I genuinely don't want to upset anyone, but as someone with 20+ years of engineering and management experience, I think it might help some people to hear what is most likely really going on here.
This is probably an example of the Peter principle:
The Peter principle is a concept in management developed by Laurence J. Peter which observes that people in a hierarchy tend to rise to "a level of respective incompetence": employees are promoted based on their success in previous jobs until they reach a level at which they are no longer competent, as skills in one job do not necessarily translate to another.
There's a huge amount of title inflation going on in the industry. We're now seeing the "Principal Engineer" title being given to people with 3 years of professional experience.
Unfortunately, this is simply not enough time to be very good at all, no matter how much raw talent you have. It takes a decade of experience just to know how to manage yourself effectively, let alone mentor others and lead large projects.
Most people won't be honest with you about these things because there's very little incentive. People tend to react defensively like you are here. But it might actually help someone reading this to know the truth.
Maybe it helps you to know that early in my career I was also sometimes promoted into roles that were beyond my abilities.
This is probably an example of the Peter principle:
The Peter principle is a concept in management developed by Laurence J. Peter which observes that people in a hierarchy tend to rise to "a level of respective incompetence": employees are promoted based on their success in previous jobs until they reach a level at which they are no longer competent, as skills in one job do not necessarily translate to another.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_principle
There's a huge amount of title inflation going on in the industry. We're now seeing the "Principal Engineer" title being given to people with 3 years of professional experience.
Unfortunately, this is simply not enough time to be very good at all, no matter how much raw talent you have. It takes a decade of experience just to know how to manage yourself effectively, let alone mentor others and lead large projects.