Traffic Jams 🚗 🚗

How to leverage your knowledge of job ladders to circumvent a period of slow growth.

So you got a staff job! You’re an official employee of a company. Well done, you.

You’ve found your groove. You’re kicking butt and taking names on a regular basis. You get showered with praise by your clients. Everything’s just peachy….only…you’ve been in this role a couple years, and no one’s really talking about growth. Promotion. Movin’ on up.

In a previous article, I wrote about some factors that get in your way when it comes to growth. But today I want to take a deep dive into one of the main issues that happens when it comes to growth: a Traffic Jam.

What do I mean by this?

Well, if you recall from the last post, we talked about Job Ladders. If you need a refresher, here’s an illustration of 3 different kinds of job ladders:

Going off this image alone, you might conclude that in order to go the next level up, you just decide to climb and then you’re on your way. You’re always pointed “up.” And the “Up-est Title” is guaranteed to be bestowed upon you - if you just continue to climb.

That’s absolutely not the case.

For most companies, there are a limited number of positions available at any given level. Even when there’s no official limit, there’s an unofficial limit.

On one hand, this makes financial sense. Companies have to balance their revenue against how much they spend to run the company. So they can’t keep promoting and hiring forever. They also have to have enough work to support all the people they’ve hired. There’s also a limited number of managers that are needed to organize everyone. This is all somewhat reasonable.

However, the other part of this is just that our society has the concept of a hierarchy deeply ingrained in almost all facets of life, but especially in business. Even in “flat” organizations, there is still hierarchy. As a society, we equate growth to superiority - in the form of money and title.

Given all that, it might be more accurate to show a job ladder as a job pyramid instead. (see figure below)

The gray circles indicate vacant roles or available promotions in this example, and demonstrate where moving up is possible. Do you spot the “traffic jam”? There’s three Designers, but zero Senior Designer positions available. In order for there to be even one spot for a Designer to move into when they are ready, one of the Senior Designers must get promoted to Art Director simultaneously.

Is it possible there is exactly one candidate who is ready to move up from each level, and whom everyone would agree is the most obvious choice? Maybe; but it’s not super likely. Is it possible that the company reevaluates the number of Senior Designers needed and adds a slot? Sure. But they’re probably not going to add THREE slots.

There’s a Traffic Jam!

How can any of these options be completely fair, no matter what criteria is used? Do you stick to promoting the level below because there are spots available there? Would it be “more fair” not to promote anyone until the way above is clear? What is everyone going to do after this when the whole ladder is then “gridlocked” because there is nowhere for the Art Directors and Senior Designers to rise to in order to create more vacant spots below them? Do you see where I’m going with this?

My point is: for your group lead it’s never just about your promotion or your growth; it’s about how changing this one thing will either help or hinder the big picture of team growth, or create additional ripple effects. A lot of times, there’re only “lose-lose” choices to be made. Your company’s CEO can create additional titles, add additional open positions, or switch things up to a flatter structure if they have the means and motivation, but that’s not who this article is for. The average person on a team has no control over any of that.

I know it’s really hard, but in this instance I would encourage you to try to put yourself in your group lead’s shoes; not necessarily because they deserve your empathy, although they might; but because it will help you figure out your strategy with a cooler head.

Do you also see how there are way more roles available at lower levels than at higher levels? And more vacancies? This is why it is way easier to move “up the ladder” when you are “mid-level-ish”. (By the way, if you did not realize that…it is!)

This is also why I often encourage people NOT to stay very long at the same company when you are in the low to middle section of the “pyramid”. You just mathematically have more momentum and flexibility to move up and increase your salary incrementally as you do so, and it’s very important to take advantage of that. If you’re trying to grow and growth (title or salary-wise) isn’t mathematically possible at your current company due to a traffic jam, then don’t linger there too long. 2 years, maximum, imo.

The “job pyramid” is also why finding an executive role (eg, Executive Creative Director) can take a lot longer than a job search for say, a Senior Designer. There just aren’t as many higher-level roles available, period. You may want to consider this before you try to race up that ladder like a bat out of hell. It can be a smart play to stay at the “senior” level longer (and thus longer at a reasonably decent compensation) before you try to rush up to the “executive” level and hit the extreme limit of the number of roles available.

As you can see, it becomes really important to ask how a team is organized when you’re interviewing or even just having a casual conversation with your boss. Knowing that answer will give you more direct and valuable information about the real likelihood of moving up once you have satisfied the qualifications required of the next level.

Note: Unfortunately, many companies are not organized enough or developed enough to be able to give you a job ladder. The job ladder might not be set in stone, either.

All you can do in that case is to record the job titles that currently exist, and inquire about whether what’s currently there is fixed or if there might be different titles available as time goes on.

I also want to warn you that you may not be able to get an org chart - those are often confidential and may not even get distributed internally. So you’re probably going to have to do things the old fashioned way here - that is, ask questions about what the team is like, take notes of how many groups, groups leads, subgroups there are, name & titles, and use your notes to make your own rough diagram.

That is not to say there are no online resources; you can check websites like The Org where you can look up org charts for various organizations. But I would assume those kinds of tools are not particularly accurate. Asking someone who knows or using an internal company look-up tool will always be your best bet.

This post would be incomplete if I were not to add that from a personal POV, I don’t love how our hierarchical society functions to squeeze people out the more experience they gain. But the goal of this (for me) is to arm you with knowledge so you can crack the system - and then go forth and invent better systems, with better leaders at the helm. Godspeed.

XOXO,

Cathy