What Actually Stops People From Getting Promoted

This is probably only true for small companies, startups, or founder-led organizations — but that's my world, so that's what I know.

Over the years, I've worked with a lot of smart engineers. Driven engineers. People who worked nights, weekends, nonstop.

And yet… many of them never moved up.

So what actually makes the difference?

For me, it comes down to one thing: the ability to reinvent yourself as the company grows.

The "Not My Job" Trap

Early in my career, I worked at a very small company. There weren't neatly defined roles. No database guy. No DevOps. No frontend vs backend. There were maybe 5–6 developers total — and in my office, three people.

If something touched technology, it landed on us.

Email needed to be set up? Us. New server? We researched vendors and bought it. Office IT issues? Us.

That was just how it worked.

I still remember one night clearly. The roof was leaking, the office was flooding, and maintenance wasn't there. We went up on the roof in the rain and unclogged the drain.

My wife called asking why I wasn't home yet. I told her what I was doing.

She said, "Why are you doing that? That's not your job."

And that's when it clicked. That mindset — "not my job" — is what quietly kills careers.

Throughout my career, I was the person who never said it.

Not because I was trying to be a hero. Not because I wanted credit.

But because if something needed to be done, my instinct was always: I can probably figure this out.

The Power of Working in the Shadows

That curiosity pushed me far outside my lane — SEO, infrastructure, networking, design, product direction, affiliate marketing. I didn't manage those teams, but I learned enough to ask better questions, push back when something didn't make sense, and influence decisions.

I didn't walk into my boss's office saying, "Can you teach me this?"

I worked in the shadows. I observed. I researched. I formed opinions. Then I spoke with clarity.

That difference matters.

Approach	What It Looks Like	How It's Perceived
Asking for Permission	"Can you teach me design/product/marketing?"	Needs hand-holding, waiting to be trained
Working in Shadows	Learn independently, form opinions, speak with clarity	Self-directed, brings solutions not questions
Transactional Mindset	"I did X, where's my promotion?"	Entitled, doesn't understand leadership
Pattern Building	Consistently removes friction over time	Trusted problem-solver, promotion-ready

The real turning point came when we were building a new product. We were meeting constantly with product and design. The process was slow: discuss an idea, wait a few days for a mockup, iterate, wait again.

Nothing was wrong. It was just inefficient.

Seeing Patterns Others Can't See

What I saw were patterns.

The same components. The same layouts. The same logic — redesigned from scratch every time.

I tried explaining it, but it didn't land. Either I wasn't explaining it well, or they couldn't see what I saw. So after one meeting I said:

"I'm going to try something tonight at home. Is that okay?"

They said yes.

I went home, built a rough version, and brought it back the next day.

We walked through it. Then we kept going. Day after day.

And suddenly everything changed.

Design iterations sped up. Decisions became clearer. Progress became visible.

Everyone could feel the difference.

That moment didn't immediately get me a promotion. And that's important.

What it did do was change how my boss saw me.

I wasn't "the developer" anymore. I became the person he could hand an unclear problem to and trust that it would move forward.

Not because I was a designer. Not because I had the title.

But because I removed friction instead of absorbing it.

The Pattern of Trust

From that point on, when something was stuck — I was the one they looked to. When a problem needed solving — I was the one they called. And when opportunities eventually opened up, I was already in their head.

That's the part people miss.

You don't do one thing and then expect a promotion.

I had people come to me all the time saying, "I did this thing — why haven't I been promoted yet?"

And I'd tell them, settle down. If you approach this transactionally, you'll end up bitter and jaded.

Promotions don't come from single acts. They come from patterns of trust.

Here's the real distinction I see now:

Good operators absorb chaos. Good leaders remove it.

Plenty of people are willing to help. Plenty of people want to do more.

But wanting to help isn't enough.

Leadership starts when you stop asking "how can I contribute?" and start asking "why does this problem exist at all?"

The Key Questions That Matter

When you're stuck and wondering why you're not moving up, ask yourself these questions:

1. Am I absorbing chaos or removing it?

• Absorbing: "I'll handle this task/problem/crisis"
• Removing: "Why does this keep happening? How do we fix the system?"

