Big tech is BS in exactly the way parent poster described but "doing a good job" doesn't usually get you PIP'd AFAICT. Just means you stay the same level for not rushing out half-baked features and very, very slowly people will realize you don't suck but it still won't help you get promo.
I'm not in Big Tech really, just a standard BigCo. IME doing anything productive in an enterprise environment means pulling out at least some legacy cruft constantly. Anything else means it accumulates faster than you can remove it. Unfortunately, almost every bit of cruft has someone that looks after it, so this naturally makes you enemies. The only realistic way to keep ones job is to constantly add to the pile, never remove from it.
