I'm now past my time that I can recruit away from MSFT after leaving some time ago. if they'd only stop doing X and start doing Y on a sustained basis, I could see it Microsoft: Citi Cuts Ests, Target On PC Slowdown. Your response is private Was this worth your time? Sometimes the answer is, "well, we'll see" and other times the answer is, "if they'd only stop doing X and start doing Y on a sustained basis, I could see it". There may be multiple reasons for pay differences - one of which is a small number of salaries submitted per job. kc. Microsoft employees make an average base salary of $208k & a total compensation of $280k. Success breeds Success: I remember reading an article about an extensive study to determine the best predictor of a stocks price tomorrow. Bottom line: Dont be shy of asking for promotions during internal transfers. Can any reader in Corp Sales Excellence(SMS&P) privide guidance on how to grow from 63 to 64 in that group. It's also a well-known fact that there is a disparity in levels between Office and now Sinofsky's Windows and the rest of the company, especially below 65 level.About asking your manager and getting their feedback, we're assuming that managers are capable of giving candid feedback. Of course not. At the beginning of each FY, I always asked, "I want to get Exceeded this year. In this article, we have explained the Job levels at Microsoft which starts at SDE and goes up to Technical Fellow. You're cursed for life.2. Working with high EQ allows you to collaborate better. Do not accept promises, or you will be already disappointed with your new team as soon as some promises dont materialize (and believe me: you will lose your patience long before some promises materialize). I'd like to hear some more experiences from MCS. New shiny brain up and working now. Many 62s (and 63s) make substantially more than 64s. Know when your market worth changes with our verified salaries newsletter, See exactly how much your competitors pay. Promotion budgets of 65 and above has been kept intact.Where did you hear this? And as my experience shows, many teams do not even staff a senior. After all, if you think you are already ready, and your manager doesn't, there is probably some way you can improve that you don't understand -- this is something you want to figure out.6. Moved to a role where I could see headroom and also where I could set specific commits and accountabilities with the GM, which I then exceeded and moved to L63 in '04. Do you think I can find a way to do almost as well and stay here, in this job I enjoy?" * One final important thought that hasn't been mentioned here and that is very dear to my heart is one that is not only specific to 63 but also to 65+, 66+, and 67+, and it is about moving up when you are a female at MSFT. Former is work of many years and long nights and proven track record while later is basically your ability to bullshit through 6 interviews. However, the results show that the vast majority of dev/test/pm will make level 63 and in a reasonable timeframe. This means there are 24 distinct job levels at Microsoft. I've been at Microsoft six years.I've never spent one second honestly thinking about my career or how to get a promotion or anything like that. i've been hearing this.. you know when you are about to cut a small feature and do balancing in your sprint/milestone essentially this is happening at VP level. Of course, it goes without saying that if you dont have any substance you will likely hurt yourself badly and get ignored with vengeance next time. There are tons of Principles and L64s anyone can immediately recall who are not doing anything above or beyond their immediate teams. Senior directors are tenured members of an organization who are considered part of the leadership or executive team, in which they represent their department or division. In general, these designations are based on rank, with the highest director position being the executive director or director of operations. VP has to find the 10 devs from some other less attractive project. Senior level executive excelling at increasing operational efficiencies, improving . These are sole individual personal points-of-view and the posts and comments by the participants in no way represent the official point-of-view of Microsoft or any other organization. So a sub role at L61 = corp L63 and vice versa.So from a sub perspective:L58 and below are relatively junior roles where you have zero influence outside of meeting your commitmentsL59 -> L60 is a tougher jump. It's because you were playing catch-up to Apple, and playing Machiavellian games with the media companies instead of working on the issues that your customers were complaining about.Vista is still unreliable, unsecurable, and a massive pain in the ass to use on a daily basis. Its a bit like the famous phrase about the definition of obscenity. If you think you will follow the management career path then get in such role as early as possible. You can switch jobs internally and get leveled up (typically 6-12 months after) - but make sure you have the conversation with the manager as to what is the expected level and what is the cap. At this point many people will ask how can I influence others if Im not their manager? It can help you identify blind spots which may be holding you back.7. All these comments apply generally to any matured company and life in general. Incompetent people tend to significantly overstate their performance, and significantly understate that of their co-workers. So far, I haven't been successful. . You have to strive to get the KEY to the boss's heart and brain. Add your salary anonymously in less than 60 seconds and continue exploring all the data. It varies greatly from manager to skip.The hardest point for me to bear is that I am young, capable of doing so much more, and absolutely dying to do