Dan Luu

So 20-year tenure means not a lot of new hires, a static cohort, and not a lot of advancement for individuals--senior jobs rarely open up.

This is a sample size of 1 company, but Centaur had, by far, the most/easiest technical track upward mobility of any company I've worked for

There was no management track because there was basically only one manager (and ~100 employees), which was why some people left.

But on the technical track, I don't see why someone has to leave for someone else to get a raise/promotion/whatever.

Agreed, but even on tech track, ownership, responsibility, and influence are in limited supply; not everyone can be company-wide architect.

And for limited # of years in growing company: great! No problem at all with 0 attrition for 5-10 years as company grows.

Or maybe there are specific outliers who happen to have a good biz where this works. But I don't think it's a model all should strive for.

Centaur had growth for maybe 10 years and then was steady for another 12 or so. It doesn't seem to be a problem for employees so far