Companies where there are long tenured employees outside of management is my ultimate green flag. If you can figure out who is in management by drawing names out of a hat by senority and stop when you run through 80% of managers without hitting a single IC then you should be aware that ICs have very little say in how the company is run so half the managers are there out of frustration because they needed to become a manager to enact change.
IC is a common term for integrated circuits and a hundred other things.
Maybe it’s used for workers in your specific region/field but that’s not definitely universal and it’s not even a useful or descriptive term. Managers are also individuals who ostensibly contribute something to the company. The distinction between managers and workers is that the workers are the people doing the actual work, not that they’re individuals.
Screw “say in how the company is run”, I’ll settle for the money. Pay me and I will work. Pay me more and I will keep working. My current employers understood the assignment, I still have a long career progression without going into management.
Companies where there are long tenured employees outside of management is my ultimate green flag. If you can figure out who is in management by drawing names out of a hat by senority and stop when you run through 80% of managers without hitting a single IC then you should be aware that ICs have very little say in how the company is run so half the managers are there out of frustration because they needed to become a manager to enact change.
What’s IC mean in this context?
Individual contributor - a term for everyone who isn’t a manager.
Sounds like corporate jargon. Why not just say worker, a term everyone understands?
IC is a common term used for non-manager type roles.
IC is a common term for integrated circuits and a hundred other things.
Maybe it’s used for workers in your specific region/field but that’s not definitely universal and it’s not even a useful or descriptive term. Managers are also individuals who ostensibly contribute something to the company. The distinction between managers and workers is that the workers are the people doing the actual work, not that they’re individuals.
No acronym is universal.
You can overload acronyms with dozens of different meanings.
But still, IC is common as individual contributor. Case in point: Microsoft uses it as a filter on their career site. Not exactly a small company…
Jargon that needs to be dereferenced when it’s used the first time. Am I right?
Screw “say in how the company is run”, I’ll settle for the money. Pay me and I will work. Pay me more and I will keep working. My current employers understood the assignment, I still have a long career progression without going into management.
My last interview, current company, the average tenure of all the people I asked was ~7 years. I would also ask why they’ve been there so long.