Reconciling my own understanding of myself with boss/colleague understanding of me?

Question

I'm a dev with two years experience who was just recently (think two weeks) denied a promotion. I currently work in enterprise software.

At this company, promotions work through applying, interviewing, and then a number of people outside your team and department decide whether you would be a good choice for the promotion. That board consists of both technicals and non-technicals. They collect references from others on your team as well.

I had a couple of meetings to review with relevant people about where I might have failed.

My boss's boss (a non-technical) doesn't understand why I was denied. He found it strange given my relatively high profile in the company. He is arguably my strongest advocate in the company. He gave me my first promotion from contract to permanent after 4 months (my company will often keep people on contract for years) and he got that extra position approved by mentioning me to the CTO.

My technical boss doesn't think I'm actually that sharp a developer (no reason given), but rather just better at conversing with the product owner about what is required, which reduces the time I spend on my work. I am also more organized than others in his view, boosting my productivity further (I have a whiteboard with my prioritized to-do list at my desk).

Senior dev (think 2nd in command) prefers to work with me on projects because I am more disciplined about my approach to development than others.

My non-technical boss (I am theoretically co-managed, which is its own messy story) barely knows my name as he is either out talking to clients or never leaves his office, so I can't get any useful feedback from him.

A co-worker who I don't get along with took the denial (he knows as promotions are generally in waves, so everyone kinda knows who got one and who didn't) to call me a bullshitter.

Firstly, this is a huge shot to my confidence as everything I do in my life is development. I often jet off to a hackathon after work and then come back for the Monday morning after a night in a hotel. I have open source contributions, albeit to smaller projects. I have a number of guest pieces on software development on various blogs.

More importantly (my goal for this question), I now need to figure out how to get an objective assessment of what I am good at and from that, figure out how to move forward (I am probably going to leave my current company either way, but need to write a strategy guide for it). How can one objectively assess oneself when faced with contradictory external information?

My initial response was to send out a bunch of resumes to get a market assessment of myself. No trouble getting replies, including from Amazon.

Answer 1

Firstly, this is a huge shot to my confidence

Try to ignore this for now. You don't know exactly (yet) what's going on and it's entirely possible that the problem is inside the process or your chain of command and has nothing to do with you.

I now need to figure out how to get an objective assessment of what I am good at

Yes, you do. But more importantly you need to get an objective assessment of what you are NOT good at so you can start working on it. Chances are you do have a few blind spots that you are not aware of. Most people do.

How can one objectively assess oneself when faced with contradictory external information?

You need to have a sit-down with your manager and maybe HR. Ask formally for feedback and the rationale why you didn't get the promotion. Be clear that you are not challenging or disputing the decision (even if you feel otherwise) but that you need to know what requirements you are not meeting, so you can actually start working on them. Ask for a written career development plan with clear action items, requirements, check in points and a time line. Don't let them brush you off, be friendly and collaborative but insistent.

At the same time ping other people whose judgement you trust for feedback. Ask SPECIFICALLY for things you can improve on. Negative feedback is hard to get and it's not fun to receive, but it's by far the most valuable.

My boss's boss (a non-technical) doesn't understand why I was denied

That's bizarre. It's their job to know this and at that level they should have a significant part in the decision making. At the very least they should be able to find out, so this may be worth a follow up conversation.

If you try all these things and get no traction, than it's indeed time to polish your resume and go job shopping. What you are asking for is entirely reasonable and standard practice in many companies. If your company doesn't want to engage in your career development, it's probably not long term viable.

Answer 2

First off, it's important to note the reason you were denied a promotion isn't necessarily down to you. It could be internal power plays / politics, budget restrictions, focus on other departments, etc. - assuming it's solely down to your abilities is fallacious.

Even if it is down to your abilities - from your description, you seem to have a high level manager who really likes you, a technical boss who's not that convinced by you, and a non-technical boss who barely knows who you are. Your best bet to improve in this area is therefore:

• Talk with your technical boss, understand his reservations about your technical ability and then work to improve those.
• Try to get on speaking contact with your non-technical boss if possible.

However, both the above could be "long term" at best. Convincing someone you've changed your stripes can be hard, and it sounds like your other boss is going to be hard to track down.

For that reason:

My initial response was to send out a bunch of resumes to get a market assessment of myself. No trouble getting replies, including from Amazon.

I'd suggest you seriously consider following up on this. The easiest, and most reliable way to get a promotion is usually to switch jobs rather than to be promoted internally. You could put a lot of effort here into trying to get a promotion that's unobtainable through no fault of your own, or you could likely land a promotion through applying elsewhere in a few weeks.