2. Do I wait for permission or do I build trust through action?

• Waiting: "Can someone teach me this? Should I learn that?"
• Building: "I learned this on my own, here's what I think we should do"

3. Am I thinking transactionally or building patterns?

• Transactional: "I did X, Y, and Z — where's my promotion?"
• Patterns: Consistently solving problems no one asked me to solve

4. Do I see myself as having a defined role or as someone who solves whatever needs solving?

• Defined: "That's not really my area, someone else should handle it"
• Solving: "I don't know much about that, but I can probably figure it out"

5. When problems arise, do I ask for direction or do I present options?

• Asking: "What should I do about this?"
• Presenting: "Here's the situation, here are three options, I think we should do X because Y"

What Actually Makes You Promotion-Ready

The people who move up fastest in my experience share these traits:

They don't wait to be given scope - They see gaps and fill them before being asked. They notice inefficiencies and fix them without permission.

They make decisions easier for leadership - Instead of escalating problems, they escalate options. Instead of creating more meetings, they eliminate the need for them.

They learn adjacently - They don't just master their domain; they learn enough about surrounding domains to connect dots others miss.

They build things that compound - Every solution creates leverage for future problems. Every system improvement makes the next one easier.

They make others better - Their presence elevates the team. When they leave a conversation, things move faster, not slower.

The Uncomfortable Truth

Here's what I wish someone had told me earlier: you can't ask for a seat at the table.

You have to make the table easier to run.

That means:

• Spotting problems before they become crises
• Building systems that prevent recurring issues
• Making decisions that leaders trust without review
• Creating clarity where there was confusion
• Removing blockers that slow everyone down

You don't move up by asking "what else can I do?"

You move up by looking around and thinking "why is this still a problem?"

The Reinvention Requirement

The ability to reinvent yourself as the company grows is what separates people who get promoted from people who get stuck.

In a 10-person startup, you might be the person who fixes servers and deploys code. At 50 people, you're the one designing systems and mentoring juniors. At 200 people, you're thinking about organizational structure and technical strategy.

The skills that got you promoted to senior engineer won't get you promoted to staff engineer. The mindset that made you a great IC won't make you a great manager.

You have to be willing to let go of being "the person who codes the fastest" and become "the person who makes the team move faster."

That's hard. That's uncomfortable. And that's why most people don't do it.

What This Actually Looks Like in Practice

Let me give you a concrete example from my career at OddsTrader.

We were building out new features at a rapid pace, but our deployment process was a nightmare. Every release involved manual testing, coordination across multiple people, waiting for QA sign-off, and hoping nothing broke in production.

I wasn't the DevOps lead. I wasn't responsible for CI/CD. But I kept watching deployments take days when they should take hours.

I didn't go to my boss and say "our deployment process is slow, what should we do?"

Instead, I spent a weekend learning about automated testing strategies for our specific stack. I researched deployment pipelines. I mapped out where the bottlenecks actually were.

Then I built a proof-of-concept.

Nothing fancy. Just enough to show: "Here's how we could deploy twice a day instead of once a week. Here's the testing coverage we'd need. Here's what breaks if we do this wrong."

I presented it in Monday's standup. Not as "look what I built" but as "here's a problem I noticed and a potential solution — what do you all think?"

That prototype became our deployment system. But more importantly, it changed how leadership saw me.

I wasn't just an engineer who shipped features. I was someone who saw systematic problems and fixed them proactively.

Six months later when they needed someone to lead the infrastructure overhaul, I was the obvious choice — not because I had the most experience with infrastructure, but because I had demonstrated the pattern they needed: see problem, research solution, build proof, drive change.

Why Smart People Still Get Stuck

I've seen brilliant engineers plateau for years. Not because they weren't talented. Not because they weren't working hard.

But because they kept absorbing chaos instead of removing it.

They became the "go-to person" for solving urgent problems — which feels like leadership but isn't. They were indispensable for their ability to put out fires, not for their ability to prevent them.

Being indispensable for execution is not the same as being ready for leadership.

Leadership is about making yourself unnecessary in your current role so you can take on the next one.

The Bottom Line

Or said more bluntly:

You don't move up by asking for a seat at the table. You move up by making the table easier to run.

That's the difference.

When you consistently remove friction, solve problems before they escalate, and make decisions easier for the people above you — promotion stops being something you ask for and becomes something they can't imagine not giving you.

Not because you demanded it. But because everyone already sees you operating at that level.

That's when promotion becomes inevitable.