more. Seek out local critique before you approach people above you. Copyright 2008-2023, Glassdoor, Inc. "Glassdoor" and logo are registered trademarks of Glassdoor, Inc. Over the years, we have acted as a preferred talent acquisition partner to. It's a knife fight to 63. You may be one of those who diligently turn over every single rock to look at problems within the org. But if you start when you think you are ready and work with your manager toward the goal, you'll get there. You might have the Microsoft Senior Career Stage Profile in front of you all marked up and broken into more sections in OneNote, but which ones matter most to your team? Most of our ways of doing things have so many imperfections that you would not have any trouble to find obvious thing to improve in obvious ways. I don't yet have any insight into what it might take to become a Partner, so I won't comment on that. Thats a very helpful answer. However good your manager is, she or he is still a human with insecurities and ego. "I actually find the content of this post to be superficial, fairly naive and not reflective of my experience having moved through the ranks from 59 to >65. Rather nice site you've got here. Don't let HR lie to you, this is a stack rank exercise. Entry level (428) Associate (378) Mid-Senior level (3,385) Director (2,581) Done . I can vouch for the efficacy of this mantra.MS definitely does a good enough job on career progression and offering diverse options. Go and restart in another org and dig through their historical biz and people stability during your informationals. They don't get defensive if their ideas are revealed to have flaws but rather delight in being able to move to a better solution. What are other groups doing? At the end of the day its about $$ and in reality levels mean nothing if your getting paid crap. That means, know what people think about you and what they don't. About Top-performing Senior Director in Digital Strategy & Commercial Development, with 25 years success in top-tier business across new Tech, data and digital in many sectors driving strategy,. If you job simply doesn't scale to that next level - and many don't / can't - then you need to build rapport with your manager to have a focused career discussion about what roles are around to get you there and how you could land in one.2. I will mis-direct and confuse you with hearsay. Right now I am 56. At a basic level, in a company the size of Microsoft, the higher you go, the less you contribute individually and the more you contribute by your impact on an organization - hiring the right people, setting clear and correct goals, driving alignment and execution. ask around for a good mentor or go to our internal mentor site to be matched with a mentor http://mentor/Mentor/user/mymentoring.asp. What worked well and what really horked things up for you? "I'm in the 61 bucket and currently struggling with my team for many months. Take it because it plays to your strengths. Strong operations professional with a Master's Degree focused in Project Management from Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto . Most organizations will do promo/slate through a consensus/stack rank process. And your list of bullet points on qualities of a 63-er is pretty much the short list I have boiled it down to. The L64 guys should be able to influence their skip level orgs plus one or two groups outside of the skip org. also work is good only when it leads to results that typically means team's success. In general, people are not leveled, jobs are. Know where you are in the stack and understand how you will rank higher next year.BTW, forgot to mention I was a manager for the second half of my career. There certainly doesn't seem to be any shortage of people wanting in. ;) I have one thing to add that might help some. I've been hearing some stealth layoffs around the SQL and BOSG groups, around 70+ people were given 6(?) He said this year he could only make strategic promotions, which sounded like promotions of people above 65. As a member of the Microsoft UK Senior Leadership Team, Olaf leads Microsoft's retail and consumer goods . Attack problems within your own areas of influence proactively and generate that same good vibe among peers. I think that the whole culture of the stack rank + fighting for scraps for their directs + a lack of visibility and input on what will justify a promotion is what scares of managers from engaging with their employees regarding career growth.Note, that I am not saying that I want a guarantee one way or the other. This slighlty contradicts some of the other posts. Thanx for it. That is one aspect where they are forced to build fake relationships with directors and GMs to get promoted and unfortunately those who maintain good relatiship with them get promoted. Continue to do so until you've slapped yourself silly to the point that you're not complaining about how other folks must just be connected or political or adept at the finer art of buttock tongue massage. Those teams I used to despise as a L60, and only tolerate as a 63? Managers plan out promotion timeframes far in advance. Don't be afraid to ask your manager some very direct questions.Don't force the issue. Of course I ensure my manager and skip-level are aware of my contribution as a mentor, but I figure that as long as I'm in front of the wave, the best way for me to advance is to move the wave forward. Your commitments should already provide you with milestones to set as your goals. weeks to find another position within the company, otherwise they are laid off.Anyone know others? When she finally left the company four years ago things improved greatly. It's a matter of human nature for most people not to want someone else to pass them up. How about a thread on the current hiring/moving freeze, or on surviving the New Ice Age? Find the right team and