Tech Talk given by Sumbry at /dev/color where we dive into the specifics of how to advocate for yourself and get ahead in your career by understanding the engineering org chart.

1. Demystifying the
Engineering Org Chart
sumbry@sumbry.com
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2. About Me
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Name: Sumbry
Email: sumbry@sumbry.com
Twitter: @sumbry
Aliases: Sumbrizzle, Sumbrymatic, Gumby
Quotes: “Never trust a skinny cook”

3. The Why
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A software company’s
purpose is to deliver a
product. How that is
accomplished varies wildly
between organizations.
Your success as an
engineer depends on
being able to navigate the
org successfully and
advocate for yourself.

4. The Agenda
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● Hierarchies
● Levels
● Structures
● Roles
● Ladders

5. A Story
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● Tech-Lead for dev team
● Designed and built most systems
● Hired my own boss
● Weekly 1:1s
● Did not understand my contributions
● Told me I needed to be more strategic
● Was confused for a year
● The gap was in how I communicated
You’re being too tactical!

6. Human Hierarchies
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7. We Need Order
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The term organizational structure refers to how the people in
an organization are grouped and to whom they report.
Humans have always loved hierarchies.

8. The Egyptians
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9. USMC
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10. Industrial Organization
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11. International Organization
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12. Dunder Mifflin
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13. Computers
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14. The Kobe Effect
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You cannot change the rules of an organization unless you first
learn to play by them.
No one is going to listen to you if you do not play the game.
Humans have always loved hierarchies … and games.

15. Operating Levels
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16. Operating Levels
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Visionary
Strategic
Operational
Tactical
● Founder / CEO
- Big Picture, Creates the mission, Why (President)
● Executives
- Develops the plan, executes, How (General)
● Managers
- Drives process, continuously delivers, When (Sargeant)
● Individual Contributors
- Builds the thing, worker bee, What (Corporal)

17. Communicating between Levels
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● Visionaries
- Communicate with broad strokes and generalities
- Do not dive into details
● Strategists
- Paint a picture of the future and plan of attack
- Do not get stuck with implementation details
● Operators
- Describe the process used to accomplish work or execute
- Do not ignore the worst case scenario or bike shed
● Tacticians
- Talk in specifics
- Do not gloss over details

18. Org Structures
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19. Types of Org Structures
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Bureaucratic Functional Divisional Matrix Flat
Description Strict hierarchy
with a leader who
makes all
decisions and
minions who
execute
Divisions are
grouped
together around
products or
functions
Self-contained
group with all of
its own
functions
necessary to
ship a product
Organized
around
Products with
each Product
Org having its
own functions
Self-organizes
depending on
need. No
formal structure
or managers
Attributes Command and
control
Decentralized
specialists and
supply chains
Rivalries among
countries and
products
Product
Managers rule
all
Everyone
reports to the
CEO
Examples Walmart Amazon Microsoft Facebook Zappos

20. Types of Org Structures
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Flat
Matrix
Functional
Divisional
Hybrid
Bureaucratic

21. Org Roles
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22. Organizational Roles
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● Executives
- Devise strategies and policies to ensure an organization meets its goals
- Board Members, CEOs, CTOs, Vice Presidents
● Managers
- Plan, direct, and coordinate operational activities
- Directors, Managers
● Individual Contributors
- The only part of an organization that produces anything
- Tech Leads, Engineers

23. Corporate Ladders
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24. Career Ladders
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● Management & Executive Ladder
- Career path that executives and managers follow
● Individual Contributor Ladder
- Career path that individual contributors follow

25. The Old Days
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Software Engineer
Senior Software Engineer
Manager
Senior Manager
Director
Senior Director
Vice President
SVP
CTO

26. Dual Ladders
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Software Engineer
Senior Software Engineer
Staff Engineer
Senior Staff Engineer
Principal Engineer
Senior Principal Engineer
Fellow
Senior Fellow
Manager
Senior Manager
Director
Senior Director
Vice President
SVP
CTO
Management Individual
Contributors

27. Reporting Structure
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Senior Software Engineer Senior Software Engineer
Staff Engineer
Senior Staff Engineer
Principal Engineer
Senior Principal Engineer
Fellow
Senior Fellow
Manager
Senior Manager
Director
Senior Director
Vice President
SVP
CTO
Software Engineer Software Engineer
Manager
Senior Manager

28. Engineering Individual Contributors
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● Software Engineer
- Entry level software engineer that knows a single system well
● Senior Software Engineer
- Career software engineer that knows several systems well
● Staff Engineer
- Tech lead who has deep domain experience that spans multiple systems
● Senior Staff Engineer
- Tech lead who may influence other tech leads and direct multiple groups and systems
● Principal Engineer
- When domain knowledge gets deep enough, you land here
● Fellow
- The technical face of the company, you should be scared of them. CTO is just a visionary.

29. Different Types of Engineers
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● Software Engineer
● Network Engineer
● Security Engineer
● Quality Engineer
● Systems Engineer
● Performance Engineer

30. In Summary
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31. In Conclusion
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● Five types of organizational structures:
- Bureaucratic, Functional, Divisional, Matrix, Flat
● Four types of operating levels:
- Visionary, Strategic, Operational, Tactical
● Three types of roles:
- Executives, Managers, Individual Contributors
● Two types of career ladders:
- Management, ICs
● Lots of specializations:
- Systems, Software, Quality, Network, Performance, etc
● Always One Hierarchy

32. Don’t Forget
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You cannot change the rules of an organization unless you first
learn to play by them.
Know the career ladder of your organization.
Humans have always loved hierarchies.

33. Questions?
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