Terrible Software

One thing I keep hearing from engineers is some version of “I want to grow, but my manager isn’t giving me the right opportunities.”

And I get it: managers should be helping you grow. Assigning you the right projects, creating space for you to stretch. That is all part of their job. If your manager isn’t doing any of that, you have something to complain about.

Two things, though. One, complaining about it probably isn’t going to change much. Two, even the best manager in the world can only do so much for you. And sometimes, they just have a big, boring project that you need to do that won’t do much for your career, but it needs to be done anyway.

What I’m trying to say here is: if you want growth, start creating your own opportunities.

A few years ago, I got assigned what seemed like a straightforward task: build a new page using some new UI components. Nothing glamorous, just build the new components, connect them, ship the page.

I could have stopped there. Nobody would have complained to me for doing exactly what was asked.

But I looked at those new components and thought: what if I turned this into a proper design system library? Something reusable, documented, that the whole team could build on. It wasn’t what anyone asked for (I’m pretty sure that my manager didn’t even know what a “design systems library” was).

So I did it. I aligned with my manager and convinced him. Built out the library, documented the components, made it easy for other engineers to use. It took more time, yes, but the result was way more valuable than just shipping that one page.

My manager loved it. Mostly because I saw something he hadn’t even thought to ask for. I didn’t wait for someone to hand me an interesting project. I turned an uninteresting project into something bigger that also aligned with growth for me.

That’s the pattern worth noticing: identifying leverage points where a little extra effort creates a lot more impact.

The opposite, unfortunately, is way more common: engineers who do exactly what’s specified, nothing more, and then wonder why they’re not getting promoted. It’s not that doing your job is wrong, but that doing only your job rarely stands out.

Now, you might be thinking: “Why can’t my manager just tell me what the high-leverage work is?” Your manager has a dozen things on their plate. They’re managing up and sideways, dealing with fires, etc. Even if they genuinely want to create opportunities for you, they might not have the bandwidth right now. They also might not know (yet) what you’re capable of. They might not see the gaps that you see.

And that’s actually your advantage. You’re the one doing the work every day. You know where the friction is, what’s missing, what could be better. Your manager doesn’t have that vantage point.

I can also already hear some of you saying, “I’m paid to do my job. Why should I do more than what’s expected?”

Because you’re not doing it for the company. You’re doing it for yourself. The skills you build, the reputation you earn, the proof that you can solve bigger problems… that all travel with you. Your company doesn’t own your career growth. To be clear, this is not about working longer hours (or during weekends), but choosing higher-leverage work within the hours you’re already putting in. Instead of just completing the task, you’re completing it in a way that compounds.

Being strategic matters here. Not every gap is worth filling. Spending a week refactoring code that nobody will touch again isn’t leverage (it’s just extra work). The opportunities worth pursuing usually share a few traits: they’re visible, they help others, and they compound over time.

A design system library that ten engineers will use? Leverage. A script that automates a painful manual process? Leverage. Rewriting a module to use a slightly newer pattern? Probably not.

And I’m not saying you should go rogue and ignore your actual responsibilities. Do the work that’s asked of you first. But once you’ve got that handled, look around. What’s the adjacent thing that nobody’s tackling? What’s the improvement everyone complains about but nobody owns? What would make your team’s life meaningfully easier?

When you spot something, bring it to your manager. Sometimes they’ll say no. Maybe the timing is wrong, maybe they don’t see the value, maybe there’s context you don’t have. That’s fine. You can save the idea for later, or take it as useful information about the environment you’re in.

More often than not, managers (myself included) are thrilled when someone on their team brings them those types of problems (even better, when they also have a solution in mind).

One important caveat: all of this assumes you’re in a reasonably functional workplace. If you’re in a place where extra effort consistently gets exploited rather than recognized, where your manager takes credit for your work, or where initiative gets punished… this advice won’t save you (and I’m sorry).

But if you’re in a decent environment with a decent manager, most of the opportunities you’re waiting for are probably already in front of you. They just don’t look like opportunities yet, they look like boring tasks.

By the way, that design system library? It’s still being used today. Not because someone handed it to me, but because I looked at a mundane project and saw what else it could become.