manager.2. I thought changing groups would help me get promoted faster however all it did was make me resart from ground zero with each group. When someone gives you the hard advice to succeed, it's quite the gift. But anyway, EOF for that angle. I wasn't sure I was going to get out of a couple of those situations but after everyone of them, I was stronger and smarter.Take the challenge and go after tough problems. I am a troll. This is all well and good, but in 9years I've never worked in a group with a Senior IC (Windows, IE, .NET), though some architects. Is there much motivation to really fix Vista's perception problems?Machiavelli might note that intentionally leaving Vista's reputation in the toilet will make Windows 7 look all that much better when it comes out - allowing some of our VP's pride, ego's and bank balances to swell to truly epic proportions. These turtles gets promoted eventually just based on time spent at MS and because they werent doing anything wrong even though they dont really meet CSP criteria. So, for those of you who are in orgs where it's 'easy' to get to L63 or L64 - think about transferring out BEFORE you get too high a level and paint yourself into a corner. Leverage your professional network, and get hired. Do you know why? One of the key lessons is to know who is the gate keeper for your career. Related Searches:All Senior Director Salaries|All Microsoft Salaries. Here's some advice from a recent L64'er (L63 last year). Mini could you please confirm or deny this. I'm a level 64 lead in Windows and this post is spot on. "2) Peel the onion. Great post and comments. Then L64 took two years. Microsoft and hey if it backfires (eg the mgr flips), I can always take the offer at hand and leave MS.thoughts? This is a great topic! Every spec coming to this team had my feedback in it. ceo/vp/director/manager/lead etc. Things get thrown your way and you knock each and everyone of the challenges out of the park. This past year I had what I thought was an outstanding year, was given a 20%, but not promoted to L63. May 2008: Gold Star. If it is "Absolutely!" Mini himself is quite high level and knowledgable. * It is true that working for the promotion should not be your only driver, but it is important for it to be "a" driver -- of course you should enjoy what you are doing while working to achieve that next level, but remember that you are not there to become a bench-warmer. What is the average promotion velocity for non-technical fields? For context, I have always been "exceeded" or "high achieved", If you want to dig a bit more around job titles which gives you an idea of someones level or the dispersion of a team, remember that the title you see in Outlook is not the real title, its just the address book title. What do you do when your manager is an absolute b***h, a disgrace in meetings with other teams and an embarrassment on her good days? In spite of it, I've been promoted 8 times in 12 years. I am a [sic] HR manager. Everything else is irrelevent or works against your promotion. The person who puts you up for promotion and has promotion conversations with your skip level. It is true you can always do that, go to Google, go to ABC, or whatever. I want to share some of my thoughts about succeeding at Microsoft and reaching Level 63, the Senior contributor level at Microsoft. No manager can bail you out of "bad brand jail" past L625. Mar 26, 2018 2 Wonderful. After all, they are thinking through if you will be a good peer and will be easy to work with (and make their lives better in some way). Be the Rosh Gadol Microsoftie. Sign up on LinkedIn and join the Microsoft Employees or ex-MSFT employees groups and then you'll see them posted. One could easily sack 4000 heads at HQ and R&D nor revenue would take a hit. Those people are almost all Level 62's with few prospects. When I gave notice, my PUM was in my office within an hour showing me stock levels at 65 and 66, willing to restructure my position pretty much to my liking. I've achieved level 65 in a field technical role and it wasn't that hard. According to Glassdoor, senior software engineers at Google can earn $172,818 as their average base pay, along with average cash bonuses of $30,921, stock bonuses of $104,769, and some other cash incentives for a total of $201,000. How do you make sure you do a good job but not too good of a job.Also higher levels will tend to require you to do things you may not like. If you are level 64 and above, your relationship with your GM or VP or above.2) Your visibility to the GM or VP. Would they give you the level if you were not already a Microsoft employee? I basically just hoped that hard work would get me ahead. Chris Capossela. They took credit for work done by others (#2 helps).Seriously, they only way to separate the wheat from the chaff in this company is to allow to interview without notifying the manager. The skip level is totally nonchalant to her ways. I /like/ OneCare. Advice from anyone at Microsoft for 10+ years is great to hear, but hard to follow. Up until L63, you can pretty continue to be promoted based on raw talent to get things done smartly and efficiently. I will mis-direct and confuse you with hearsay. Why are we doing x and not y? Contributed and exceeded in two roles - getting G-Star, then moved to another team with clear headroom and again, exceeded all commits and moved to L64. Strategy and Product Leader for an omni-channel team encompassing blended physical-digital experiences that combine personalized services with customer relationship strengthening across 400- centers. I give you the example from http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/awaits "A busy day awaits" as evidence.So one legitimate missing punctuation mark, one matter of verbal interpretation, one popular idiom, and one completely correct phrase. I'm not even thinking about level 63 