enterprise, and did some truly great things... but eventually he did have to move on. He knew he couldn't stay on the Enterprise forever, and finally accepted a command of his own. The USS Titan.

Riker decided that he should stay on the Enterprise for all the reasons you've stated you might want to stay where you are. But he was able to take a step back, and realize that at some point... he had to move on. He had spent half his career in the same position, and had to move onto different things. He had to leave, or else stagnate.

Some stuff to think about, I guess.

Re:Welcome to Corporate America...

[Angst Badger]

Management is not fun, it is work, and it is harder work then being a cog in the machine. This is why the big bucks come at the top. Good luck.

The first part of this is true. Being an effective manager is really hard work -- contrary to what you may have been led to believe by watching crappy managers -- and not everyone has the peculiar set of talents for it, much less the actual skills.

The second part is not true: the actual correlation is between earnings and your perceived value to the organization. That's the other half of being a manager: effectively selling yourself. Some genuinely excellent managers are very poor at selling themselves to their superiors, and some genuinely awful managers are very good at selling themselves. This is a separate skill, but one you must also master.

I've turned down management positions before, sometimes several times within the same organization, so it's not necessarily true that you'll never get another chance, but the offers will decrease in frequency over time. (Most increases in position come from changing companies anyway, so this need not be a disaster.) In my case, I turned them down not because I'm a poor manager -- I've done very well as a manager before -- but because I absolutely hate doing it. But I knew I was choosing to do what I loved (programming) at the expense of higher earnings. Some people really get off on climbing the ladder, usually less for money than for the challenge or the prestige. If you're one of those people and you think you can face the challenge, by all means, do it. But if not, there is no shame in recognizing where your real strengths lie and refusing to be seduced away from it.

An alternative perspective

[Tandoori Haggis]

I'm about to change jobs. I had an opportunity to help a different department with a critical operation. The work was very different to my existing job and it wasn't exactly clear what I would be doing. I'd been assigned to help a specialist who had no idea of how to get best value from me, so I found out who the main mover, (Project Manager), was and he gave me the low down on the main issues. He also gave me the opportunity to get involved at a level that had not been considered by the folk that had drafted me in.

They got value from me for sure! There was the reward of having a very real impact on business.

It occured to me that my old job = boredom = stress. I actually dreaded going to work back then. On returning to the old job, nothing had changed. WRONG!!! I had changed!

Give me a project, procedures, a remit and resources and I'll deliver. Left in a rut, doing the same old tasks, there is no challenge and no job satisfaction for me.

Don't get me wrong. The folk I've been working with are decent, peaceable and well meaning. However, that place has been like Kryptonite to my soul. The management structure changed recently, a bit too late, potentially giving me more say in how things are done. This is where the hint of doubt can creep in and say " look, you can stay here and it'll all be fine and dandy".

Yeah sure! Like last year and the year before. My position had already been compromised. There are times in life, jobs, projects, frienships and relationships, where each party is pulled towards divergent paths.

It may be the hardest path to take but choose the one which allows you to grow as a person.

One cautionary note. You can be a no limits person but be sure that you retain a sense of balance and
ask yourself the question "why do I want this?". If you have the answer - go forward.

Good luck!

It depends on you

[Mr. Piddle]

Working on shitty projects almost made me burn out of software development entirely, yet I see other people whore themselves to these projects year in year out with out a care in the world. It makes me thankful for diversity, that for every shitty job, there's someone just as shitty to take it.

"Cool" is in the eye of the beholder

[JohnQPublic]

Wanna know what's cool? Taking a group of people working on an unsuccessful project and helping them turn both themselves and it around. There's nothing quite so satisfying as helping someone put their career back on track and watching them become successful in their own right.

Some advice:

• Take the job, but make sure they know that you know it's a tough row to hoe. They know it, that's why you've been offered it. If it's a particularly bad project, consider asking for an extension of the key deadline or deliverable that is hard-but-possible instead of the current impossible target. But expect to be held to the revised target, and to be judged on your success at motivating the team to achieve it.
• If you don't have a mentor, find one ASAP. You need an experienced manager to help you learn some of the Secret Teachings. Don't approach someone in the chain of command above you - that way lies madness and back-stabbing. Ideally it should be someone in your company but far enough away from your arena to be dispationate about your responsibilities.
• Don't read the team's personnel folders. If there's anything in them at all, it comes from the mind of some other manager. You need to form your own opinions. Nothing will stifle your attempt to turn Joe Slacker into U. Ber-Coder faster than finding out the last manager wanted to fire him.
• Read Tracy Kidder's The Soul of a New Machine [amazon.com], the story of how the Data General MV/32 Eclipse was built. It should be required reading of any new manager in our business. Pay particular attention to the ideas of "signing up" and of not being the fair-haired project.
• After you take the job, talk to each and every team member one-on-one. Let them know you're not just a retread of their previous boss. Likewise let them know that their complaints about him are yesterday's news and today's a different day.
• Help them sign themselves up (again, read Kidder). You can run a project, even an important one, with people who aren't motivated to be part of it, but it's very hard to succeed that way.
• You need to become their leader. That doesn't happen because someone annoints you "Boss". It happens because you do things that make them offer you their respect. Your goal should be that if you leave the team, some of them ask to come work for you at your next gig, inside or outside of this company.
• If you must fire anybody, do it soon and do it all at once. Then with the dead men being politely escorted out of the building by another manager (not by Security!) and their blood still wet and warm on your hands, explain to the survivors that you did what had to be done and that this is the end of it. Don't discuss why it had to be done in any detail - ideally you shouldn't discuss it at all. Given time, the survivors will see why their coworkers had to go, and that nobody "was next".
• Be as good as your word. Always. Don't promise something you can't deliver, and don't let yourself be percieved as promising something you didn't mean to promise.

Good luck and welcome to the team. Management can be very rewarding when done right.

Re:Thoughts from someone who used to promote peopl

[ErroneousBee]

This is known as 'eliminate the assholes', of Dilbert fame. Trouble is, are you being given this job to elimiate the assholes in the team, or are you the asshole they want to eliminate. Also, is your organisation healthy or is it a beaurocratic nightmare? If I got a job 3 rungs up, I'd be CEO, but your place sounds a bit like a 'Yes Minister' sketch: "I'm the Permanent Secretary, I report to the Cabinet Secretary, Bernard is your Principal Private Secretary he works for you, but reports to me. Bernard has 2 Private Secretaries, I have 3 Assistant Permanent Secretaries." "Do you all type?" "Gosh no, Mrs Briggs does that, shes the secretary" So it sounds like you might do well to get a bit Machiavelian, and take your new job on the condition that you can move sideways to a safe harbour if it doesnt work out. Say you are only doing the new job to get a bit of experiance. Perhaps you need to work out who is supporting this promotion, do they dislike you, are they using you to get at the guy you will be replacing, or is it a genuine offer?