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March 29, 2024, 12:38:35 AM

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The concept of a 'junior role' in employment is bullshit

Started by ASFTSN, March 14, 2019, 10:23:21 AM

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ASFTSN

"Junior" now basically means "unfortunate enough to have graduated after or around the 2008 worldwide financial crisis. It can also mean anyone under the age of 40.

Just witnessed a bloke who works harder than anyone else in the company nearly lose it because of this crap. He's normally calm, funny, collected, knowledgable and ready to learn, goes out of his way to help everyone as much as he possibly can and I've just seen him leave the office to trek to the CEOs house from London to East Sussex with a device to ready for a tech demo in a combination of courier duty, dogsbody and complex tech support, all of which is way way out of the scope of his contracted duties.

Staff of less than 20 people, and this guy earns considerably less that £20k at the age of nearly 30 while there's staff on payroll here on £60+k. He's worked here for 18 months and isn't in any sort of probationary period. No HR department, no complaints system, and when I've brought up how unfair this to senior members of staff I've been told it's because....


"It's a junior role."

This is for a guy with a technical degree and coding skills.

Hey old guys and girls - how does this compare with the situation when you were working in offices in the 80's and 90's?

ASFTSN

And there isn't really a union as such that could help here I don't think, and you can't really convince a person in the middle of being crushed by circumstances to join one.


Paul Calf

I was considered junior until I gained enough skills to convince people that I shouldn't be considered junior. There's no objective standard for this, and considering that juniors are cheaper to employ, economic circumstances will always form part of the criteria for judging.

No-one described me as a senior technician until well into my 30s. I think generally, no-one with less than 10 years' relevant experience that they've actually learned from could be considered senior in a technical role.

Technical degrees do not qualify you to practice technical skills in a commercial environment.

Paul Calf

Having said that:

1. Being described as 'junior' at the age of 30 with skills and experience is a piss-take and he should go elsewhere. He might not be senior, but he doesn't sound like a junior.
2. Less than 20k is a massive piss-take. He should definitely go elsewhere.

ASFTSN

Quote from: Paul Calf on March 14, 2019, 10:52:28 AM
No-one described me as a senior technician until well into my 30s. I think generally, no-one with less than 10 years' relevant experience that they've actually learned from could be considered senior in a technical role.

Technical degrees do not qualify you to practice technical skills in a commercial environment.

I'm not saying he should be considered a senior role in anything, I'm saying people shouldn't take the piss and hide behind flimsy justifications based on age. It's basically been made clear that you have less grounds for complaint if you're being made to do things not in your job spec, because you're younger.

ASFTSN

Sorry, posted while you were writing your follow up points.


I work for a multinational IT firm, and junior roles are genuinely that: roles for somebody who isn't as experienced (or as good) as seniors.  It took me about two years to graduate from junior to senior.

This firm sounds like it's either taking the piss, or too small to know the above, or both.  It sounds like he's punching above his pay-grade, but I don't know the criteria for promotion in this firm.

My approach would be: get a new, better paying job, and use that as leverage to get a payrise and a decent job title.  It's ultimately up to him though.

bgmnts

Quote from: drummersaredeaf on March 14, 2019, 11:23:49 AM
Knock this on the head.

He's obviously capable and experienced. He should bin working for these bellends and go off somewhere else is all.

I am in agreement with the original post obviously.

People being forced to jump ship whenever employers do something stupid like this just buttresses their power. I get that pragmatically he might be best leaving, but wrongheadedness is best challenged. It's the same rationale employers have moaning when people apply for jobs they don't want but also only offering pay rises when someone has a better offer elsewhere.

Shoulders?-Stomach!

Pretty depressing responses so far. The fundamental problem of deskilling while directors enjoy obscene salaries and bonuses can't be solved by recommending everyone at the bottom end work elsewhere.

bgmnts

Quote from: drummersaredeaf on March 14, 2019, 01:38:23 PM
People being forced to jump ship whenever employers do something stupid like this just buttresses their power. I get that pragmatically he might be best leaving, but wrongheadedness is best challenged. It's the same rationale employers have moaning when people apply for jobs they don't want but also only offering pay rises when someone has a better offer elsewhere.

I'm a greedy cunt CEO manager type, convince me to pay you more. Go!

Utter Shit

Quote from: Shoulders?-Stomach! on March 14, 2019, 01:43:20 PM
Pretty depressing responses so far. The fundamental problem of deskilling while directors enjoy obscene salaries and bonuses can't be solved by recommending everyone at the bottom end work elsewhere.

So what should he do then? Hang around and get increasingly angry about how disgusting and unfair it all is, and end up still there (only more miserable) in a few years because there's fuck all chance of there being any systemic change, because the people in charge of implementing those changes are the same directors who benefit from the inequality?

Even if there was any chance of this guy being at the vanguard of systemic change - and obviously there isn't - it wouldn't happen any time soon. If his priority is being more respected, or more financially secure, or happier than his current job allows in whatever way, the logical next step is to look for a new job. Hanging around and demanding things improve might be the principled thing to do, but I don't imagine it would be the most successful. There's no point in trying to interact with the world as you think it should be, you need to interact with it as it is, ie. completely fucked.

