How I influence tech company politics as a staff software engineer

Many software engineers avoid dealing with company politics because they consider it pointless to get involved. The main reasons why this is the case are as follows: Technical decisions are made for selfish reasons that cannot be influenced. Many powerful stakeholders are incompetent. The political game depends on private information that software engineers do not have. This sucks. You play a different role. If you're not spending your time playing politics and others are, such as your manager, then you're unlikely to succeed with less effort. This Hacker News comment describes the first point really well. They claim a few interesting things. First, devs/supervisors want the new hot thing on their resume. Another reason is to push the newer version of something by proving that the older version is bad, much of the time at the expense of others. Third, the organization needs the new buzzword to show to VCs or get the opportunity. Another comment claims that proposals are often accepted by everyone but then rejected by the C-Suite because they played golf with somebody that changed their opinion of it. Given that politics are present in the workplace, how do we address them? We're clearly not well-equipped to do it. Their first piece of advice is to work on a high-profile project successfully. If you kicked ass in your own area, then you will have respect from others. Making this success known to those people is a challenge in its own right, though. This gives you rewards like bonuses and more clout. The hard way is to drum up support for your own project. Since this doesn't align with others and you don't have the political clout, this is very hard to do. Instead, let other people fight for you. When the next political initiative that lines up with your project comes out, push it hard. For example, imagine your project is pulling some existing functionality into its own service. If there's a mandate at the company for reliability, then push your project. The org will get behind your project in response to it aligning with others without much political debt. This waves come and go but the executes are always excited to be doing something. So, always have an important thing lined up that matches their flavor of the month. A good quote: "Having the right idea handy at the right time is your responsibility." Overall, a good post on politics and how to navigate them as engineers.