I am 36 yrs old with more than 12 years of experience in software development and maintenance projects with 4 of the biggest names in Indian IT organizations.
I started out as a
Java programmer way back in 1999 - 2000 and have travelled to various countries for short - medium durations as programmer , onsite lead etc . Subsequently , I had matured as a Java professional and went on to become a Java architect with many Sun Java certifications under my belt. I was the proverbial 'Hot Property' simply because of my experience of being in so many Java development projects. I could easily spot 'stock' mistakes , rookies make and was able to put forward the common hygiene factors such as -
test driven development , code quality check , configuration management etc ...
3 yrs back I got very tired of this whole 'architect' stuff by watching how project and delivery managers only call architects for petty troubleshooting and for lack of good architecture work in all these so-called big organizations.
Since , I had good SDLC knowledge and have seen projects from start to stop for many years , I thought being in the Project Management role would probably help me get out of this rut.
Unfortunately , this has turned out to be a disaster ! My PMP , ITIL knowledge + certifications mean nothing to my senior management. Also , almost all the norms of project management are overridden by the overarching quest to show a strong
profit margin. Tremendous politics of talking about me behind my back and nepotism with scant regard to people's abilities. I am also seeing people who are completely out-of-touch with technology calling the most crucial shots and are being treated as the godfathers of business units. People with very bad people skills become the champions of employee centricity. Managers who are ruthless , with no regard for employees , are termed as the best of the lot.
This has been an even bitter 3 years as a PM than my disgust as being an architect with nothing substantial to do.
Wanted to know from my fellow colleagues , friends and advisors as to what are the potential ways of coming out of this mess.