Oh yes. They lump levels together in "bands" and you're basically competing with your peers for slots. The ranking has forced buckets, so someone always gets screwed. It's about as fucked up as you're thinking right now.

Seriously, there are groups who actually hire people to fall into the seven percent "knucklehead" bucket, so that none of the (presumably) good employees need to be fired.

I don't miss that stuff at all.