(I think you posted this to hn because I posted it to Facebook again, yes?)
The really interesting things to me are:
1) Invisible divisions, and the system to split units
2) Hiding top-tier equipment from the West -- even at the cost of not allowing their own soldiers to know what equipment they're supposed to ultimately use. Vs. the US, where soldiers are expected to be intimately familiar with their assigned weapons systems.
3) A really naive view of economics, that the military is "free" because the State provides it. It doesn't correctly assign the cost as that of the foregone alternative -- a tank means 100 fewer cars, etc.
4) "Role before Rank" promotions -- officers being promoted into a role above their rank as a precondition to attaining that rank. In the US system, that only really happens for certain General Officers; everyone else is promoted and then assigned, with most early to mid career promotions being either automatic or based on seniority and checkboxes.
"Role before Rank" is how I laid out a company remuneration and incentives program.
The essence was "to be a senior dev you must already be doing these things". The proof (observed by two senior people and acknowledged by colleagues at and below your level) that you were fully performing the given role meant that you would be given the job title and salary to match.
We felt this was an improvement on other systems as it made it very clear what it meant to the individual. In that they needed to improve, learn things, operate differently, to be able to progress from one tier of recognition to the next and left it up to the individual to say whether they wanted to or not. It also handled the scenario of demotion... failure to maintain a standard of work meant that you'd set your role (and thereby rank) at the step below.
Did this work? Mostly, yes.
Definitely some rough edges when it came to dealing with long-time serving people who didn't (or couldn't) improve themselves. For those people the title and salary seldom matched their expectations.
I thought I was the only one in an organization structured like this.
While off topic a bit... I found this structure pretty discouraging.
If you don't promote your developers into the role they are actually fulfilling, it quickly begins to feel like you're taking advantage of them. That is, treating them and giving them the responsibilities of a Sr. Engineer but only compensating them like a typical engineer (or developer).
There's only so many 'atta boys you can give someone before it seems like you're dodging meaningful compensation for their efforts.
Agreed. If you don't actually give the recognition and promotion after making it clear what is needed to reach the next level... then none of this works and morale will crash.
We put in place quarterly reviews that were heavily focused on employee improvement, learning and application of that learning. Promotions were automatic and didn't need many levels of buy-in to approve. It was simply "are you doing the job of a senior dev? Congrats, then you are one".
This was also strange as to most it was very different from quarterly or annual reviews they'd encountered elsewhere that had focused on project progress and milestones. The business goal was to build and retain the best team, focusing on that meant the project goals naturally followed.
> In the US system ... everyone else is promoted and then assigned
It's worth pointing out that one of the reasons this system works in the US army is that non-commissioned officers are trusted with a great deal more responsibility than their Soviet counterparts were. The mechanical promotion of junior officers would be impossible without 15 year veteran NCOs taking care of a lot of the grunt work that Soviet officers got stuck with, simply because the system wouldn't trust NCOs with it.
The really interesting things to me are:
1) Invisible divisions, and the system to split units
2) Hiding top-tier equipment from the West -- even at the cost of not allowing their own soldiers to know what equipment they're supposed to ultimately use. Vs. the US, where soldiers are expected to be intimately familiar with their assigned weapons systems.
3) A really naive view of economics, that the military is "free" because the State provides it. It doesn't correctly assign the cost as that of the foregone alternative -- a tank means 100 fewer cars, etc.
4) "Role before Rank" promotions -- officers being promoted into a role above their rank as a precondition to attaining that rank. In the US system, that only really happens for certain General Officers; everyone else is promoted and then assigned, with most early to mid career promotions being either automatic or based on seniority and checkboxes.