If you're early in your career and at a place where doing "too good of a job" is frowned upon, IMO, you're better off to find that out early and leave early. No time for that early on. If you're a threat to the established technical team, move elsewhere, because you cannot afford not to build the strongest possible technical basis for your later career.

Later in your career, especially if you aspire to technical leadership positions, you might want to reconsider, but just starting out, go find a place where technical excellence is valued and cultivated.

Note: what you think of as "too good of a job" is very likely not "too good of a job" if you're just starting out. Porting an entire enterprise system to Rails because it's cooler and easier (for you) to maintain and getting told "No!" is not an example of you trying to do too good of a job...

"If you're early in your career and at a place where doing "too good of a job" is frowned upon, IMO, you're better off to find that out early and leave early. "

-agreed 100% Leave unless you need the job. This scenario applies less to the startup (and probably IT worlds) than it does to other places but unfortunately I believe it is pretty common in older established companies. You might not be told you are doing "too good of a job" but if you are threat to your supervisors there is good chance life could be rough at this stage. So make sure you are helping them look good and not appearing to be gunning for their positions. That was my point. And I hear you on newbies thinking their inexperienced pivots are game changing paradigm shifters. I think we have all seen that as well but it wasn't specifically what I was referring to.

This is so true. I had a job in a factory making lights and after a day I was pull aside by the foreman and told to slow down. The funny thing is I was not even trying to be fast - I thought I was being really slow as I had been concentrating so much on getting every part perfect.

More seriously when you are new take the time to observe the culture of the place before saying or doing anything unexpected. Your primary job in the first month is learning the true power structure and who matters to who.

Similar to some advice I heard early on in my career:

"When you start at a company it's tempting to work really hard to give a good impression. Don't. All you're doing is setting expectations on your work. Instead, do an average amount of work and only work harder when it will be noticed (ie. near salary review day)."

It's unfortunate but this is true. If you work your ass off people will just expect you to work your ass off.

If it's politically inadvisable to work your ass off, for example because it makes your less dedicated peers look bad, then this can be good advice.

Given my druthers, though, I'll do the best work my talent and skill make possible, for two reasons: first, should I find myself having trouble in a given situation, I find it strongly preferable to have the certainty that it's for some other reason than because I'm not working at the top of my form; second, because if I should find myself in need of support from management, it's a lot easier to start that conversation, and achieve a favorable result, when the fact that I'm working at the top of my form is obvious to everyone involved.

Of course, not everyone shares that opinion, and my own experience isn't universal. But I will note that I've never found myself in a situation where I had peers gunning for me because I was making them look bad -- on the contrary, one of the benefits of an insatiable appetite for hard work is that others quickly learn I can be relied upon to help them out when they need it, while rarely asking for such help myself. Quite aside from the fact that helpfulness is one of the criteria by which I evaluate my worth as a human being, this gives my colleagues the very best of reasons -- those of self-interest -- to bend their every political effort on my behalf.

This, by the way, is an example of what I mean, else-thread, when I talk about playing office politics in a principled fashion. Sure, there's some of my own self-interest in the mix here! I don't deny it. On the other hand, I've found a way in which I can serve not just my own interests, but those of my colleagues, and of the organization as a whole, all at the same time -- in short, a style of play that redounds to the benefit of all involved, and an excellent illustration of how it's possible to play office politics quite adroitly indeed, without having to become a Machiavellian bastard in the process.

That's fine when the people you work with appreciate the work you do, but you're not going to know that going in. If you work hard from the off, all you can do is go down, whereas if you start off slowly then you can look good when you need to.

Personally I find it difficult to work like that, but I think the advice is reasonable - I've certainly experienced it when you're only working twice as hard as others and yet you are seen to be underperforming.

A point well made, and one which I hadn't fully considered.