On several occasions, I put my projects on hold for weeks or even months at a time to help a teammate whose launch was at risk. It was the right decision for the team, but it looked unimpressive in a promo packet. To the promotion committee, my teammate’s project was the big, important work that demanded coordination from multiple developers. If they hornswoggled me into helping them, it’s evidence of their strong leadership qualities. I was just the mindless peon whose work was so irrelevant that it could be pre-empted at a moment’s notice.
My experience is that oftentimes people at Google-style companies play not even a zero-sum game, but more like a negative-sum game (if there is such a thing). If you're helping someone out, people will take that as an opportunity to take advantage of you.
This sounds harsh. In cases you are a significant contributor to a launch it should be signifiend in the "launch entry" (there's an internal tracking tool for all launches).
You then of course need to sell your contribution:
- It was nothing less than ciritical for the success of the project
- It required deep technical knowledge
- It required communication with other teams
- It required mastery of several technologies, etc.
The teammate in question should hepefully support these claims.
My experience is that oftentimes people at Google-style companies play not even a zero-sum game, but more like a negative-sum game (if there is such a thing). If you're helping someone out, people will take that as an opportunity to take advantage of you.