The frustration of being an engineer in Europe comes from the rules that this implies. Well, aside from the fact that this is mostly gone, but still exists in some big public or banking companies.

1) you can only get promoted if the company grows and/or someone above you leaves, or dies, or ... Btw it really requires leaving permanently. They leave for 10 years due to being in coma after a traffic accident? Nope.

2) the oldest person gets promoted (and that means ancienneté: longest in the company). No arguments, no exceptions. To the point that there are plenty of teams that have a manager (who gets the 10% pay boost) and an actual manager (who makes things work). Often not the same person.

3) No mobility (technically, yes, there's mobility, BUT your ancienneté resets in many cases. So it's really stupid to do)

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teiferer 3 hours ago | parent [-]

That's not mandated by law though. Shouldn't companies following such stupidity be easily out-competed by those that don't? In he market for their products/services but also in the market for employment.

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sneak 3 hours ago | parent [-]

This would be true if the government didn’t have ridiculous outdated requirements for starting new companies.

	▲	spwa4 14 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		The kinds of companies this is talking about cannot legally be started in France. We're talking about the largest companies: Credit Agricole, a "cooperative" bank that is ruled by union contracts that impose strict limits on how many commas in the rulebook are allowed to move per decade. A company where any change gets so stuck committees they found it easier to implement changes through parliament than through the company's own management structure. Several times. Total, government owned oil company that gets special tax treatment and gives free shares to French presidents and ministers who leave office. Actually has a good reputation as an employer, but not because there is any chance in hell of getting promoted. EDF, the power company (mostly nuclear), who are positively famous in how difficult they are to work with, both internally and externally. But, have a good reputation as an employer. France Telecom, which used to be a subsidiary of EDF. They split off to remove worker protections from their (many) employees. Still extremely tied to the government. They have an extremely poor reputation as an employer (as in they have driven employees to suicide). If you try to start any such companies in France, the government is going to outright sabotage you, whatever the laws say.