Zack, I've been at the same job for eight years. I'm good at it, my manager likes me, and I've had two pay rises that barely covered inflation. Every time a promotion comes up, it goes to someone external. My friends keep telling me I should be further along by now. I'm 36. Is it too late to do anything about it, or have I just become furniture?
— Stuck in SwindonCongratulations. You’ve achieved job security the way a fence post achieves job security.
In eight years a person can learn a language or raise a child to the age where it judges them. You used the time to become so good at one job that the company now believes you are physically incapable of doing another. You are not furniture. Furniture gets replaced. You are a load-bearing wall, and nobody promotes the wall. They hang a motivational poster on it.
Every external hire is a memo addressed to you. It reads: “We checked. You’re not going anywhere.”
Two pay rises that “barely covered inflation” are not pay rises. They are the company paying you to stand still while the floor moves backwards. Your manager likes you. Of course she does. You’re cheap, you’re reliable and you have never once made her fill in a retention form.
Here’s your grain of sense, since you’ve clearly been starving: update the CV tonight, apply for three jobs, and get one offer in writing. You don’t have to take it. But until somebody believes you might leave, including you, you’re not an employee. You’re a fixture with a pension that won’t cover the funeral.