Horizontal Career Growth: When Moving Up Is Not the Only Way
The best salesperson on the team gets promoted to manager — and the team's results get worse. Benson, Li and Shue tracked 53,035 workers at 131 U.S. companies and found this is a systematic pattern, not an anomaly. Why the career ladder can be a dead end, and what to choose instead.
Horizontal career growth means deepening expertise, acquiring adjacent skills, or moving into a different function without necessarily climbing the hierarchy. According to Ryan and Deci's self-determination theory (Psychological Review, 2000), competence and autonomy predict job satisfaction more reliably than job title. Vertical advancement is one path, not the only one.
Picture the standard script: you do good work, you get noticed, you get promoted. Then promoted again. A few years later you are in a role where the main job is managing people — and the thing that got you here takes up an hour a week, if that. Laurence Peter and Raymond Hull described this moment in 1969 as your "level of incompetence." At the time, the book read as satire.
The satire turned out to be data.
The Peter Principle: from joke to evidence
In 2019, economists Alan Benson, Danielle Li and Kelly Shue published "Promotions and the Peter Principle" in the Quarterly Journal of Economics. They analyzed 53,035 workers across 131 U.S. sales organizations over the period 2005 to 2011. The finding was uncomfortable: the higher an employee's individual sales performance before promotion, the worse their team tended to perform after they became a manager.
The mechanism is direct. Companies judge promotion candidates by the same metric used in their current role — personal sales volume. But the skills that make someone an outstanding salesperson (closing deals, handling objections, sustaining negotiation rhythm) do not automatically transfer into managerial skills (setting goals, coaching, keeping a team energized). These are different professions.
The study found that firms systematically promote their best performers — even when other observable qualities predict managerial success more accurately than individual sales numbers.
What horizontal growth looks like in practice
The phrase "career lattice" as an alternative to "career ladder" was popularized by Cathleen Benko and Molly Anderson in The Corporate Lattice (Harvard Business Press, 2010). The argument: career movement does not have to go upward. It can go sideways — a new function, a new context, or deeper expertise at the same level of seniority.
In practice, this takes different forms. A senior engineer who does not want to manage a team can grow into a principal or staff engineer without taking on direct reports — and earn a comparable salary to their manager peers. A marketing analyst moves into product, keeping their grade. A finance professional builds machine learning skills and becomes sought after at the intersection of two disciplines.
None of these is inferior to vertical movement. The only question is which one fits the individual.
Why mastery works as well as status
In 2000, Richard Ryan and Edward Deci published a landmark synthesis of self-determination theory in Psychological Review. Three basic psychological needs predict sustained engagement in any activity: autonomy (feeling that the choice is yours), competence (feeling that you are growing and capable), and relatedness (belonging to something that matters).
None of the three translates to "holding a higher title." Vertical growth can deliver all three — but not automatically. Someone promoted against their inclinations often loses precisely autonomy (the work changed) and competence (they are no longer excellent at what they were doing). Horizontal growth, done well, tends to strengthen both: you go deeper into what draws you, and you can see yourself getting better.
How to tell which path fits you
Three signals that horizontal growth is more likely your path:
- You do your current work well and want to do it even better — not switch to managing people.
- When you do have to manage, it drains you rather than energizes you.
- You think about a promotion because it is expected, not because you actually want those tasks.
Three signals that vertical advancement fits you better:
- You are drawn to systems thinking: how processes are built, how teams develop.
- Helping others grow gives you energy, not just a sense of duty.
- Influence and scope matter to you personally — not as abstract status, but as the actual work you want to do.
Neither scenario is objectively better. The question is which one serves your interests — not which one is the default expectation. If you never ask it clearly, your career will follow the path of least resistance.
What to do right now
- Ask yourself honestly: what do you actually want from the next role — more of the same work, different work, or leading people? These are distinct requests.
- Talk to someone who is already living the path you are considering. Not someone planning it — someone who has been in it for a year or two.
- Take the free career assessment — it shows where your interests are strongest and helps clarify what you want from work beyond job title.
- Find out whether your company or industry has horizontal growth options: senior individual contributor tracks, rotations, project-based roles. If not, that is useful information too.
Frequently asked questions
Is horizontal career growth the same as being stuck?
No. Being stuck means no new challenges and no growth in competence. Horizontal growth is intentional movement sideways: deepening expertise, acquiring adjacent skills, or moving into a different function at the same level. According to Ryan and Deci's self-determination theory (Psychological Review, 2000), feelings of competence and autonomy predict long-term job satisfaction more reliably than job title.
How do I explain horizontal growth on a resume or in an interview?
Frame it in concrete terms: what you learned, what problem you solved, which project stretched you. "Moved to the product team and shipped feature X" is clearer than "grew horizontally." Employers value breadth and the ability to operate across disciplines — especially in roles that sit at the intersection of several fields.
When should I choose vertical advancement instead?
When you are genuinely drawn to management work: designing processes, developing people, making strategic calls. Vertical growth works when it matches your interests, not just because it is the default next step. If you are unsure, take the career assessment test — it shows where your interests are strongest.
Sources
- Peter, L. J., & Hull, R. (1969). The Peter Principle: Why Things Always Go Wrong. William Morrow and Company.
- Benson, A., Li, D., & Shue, K. (2019). Promotions and the Peter Principle. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 134(4), 2085–2134. doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjz022
- Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2000). Self-Determination Theory and the Facilitation of Intrinsic Motivation. Psychological Review, 107(1), 68–78. doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.107.1.68
- Benko, C., & Anderson, M. (2010). The Corporate Lattice: Achieving High Performance in the Changing World of Work. Harvard Business Press.
This article is for educational purposes and does not constitute professional career advice.
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