A few years ago, “Senior Developer” meant something. Not just a pay grade, not just an internal leveling band, but a signal that you’d seen some things. Broken prod on Christmas Eve. Legacy codebases with more comments than code. Real consequences, real complexity, real context.
Now? I’m seeing resumes from people three years out of university with “Senior” in their title. Not senior in years, not senior in depth—just the most experienced person on a three-person dev team at a startup that launched last quarter.
It’s not their fault, really. The industry let it happen. Titles got inflated to attract talent. Junior roles vanished because nobody wants to hire someone they might have to mentor. And so we ended up with “Senior Frontend Lead Engineer III” whose biggest accomplishment is configuring Tailwind.
On the flip side, some companies have gone the other way. In an effort to create a flat, egalitarian utopia, they’ve removed senior titles entirely. Everyone is just “Software Engineer.” Doesn’t matter if you’ve been writing production systems longer than the intern’s been alive. Titles are seen as divisive.
But here’s the thing: people aren’t equal. Not in skill, not in experience, not in impact. And pretending otherwise does everyone a disservice. The title “Senior” should be earned, not handed out like a free t-shirt at a tech conference. It should mean you’ve seen enough systems fail that you ask the awkward questions before shipping to prod.
And it’s not just tech.
A friend sent me a post from someone who worked at Toyota, where the mark of a Key Trainer was a red stripe on your hat—earned through experience, process, and a commitment to quality. When management flooded the floor with inexperienced trainers to hit hiring targets, that person walked away. Not out of ego, but out of principle. Because when you dilute the meaning of a title, you don’t just break a process. You break trust.
This is happening across industries. A quiet erosion of standards in the name of speed, optics, or equality. We’re mistaking title for capability. And when that happens, both the learners and the system suffer.
Original Toyota post here: LinkedIn
So why is this happening?
- Hiring managers want to attract candidates, so they inflate titles.
- Startups avoid hierarchy by default, so the most experienced dev is suddenly “Senior.”
- Enterprises try to create equity by flattening titles, pretending everyone is interchangeable.
- And somewhere in the chaos, mentorship, mastery, and meaningful recognition get lost.
I’m not asking for gatekeeping. I’m asking for meaning. Let’s stop cheapening the title for the sake of hiring or harmony. Not everyone is a Senior—and that’s okay.
Looking for someone who actually is senior? I’m currently open to new roles. Preferably ones where job titles mean something.