Endicott

Quote from: ASFTSN on March 14, 2019, 10:23:21 AM
Staff of less than 20 people, and this guy earns considerably less that £20k at the age of nearly 30 while there's staff on payroll here on £60+k. He's worked here for 18 months and isn't in any sort of probationary period. No HR department, no complaints system, and when I've brought up how unfair this to senior members of staff I've been told it's because....

Companies like this don't have a promotion structure, and given their attitude it's almost inevitable that the one at the bottom gets all the dogsbody work. Unless he has a good relationship with the firm and they've made him promises about the future that he has confidence in (and it doesn't really sound like it based on what's been written), he's stuck in a dead end.

Choices - moan about it, cause a stink, get sacked, claim unfair dismissal if you're lucky enough to fall under one of the clauses available to people who haven't been there for 2 years, or get another job asap.

Eventually they will realise they can't keep continuity of staff at that wage level, then they either don't care, or they put the salary up. That's how it works.

Quote
Hey old guys and girls - how does this compare with the situation when you were working in offices in the 80's and 90's?

Not much different I reckon.

Zetetic

Quote from: ASFTSN on March 14, 2019, 10:23:21 AM
"Junior" now basically means "unfortunate enough to have graduated after or around the 2008 worldwide financial crisis."

This is worth emphasising. The young (16-25?) during a recession tend to experience life-long impacts - they're stuck with 'worse' CVs compared to generations either side, they're less likely to be able to stay in full-time education or receive part-time education and so on.

(I note I'm not talking from experience, because I am extremely fortunate in a number of Wales. The closest thing to advice I can possibly proffer for individuals is, if you have any marketable skills, find places where they're rarer - which usually means moving to places that are themselves something of a dead end.)

thenoise

Is this man you by any chance?

Yeah I was used and abused by 3 different companies over 10 years, treated like shit by managers bizarrely proud of their lack of 'formal' education and only ever got payrises for going and working for a rival. They are all the same, rotten to the core, ran by cunts and only cunts succeed in them. I live in Cornwall now and tutor the cello.

Danger Man

Quote from: Zetetic on March 14, 2019, 05:10:43 PM
(I note I'm not talking from experience, because I am extremely fortunate in a number of Wales. The closest thing to advice I can possibly proffer for individuals is, if you have any marketable skills, find places where they're rarer - which usually means moving to places that are themselves something of a dead end.)


One of the lesser known Wales, I assume.

Zetetic

Clearly had the end in mind at the start. Anyway, 'ways' of course.

Janie Jones

This guy has a technical degree and coding skills? And he's on under £20k? Hmm. There must be some other factor at play that you either don't know or aren't telling us.

flotemysost

I think there's a cultural/structural problem in a lot of companies where it's impossible to progress unless someone above you leaves - so you end up with lots of talented, dedicated people in 'junior' roles who might be stuck on a lower salary rung or job title for years (even though they may well have worked their arses off and taken on increased workloads), with no hope of progressing unless someone leaves/retires/dies etc.

A while ago, when my manager at the time was due to go on maternity leave in a few months (someone else would be covering, but I'd have to step up a bit as that person was new to the company), I was called for a 'catch up' with her manager. I'd been in the role for about 2 years, but because of various changes in the company I'd taken on a fairly increased workload within that time, which on the whole had gone pretty well (I think).

During this meeting he kept saying things like 'Well, when she's gone, this is a chance to prove what you can do', 'You'll have to really step up and take on more responsibility, but this could work out well for you' and stuff like that, only to round it off by saying ' ..and who knows, maybe in a couple of years, she'll have ANOTHER baby, and we'll see what happens then, eh!'

Not even going to go into how presumptuous (and also possibly sexist) that was, but it pissed me off. My salary's not bad but it wasn't even about that, it was just the patronising implication that you should be striving for this dangled carrot which maybe, just maybe, will be offered to you on the off-chance that some external circumstance means the team structure changes.

And yeah, if the guy in the OP's quandary is a skilled coder that salary does sound unrealistic.

wooders1978

Sorry but it sounds like a junior role on the surface

Urinal Cake

The meritocracy doesn't exist. The only options are to negotiate a new salary or threaten to leave.

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: Urinal Cake on March 14, 2019, 10:17:58 PM
The meritocracy doesn't exist. The only options are to negotiate a new salary or threaten to leave.

"complex tech support".... he's a task or two from making himself indispensible, possibly, & gaining some leverage. leaving the situation won't fix it, & he could end up worse off- shitty or no references.

Urinal Cake

Choices aren't without risks. OP obviously values this guy's work. But the OP has gone as far as they can advocating for the guy. I presume the OP has talked to the guy?

Sebastian Cobb

My work tends to employ juniors as grads/out of college abd bumps them to dev within a couple of years
One was a high school drop out, who is better than a lot of grads tbf. Seems fair enough. Keeping a junior at 30 is a piss take though.