Editor’s Note: This is the second article in SHARE’s series highlighting the mainframe career journey at different stages. Read the “late in career” piece, and stay tuned for future installments. If you would like to participate in this series, reach out to editor@share.org.

At some point, the scoreboard changes.

Early in your career, growth is obvious. You learn a new language. Ship your first major feature. Earn a certification. Get promoted. Progress is visible, measurable, undeniable.

Then something shifts.

You’re no longer proving you belong, but you’re not clearly advancing either. The milestones thin out. The feedback loops stretch. The wins get quieter. And if you’re not deliberate, momentum doesn’t crash.

It fades.

In mainframe and enterprise IT, that fade is easy to miss. We work on platforms engineered for longevity. Systems that move trillions of dollars, run governments, and quietly power the world. They are designed for stability.

But stability in the system can create stillness in the builder.

The platform will endure.
The real risk is that you don’t.

From Boot Camp to Systems Thinking

I started my career in 2014, fresh out of the University of Pittsburgh, with no mainframe background. A seven-week boot camp at CA Technologies dropped me into the deep end. Within months, I was reading dumps in IPCS, shooting 0C4s, and learning to respect packed decimal arithmetic the hard way.

Later, I was building web applications on z/OS, deploying open-source tooling, and solving problems both internally and externally.

The technical growth was undeniable. But the lessons that shaped my trajectory weren’t about Assembler syntax or debugging strategies. They were about momentum: how to create it, protect it, and redirect it when the environment shifts.

Embrace Change as the Baseline

One principle has stood out in my career: change is constant. I could either fight it or accept it as part of the contract.

Within my first year, I worked on three distinct product teams. During that time, I was surrounded by people who had built decades-long careers on a single product. It felt like the constant change was holding me back from gaining depth.

But what initially felt like a liability quickly became an asset. Versatility and a willingness to embrace change allowed me to become effective much faster than I expected.

It’s like training your body. The first mile of a run feels unnatural. Your body wants to stop. But with repetition, capacity expands. What once felt overwhelming becomes sustainable. Then it becomes strength. The same applies professionally and, compounded over years, becomes transformational.

Technical Skill Gets You In. Human Skill Moves You Forward

At mid-career, technical competence is assumed. What I’ve learned is that what separates strong contributors from indispensable ones is how they take ownership and how they create it in others.

When I first moved into leadership, I encountered recurring quality issues that frustrated me. My instinct, shaped by years of hands-on engineering, was to diagnose and fix them myself. That approach would have been fast. It would also have been small.

Instead, I assembled a quality “SWAT team” of engineers tasked with investigating where our process was breaking down and proposing solutions we could stand behind as a team. This wasn’t delegation to avoid the work; it was a deliberate transfer of ownership.

The result wasn’t just better quality controls. We saw clearer root causes, more durable fixes, and stronger alignment across the team. Best yet, the engineers who diagnosed the issues became vocal advocates for the solutions.

That was the shift for me. Leadership isn’t about being the fastest problem solver in the room. It’s about designing the conditions where the right problems get solved by the people closest to them.

Don’t Let Your Identity Shrink

One of the fastest ways to lose momentum is to let your role define your limits. Or worse, let someone else map your trajectory. It’s especially true in our industry where you can quickly become the “IMS” expert, having written one fix. Or to be labeled by the language you write in most often. It’s up to you to dispel the myths others create about you through action and results.

For example, don’t just code: engineer. Think in systems, trade-offs, and long-term consequences.

Don’t just manage: lead. Tracking deliverables keeps projects moving. Setting direction and building trust moves people.

Momentum comes from widening your capability without losing your center.

I’ve had seasons buried in low-level debugging. Others coordinating across teams or mentoring new hires. The constant I’ve learned wasn’t the task but rather the mindset: lean into what the team needs most in that moment instead of clinging to a label.

Redefining Momentum

Mid-career momentum isn’t loud. It’s not about stacking credentials or chasing titles. It’s about scaling what got you there.

It’s knowing when to step in and when to step back. It’s building systems that function without your constant intervention. It’s investing in people so outcomes improve even when you’re not in the room.

The mainframe has endured because it adapts without abandoning its core strengths. A durable career works the same way.

Build more than code. Build trust. Build perspective. Build systems that last and become the kind of professional who does too.

That’s momentum.

Cody Giardinello has spent the past 12 years at Broadcom in z/OS development based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He currently serves as Engineering Manager for the OPS/MVS, Automation Point (automation), and MIM (data serialization) products. Giardinello is a longtime SHARE volunteer and active contributor to the mainframe community. He has served as a zNextGen project manager and now leads the Open Source Track, while also supporting board-adjacent initiatives, including the Membership Committee and Branding Task Force. Outside of work, Giardinello recharges by running, pulling great espresso shots, and spending time with his two young daughters, Lia and Violet.

Learn more about working in a multigenerational workforce with "Creating a Thriving Multi-Generational Workforce."