When to leave the first tech job

Slashdot has a link to an article on this.

Having shifted a few jobs myself, I do have some experience to talk on this subject :-). But I will not bore you with all the details. I will just take a few points out of the article.

Cubicles

I think Dilbert has made cubicles the nemesis of all Tech people. Well, they are good and not so good. IF you have the people of your group sitting together - they are great. The whole team will be together and I find that your work satisfaction and efficiency increases. So, I guess its more a problem of having the teams together rather than the cubicles which is the probelm.

The problem comes in when you start differentiating the cubicles. When you have different sized cubicle for different people. That leads to a feeling of being excluded even when you are part of the same team.

Management

The management problems cited in the post are the most prevalent ones. Unfortunately, I still have not come across to a solution to the problem. I think its a case of the wrong people in the wrong job.

Take for instance how the carrer grows in Indian companies.

Traditionally , most jobs in India have been associated with your growth in the different parts of the company. I think it is because of the 'babu' culture that is there in India. During the British rule , the Indians were given jobs as clerks and had to grow up the ladder. That has had a fallout in the post-independence era also. The Civil services is one such example - where people join at the lowest rung and hope to reach the highest rung by the time they retire.

That now translates to the IT industry also. The path that people see for growth is of joining as a low level tech person, growing up to a tech lead, a team lead and then from that point onwards to a Manager .... and so on. However, in the Civil Services (CS) people generally take up more and more responsibility as they progress onwards. In the Tech field - the change is just drastic.

So, we have people ( and I think I should include myself here) who have been working as nerds and geeks who suddenly are confronted with the task of Managing a team - which roughly translates to "Get the work done by THE date" - and have no idea of how to do it. So, we become the Dilbert Managers. :(

Recently the technical line has started to come into play in Indian companies - where tech people do what they do best - work on tech. But, still, the way to riches is through the management route ... and that's what translates to your social status also.

There's only one thing a person can do in this case - Dilbert to the rescue !!! ( PS. bought another of the Dilbert books to help me over this tide! )