How to Grow in 2026

The second post in a series of analyzes of questions that I was asked in form on mentoring. Today I would like to pick up a group of questions that can be combined into one meta-question: "I want growth, but it's not clear how within the company"

It is worth recognizing that in many companies growth is not a systemic process. Sometimes it is not economically profitable, sometimes there is no resource (human) to do it. Most often, people grow in spite of, and not because.

But it's not scary. This is an opportunity for you to become better and reach a higher level in the midst of relative chaos.

Growth is an initiative from below, not a bonus from above

It would be great if every place I worked had a clear path to get from Junior Developer to C-level, but so far the main path in most companies is to make your way.

In past post, we discussed the importance of finding new tasks for yourself in order to develop an expert in yourself. Therefore, I will not dwell here, but if we are talking about local companies, then being visible is an important part of your daily work. However, remember that "in sight" = visible contribution and responsibility, and not activity for the sake of activity. For example, if you came up with the idea to change the linter rules and fill it with one PR without discussion, then in 99% of cases this will cause indignation of your colleagues, but fixing failing tests or finally writing documentation for the release are good examples for proactivity.

Remember that no one will quickly promote a person whose track record includes "going to daily meetings and completing tasks."

This means that you will have to take the initiative. We have already discussed this with you earlier, but let me just remind you that this initiative can be very different: from optimizing CI/CD to creating an internal community for solving algorithms.

Choose initiatives that remove pain for the team and provide measurable results or make you stronger as an expert.

If the area of ​​responsibility does not expand, your level does not increase

Compare yourself on the first day/week/month of work and now:

• What have you started to do better/more since then?
• What did you start doing that you didn't originally plan?

If there is some answer to at least one of these questions, then you move forward.

If you can't answer these questions yet, then now is the time to think about it and take on something new or improve an existing process in your work. If somewhere you hear a phrase in the spirit of "we are used to it," then this is a signal to you that you can change something.

While you're at the IC level, getting quick wins is much easier. And where there are victories, there is your growth and additional advantages for your resume.

If you don't know where to start, then just take one pain of your team that every time prevents you from achieving your goal faster: releases, tests, CI, documentation, monitoring.