Post-Fowler, HR became very concerned about income inequality. They implemented this by severely compressing the range of compensation at each level. For a year or two, there was no way to meaningfully reward a high performer in her level other than to promote her.

Since mid-2019 or so, the company realized this mistake and the pendulum swung back towards TK’s more Ayn Randian compensation philosophy. But the damage was done. FWIW I never saw much of a power dynamic around title. But it is definitely the most important task of an engineering manager to secure promotion-worthy projects and hand them out intelligently. Since promotion is based on impact, it’s almost entirely determined by the project charter. Difficulty or skill deployed in execution is a tertiary concern.

Also given the precipitous drop in equity value, promotions with hefty raises are required just to keep people’s TC in moderate decline instead of freefall.