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Comment by emodendroket | Hacker News Reader

This is a great way to end up being the "expert" in PHP, Rails, frontend dev, and other stuff you actually don't really enjoy doing, and have everyone just keep assigning you those tickets instead of lifting a finger to do it themselves. Ask me how I know.

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This has been my experience and it has left me feeling kind of rudderless. I want to do a good job, accomplish things, and build a solid reputation (and hopefully make more money) but it ends up feeling like getting punished for doing well.

Of course, it's easy enough to say that hard work is its own reward or that it'll pay off in the long run but it sure doesn't feel that way sometimes.

I know what you mean. It’s hard for me to half-ass things and I hate everyone sitting there with their thumbs up their ass or pretending they’re too stupid to figure something out. All I can say is it try and find a team that’s focused on stuff you want to do and will appreciate your flexibility. Easier said than done.

Hmmm....it landed me as the tech lead for all of IT and development.

Well, glad it worked out for you, but I am not the first person to find that doing too good a job at undesirable tasks means everyone thinks of you when they want them done.

Survivorship bias?

Yes. But it is common advice from CEO s and it fits with what my grandmother used to tell me: the boss gets all the shit jobs.

CEOs are not exactly a disinterested party here, are they?

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