I started with my current employer 8 years ago as an intern heading into my final half of undergrad. The internship was great and I did very well so they offered me a 30-35 hr a week position to stay on. It was great because it allowed me to take early morning classes and evening classes and make money I desperately needed to pay for school. Back then it was $10/hr and to get experience in my field at $10/hr before graduation was unheard of. My bosses back then were all great and I really enjoyed most of my coworkers.
Fast forward 2 years. At this point I'm done with school and working there full time with a new position slightly above market average for my degree. I have been dating my now wife for about a year and just signed a lease on my first car. All my previous cars at this point have been some used beaters. Several of the other high performing interns of the last few years were also being hired so I finally had people I can relate to in the office.
One of the top bosses who was a mentor to me unexpectedly dies. New boss has very different ideas but keeps the same senior leadership. My manager who was also in charge of most of the senior management being one of the leaders who the new boss keeps. The boss who passed was also a mentor to my manager who originally started as the dead boss's intern. My manager and I started to get pretty close during this time given our shared relationship with our late mentor.
Some of the senior leadership over the next year or two starts to move on or retire and the new hires are mostly garbage or unqualified. My manager and I get annoyed at a lot of it since other people's incompetence ends up creating more work for us. I end up getting a few performance based pay raises throughout this time for taking on the additional work so I'm not too upset.
My manager tells me about a year and a half into the new boss's tenure that he plans to leave in about a year and that he plans to take care of me and get me into mid level management by the time he leaves. My manager follows through but the transition to a new business unit is still in process at the time of his departure. One of the other senior leaders gets promoted into my managers position and this is where shit gets fucked.
New manager allows the transfer to go through, but alters the transfer. I end up getting a SIGNIFICANTLY smaller pay bump and no title promotion with the transfer once it's done. The senior manager I now work for is pissed off about it since I have helped her with a lot in my old position and was coming over to help rebuild the business unit. I'm also going to be making 25k less than the person who previously had the same position I am now in. She tries for about a year to get it fixed and my old manager's replacement keeps blocking it. She ends up being forced into retirement over something else.
(Inb4 you should have left for a new job at this point in the story)
We then go a year without a manager and are direct reporting to another unit manager who had retired from a pension position and was hired by us after she retired. She is never around and never checks in with me or the other mid level managers. The other mid level folks are both 15+ years in with kids, they need their jobs. We agree to have each other's backs and run the unit better than it has ever ran. Revenues, workloads, and performance are all up across the board. They bring on a national headhunter for 50k and go a year without finding a single qualified replacement. They never consider me or my peers for the position and end up resolving the vacancy by making our interim report our permanent report.
At this point they finally get around to processing the promotion I was supposed to get when I transferred two years ago. New manager is hardly around and the other mid level managers and I are getting increasingly frustrated. I begin looking for another job.
Go on several interviews. Some with organizations I have done work with and they are all offering me much better jobs. Some encouraged me to apply over dinners or drinks and then hire someone else.
Come to today, I have finally found something I want to take and told senior leadership last week I plan to leave for this new job and gave them a departure window of July for the new job (I have a ton of vacation I need to use before I leave). Senior management met with me today to ask about who I think may be a good fit to replace me. They didn't seriously listen to my suggestions and instead tried to convince me to say and tell me things like “you're one of our top performers” or “this really screws us, what will it take for you to stay.” The number 2 at the company then says during all of this that they realize that my future replacement will need to come in at a higher pay grade and title above where I am now.
That title and pay grade they are going to post my job at is exactly where the guy I replaced was when I transferred into the unit 3 years ago….. This is also the title and pay that the same number 2 guy screwed me out of when the transfer to this position happened.
TLDR: start career as an intern, bosses are great, get brought on full time. First boss who was my mentor unexpectedly dies. New boss keeps senior managers. My manager leaves shortly after. I get fucked out of a promotion during a transfer because new manager is a dick. Few years later get some smaller promotions and recruited into a new job. Company is now saying they need to replace me at the rate and title of what the OG promotion was going to be before the new manager stopped it.