In my book, yes. Things like delivering value to customers, building great products and doing work that you'll be proud of. Career goals are quite often orthogonal to those.
> Is there really anything more important than career progression?
In a particular company? Yes, most things are. In my professional life? Yes, but career progression ranks pretty darned high. However, my career progression is a layer of abstraction above whatever company I happen to be working for, and can really only be effectively managed at that level.
> your manager is there to help you get paid more.
That's not the most important thing I want from my manager. The important things I want from my manager are making sure I have what I need to do my job, making sure that I am not being unnecessarily hampered in doing my job, and making sure that I am working in sync with the rest of my team and other teams toward a common goal.
In other words, the most important thing a manager can do for me is to keep the skids greased.
If you want to get paid more, then don't engage the company for "career progression". 90% of that stuff is designed by HR for "engagement" to keep you on the hamster wheel. A lot of that stuff at my company is kept under the retention category in HR, which tells you all you need to know.
If they like you, you will get promoted anyway rather than engaging in that sort of stuff.
