I’ve seen people call themselves “senior” after 3 years on the job, other become CTOs in the same time, and others still have a senior title after 20(!) years in the industry yet have a fuckton of technical experience.
I’ve heard that they are all just titles and opinions from “if you don’t have the technical skill you can’t call yourself a senior”, to “senior and staff are just a feeling, principal is the actual senior” and “staff? above senior? we call that manager”.
What’s your story? Is there a ladder? Do you feel like you belong on it? Where are you on it? Does it make sense? Did you see major bumps in salary? Did titles count at all?
For better or worse, social skills are as important as actual tech skills. This is scary for nerds whose brains can’t socialize properly. I’ve seen mediocre-skilled “leaders” lord it over better workers using sophisticated bullying and manipulation.
As important if you want to get higher positions and partially also for more money. But if you “just” want to do stuff you like it is fine.