This article was originally published on LinkedIn on January 18, 2026.
Over the years working in the NetSuite ecosystem, I've seen a consistent pattern: talented NetSuite professionals rarely leave for a single reason. More often, they leave because compensation no longer reflects their responsibility and because the role itself has become unsustainable.
I think that framing matters, because it cuts through a lot of the comfortable explanations we tend to hear. But it's still incomplete.
What I've come to believe is that retention failures in NetSuite environments aren't driven by economics or culture alone. They emerge from the interaction between the two. Economics determines when someone leaves. Culture determines whether anyone recognizes the risk in time.
That distinction, I think, explains why these departures so often feel sudden to leadership and long overdue to everyone else.
While I'm focusing on NetSuite here because that's where my experience lies, this pattern isn't unique to this ecosystem. Salesforce admins, SAP specialists, Dynamics consultants, Workday analysts - they all experience variations of the same dynamic. The technology differs; the organizational pattern doesn't. If you work with any complex enterprise system, chances are you'll recognize what I'm describing.
How the Economics Drift Out of Alignment
In my experience, NetSuite roles don't start oversized. They start as support. Someone learns the system well enough to answer questions, fix issues, and keep things moving. Over time, they take on more - reporting logic, permissions, workflows, integrations, close support. Nothing changes overnight. The scope just grows quietly.
But here's what happens: titles don't change. Compensation usually doesn't either. Internally, the role still looks like "admin" or "systems support." Externally, the market sees something very different - a scarce skill set tied directly to operational risk and financial outcomes.
That gap doesn't create an immediate problem. It creates pressure. And pressure, left unaddressed, eventually finds a release.
The Silent Promotion
What's really happening underneath is a kind of promotion that no one acknowledges.
Responsibilities accumulate one by one. There's no formal reset, no conversation that says, "This role is now materially different than what we hired for." Each addition feels reasonable in isolation. Can you take on this report? Can you help with the integration? Can you support the close?
If you've ever worked on a project that suffered from scope creep, you know how this goes. Small additions pile up until the project bears little resemblance to what was originally planned. The same thing happens with jobs - call it role scope creep. The difference is that projects eventually end, but a job just keeps expanding until something gives.
From the organization's perspective, this looks efficient. From the employee's perspective, it feels like carrying more weight without recognition.
I've seen the admin role gradually become a catch-all in so many organizations. Support. Reporting. Training. Integrations. Workflow logic. Permissions. Close support. Audit prep. Historical context. System behavior. The role expands horizontally and vertically, but it's never formally redefined.
As a developer who works as a contractor in the NetSuite space, I see another version of this all the time: the admin becomes the point of contact for custom development projects. When the organization decides it needs a customization or a custom solution, guess who gets tasked with it? The admin. They're expected to scope the project, select a developer, manage the engagement, handle testing and QA, and coordinate the deployment. That's project management on top of everything else - and it lands on them without anyone stopping to say, "Wait, we just added a significant new responsibility to this role."
NetSuite makes this easy to justify, honestly. The system touches everything. When an issue doesn't clearly belong to finance, IT, or operations, it lands with the admin. When something breaks, they can usually fix it. When a request shows up, routing it to the person who "knows NetSuite" feels efficient.
And early on, it is efficient. But over time, efficiency becomes dependency.
It's Not Just Admins
I've focused mostly on admins here, but I want to be clear: I see this same pattern with developers, too.
Sometimes a company hires a developer for customization work, and that role gradually absorbs admin responsibilities. They're debugging workflows, managing permissions, answering user questions - all while still expected to deliver development projects. Other times, it happens because the company never had a dedicated admin in the first place. The developer becomes the de facto owner of the system by default.
And then there's the scenario I see more often than I'd like: an admin leaves, the company doesn't backfill the role, and everything lands on the developer. No title change. No comp adjustment. Just an unspoken expectation that they'll figure it out.
The pattern is the same. The role expands. The recognition doesn't. The pressure builds.
Competence Creates Invisibility
Here's something I find particularly interesting about this dynamic: as dependency grows, so does the employee's expertise. But that expertise often becomes invisible.
They understand why workflows behave the way they do. They know which reports are reliable and which ones aren't. They remember the historical decisions that shaped the system. They prevent problems before anyone else even sees them.
That last part matters most, I think.
The better they are at their job, the quieter their impact becomes. Stability replaces visibility. The absence of pain becomes invisible work. How do you quantify problems that never happened?
Meanwhile, titles stay flat. Compensation stays anchored to an outdated job description. Authority remains informal. The organization increasingly relies on someone without formally acknowledging the risk concentrated in them.
The employee sees this clearly. Leadership usually doesn't.
And I want to be clear: this isn't just emotional dissatisfaction. It's structural misalignment.
Economics Triggers Exit. Culture Conceals Risk.
It's tempting to frame retention as either an economic problem or a cultural one. But in my experience, they're deeply intertwined.
Economics explains why leaving eventually makes sense. Culture explains why no one intervenes early enough to prevent it.
