Earning Trust

The currency for your growth

In “Hit Refresh”¹, Satya Nadella defines the trust equation as “trust = consistency x time“. The longer that consistently deliver, the more trust that is placed on you. The most universal indicator of earned trust is your level. The more senior your level at a company, the more trust the company is putting in you.

When you’re a junior level developer (Microsoft calls this SDE I), you’re still figuring a lot out about the company and, likewise, the company is still figuring you out. This is why the junior level feels more constrained. You’re going to be working on individual features and related bugs. You can feel more like a cog in a vast machine than like a human.

When you reach a staff level developer (Microsoft calls this SDE II), you have learned enough about how the product cycle works that now you can be trusted with more aspects of the design and execution. You’re now going to be seeing features the entire way through their arc from conception to delivery. Your work will feel a bit more well-rounded than your SDE I work, but you may still feel like you’re in a box.

When you achieve a senior level developer position (Microsoft calls this Senior SDE), you’re recognized as more of a leader for your team. Now, in addition to your feature work, you are tasked with the more ambiguous responsibility of elevating the team. Your technical skills continue to be leveraged, but now you’re tapping more into your human side. This is most likely where you’ll hear the term “EQ” (Emotional Intelligence) being used. It is typical to feel a bit stretched here initially, but when you gain comfort, you will realize how much broader your scope of influence is. This is the beginning of the force multiplier feeling, where you are doing your own individual work while also helping others around you. You’re less aware of anything fencing you in at this point. It’s a pretty wide open field.

Progressing further to a principal level developer position (Microsoft calls this Principal SDE), you have now been exposed to the culture and philosophy of the company to a point where you have now internalized “the company way”. This creates a fundamental inflection point. Up until now, the company has told you what you’re going to do. Now, you’re going to be telling the company what you are going to do. The company trusts that you will be able to operate autonomously in a manner that aligns to the company’s mission. This brings incredible freedom, but with it comes incredible pressure. You are now one of the individuals that is architecting the overall direction for your team.

There are many levels of progression beyond this. At Microsoft, this includes Partner, Distinguished Engineer, and Technical Fellow. Other companies will create similar or different stages. But I only needed to detail this up to the principal level for the purposes of the topic of trust.

If you don’t like the constraints of your current role, the way out is through growth. The way to grow is by earning trust. And the way to earn trust is by following Satya’s equation. Here’s how.