2y ago

Is the old advice to change companies every two-ish years still the best practice for career advancement?

I recall a regular piece of advice for software engineers: “change your job every two years.”

There’s innumerable Google results for this, even from as recently as 2022 — but none of them really seem that high-quality?

I’m really, really enjoying my current (somewhat unusual, hard-to-replicate) position; am about a year and a half into it; but I also don’t want to relax into that and have it cost me in the long-run, career advancement wise.

So, what’ve y’all been doing? Especially in the post-pandemic/fully-remote world, does that advice still apply?

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24 comments

The real answer is "it depends", but that said, I think when you're early in your career you will advance faster, and increase your compensation more quickly by switching jobs.
I do also think there are advantages to see how different organizations and industries tackle similar problems.
But if you have a job you're happy with, are getting paid fairly, have a good manager/team, then I wouldn't just change jobs for no reason.
As you get later in your career though I do think it's easier to get promoted to more senior/staff/architect roles from within. Taking on a high level leadership position at a new company comes with its own set of challenges that are not the same for a tenured engineer that gets promoted.

24 comments