at this point. Thoughts? Despite the fact you may be totally right, you can inadvertently be viewed as a negative person.Although your bosses are probably aware of the problems, they might be overwhelmed by the scope of the situation, and start getting annoyed at you for being the person always reminding them about the flaws. Framed on my former VP's wall:"High-level guys are low-level guys that don't whine.". Less than a year is fast, but not unheard of. I think getting promoted elsewhere is not as tough as getting promoted in CTS-GTSC. With wide-eyed wonder he asked WHAT? I said whatever the @#$% your manager most needs you to do!6. Its above level 64 that things get tough, but getting to 64 isn't difficult. more often than not it is up to the employee to use the resources, show maturity and commonsense and move up62 -> 63 is difficult and there is a reason behind it. If you reach L63 during your time at Microsoft, especially if you started at L60 or below, you should celebrate. I drove my 59-62 agenda with an iron fist and it didn't matter so much that I didn't play well with others or work to help other teams who were struggling.I became a manager during that time and had a year of major hiccups while trying to break through to 63 -- all of a sudden the fact that I was a unilateral force was working *against* me and not for me. Will <> reach Level 63 during their career? Then they start pinging the manager on why and putting pressure on them to do something, move them up or out. My manager told me a while ago that I was about to get one. They want you to succeed, they want the team to succeed. Unless you know for sure that your boss's answer is an immediate "Absolutely!" For those impatient folks who want to move up every 18 months, watch out. Give the employee directives and start documenting when they fail so a case can be brought to get rid of them if it comes to that. I'm now off the meds, not seeing the psychiatrist, and living happily.Working at MS was both the best time in my life and the worst time. At 63, he has to be the one who tells me what the next thing for the product should be. Now the setup team for most products has more than 6 devs. Ask yourself: what fraction of your job do you actually enjoy? The scope imcreases, the risk increases and the visbility increases. You should be on the same side. And you know something? Our entire unit was let go but we were moved to different groups in the org. Amazon But if you can collaborate with others you can help accomplish much more than youll ever be able to accomplish individually. (Senior Project Manager), with 63 (Senior Project Manager) level earning average salary of $247k along with $38k worth of stock options. Senior Director, Data & AI South East Asia lead i.a Aug 2021 - Jan 20226 months Singapore 33NFT Admin & Ops 33NFT Sep 2021 - Present1 year 7 months Netherlands 33NFT is one of the top anonymous. I was always righteously indignant when I encountered asshats and incompetence and I would rail against the losers to anyone who would listen, and then I would do whatever it took to drive my agenda through to completion.I focused 100% on producing vast quantities of superior quality work -- which endeared me to my management chain and opened up a crap-ton of doors at those early levels. It works like this: Senior (L64,63) - works on tactical efforts, writes code or works on projects autonomously, collaborates with others below 63 one has low influence and above 64, it is more strategizing and less execution.Overall, my experience has been that promotion is the effect of results and good work. Executing on what you have now at a high rate/quality level.2. For the folks on the path to L63, I want you to first understand your boss's opinion of you, your opinion of yourself, what it takes to succeed in your team, and then ways you can step up and be on the right path. Ugh, not good, not good at all.>Finance is cutting 10% of work force. > Where did you hear this? Help make it more accurate by adding yours. Now it's up to me to do whatever it takes to make *them* great, even if it doesn't benefit my product directly. You don't get your money by snatching it out of Google or Apple's hands, you get it by convincing your customers to hand it to you.Do you want to know why Vista is such an unmitigated disaster? I moved around 3 teams before I found one where I really enjoyed the technology and the people, and here I've flourished.So forget all the whining about politics and crap. In MCS, soft skills are often more important than hard skills since you work with customers (often angry ones), sales (often under pressure and looking for someone to blame). To the guy you said:I'd like to hear some more experiences from MCS. HC-freeze is already in motion, as is serioius savings in all FSC/COS - only thing still not explored is layoffs. IBM got their position by focusing on the customer. I think talking about level just confuses people as beyond US there is a different level system!L63 in the US is Senior (Level 60 in most of the other countries), well, moving to Senior is not such a big thing if you have experience, with more than 10 years in the industry I was hired at this level, now Senior II is just a matter of continuing contributing but the different comes to Principal (or lead), here is where you need to shine in order to succeed.Recommendation: Work not only towards your commitments but your managers as well As a former L65 (left MSFT about two months ago) I can say you are right on when it comes to understanding where your boss stands. Worked my ass off and finally get recognized as Snr contributor. It takes a little time to get on your skip-level manager's radar. Who da'Punk But on balance mgrs at MS get things right a lot more often than they get them wrong or we wouldnt be one of the most highly capitalized companies in the history of biz.