NetSuite admins and developers are often described as "taken for granted," but I think that phrase undersells what's actually happening. It's not just a lack of appreciation. It's that organizations develop an unexamined assumption: whoever owns the system can and should handle all things NetSuite. Everything. If it touches the system, it's their problem. That assumption becomes so embedded in how the organization operates that no one even questions it anymore.
The organization normalizes reliance. Responsibilities are added without conversation. Risk is transferred without acknowledgment. Success becomes assumed.
"You'll handle this. You always do."
That's not malicious. It's cultural drift. And it happens gradually enough that no one notices until it's too late.
By the time compensation becomes a discussion - often prompted by an external offer - the organization is no longer managing the situation. It's reacting to it.
Why Culture Alone Can't Compete
At this stage, I've noticed that retention is often reframed internally as an engagement issue.
"We treat them well." "They like the team." "They have flexibility."
All of that may be true. But does it change the equation? I don't think it does.
The market prices the role differently than the organization does. And NetSuite professionals are constantly exposed to that signal - through recruiters, through peers, through simple awareness of how rare their skill set actually is.
Culture helps people stay. Economics determines whether staying is rational. When those two diverge for long enough, culture loses. Quietly, but inevitably.
This Goes Both Ways
I've been hard on organizations here, and I think that's warranted. But I'd be leaving out part of the picture if I didn't acknowledge that employees have a role in this dynamic, too.
Many admins and developers never raise the issue until they're already out the door. They absorb new responsibilities without pushing back. They don't ask for title changes or compensation adjustments. They assume leadership should "just know" how much the role has grown - and when leadership doesn't notice, they take it as confirmation that no one cares.
That's understandable. These conversations are uncomfortable. And there's a real power imbalance that makes it hard to advocate for yourself without feeling like you're being difficult or ungrateful.
But silence gets interpreted as contentment. If you never say "this is too much" or "my compensation doesn't reflect what I'm doing," the organization has no signal that anything is wrong. That doesn't make the organization's blindness acceptable - but it does mean that employees who want things to change often need to initiate the conversation rather than wait for someone to notice.
The best outcomes I've seen happen when both sides engage honestly: organizations that proactively check in, and employees who speak up before resentment sets in. When only one side is paying attention, the drift continues until something breaks.
When They Leave, It's Not Just Attrition
When a deeply embedded NetSuite admin or developer leaves, it's rarely just a staffing problem. I'd argue it's an organizational risk event.
The role goes unfilled longer than expected. Or the responsibilities land on someone who already has a full plate. That person enters overwhelm quickly. Shortcuts appear. Decisions get deferred. Context disappears.
Domain knowledge doesn't vanish all at once. It erodes, piece by piece.
Morale follows - not because someone left, but because the remaining team suddenly feels the weight of what that person was carrying. Often for the first time. The organization discovers the true scope of the role only after it's gone.
By then, the cost has already compounded.
What Actually Improves Retention
So what works? In my experience, organizations that retain NetSuite talent don't rely on perks or platitudes. They do the harder work of honest recognition.
That starts with seeing the role clearly. Not as it was defined when someone was hired, but as it actually exists today. What does this person own? What decisions flow through them? What breaks if they're not there? Most organizations have never asked those questions seriously - and if they did, they'd realize the job description is years out of date.
From there, compensation needs to follow. Not as a reaction to an external offer, but as a proactive recognition that the role has changed. Benchmark against the market regularly. If someone is doing senior-level work, pay them for senior-level work. Waiting until they have leverage is how you lose them.
Build in redundancy before it's urgent. Cross-train. Document. Create overlap. The goal isn't just risk mitigation - it's giving the person room to breathe. When someone is the only one who can do something, they can never fully step away. That's exhausting, and it compounds over time.
And have the conversation. Not once a year during a review, but whenever the role meaningfully changes. "We've added a lot to your plate. Let's talk about whether this still makes sense for you, and what we need to adjust." That kind of honesty goes further than most leaders realize.
For Admins and Developers Reading This
If any of this sounds familiar, I want you to know: you're not imagining it.
The expanding scope, the invisible work, the gap between what you do and how you're recognized - it's real. And it's common. You're not being unreasonable for noticing it, and you're not being disloyal for thinking about what comes next.
My advice: document what you actually do. Not for a confrontation, but for clarity - yours and theirs. Write down the responsibilities you've absorbed. Note the things that would break if you weren't there. Understand your market value, because the market certainly does.
Then have the conversation. Not as an ultimatum, but as an honest discussion about where things stand. Some organizations will respond well. Some won't. But either way, you'll have the information you need to make a clear-eyed decision about your future.
You've earned the right to be recognized for what you actually contribute. Don't wait for someone else to notice.
The Hard Truth
When a NetSuite admin or developer leaves for a materially better offer, it isn't just an economic correction. It's what happens when delayed recognition meets cultural inertia.
NetSuite roles evolve quickly. When an organization's understanding of those roles doesn't evolve at the same pace, the market eventually intervenes.
And in my experience, it always does.