The Care and Feeding of a Jr. Dev

Jesse Wolgamott & Brian Dorton

Outline

Metaphor

Orgs like to only hire expert level developers

But experts are already paid well, working in conditions that are good, and are only looking for a change if the money is 30% more.

Either:

Jr vs Mid vs Sr

Sr Devs

• Can Solve Problems
• Can make technical decisions
• Knows when something is good enough
• Knows when something is overkill
• Knows what they know, and what they don't

Mid Dev

• Can Solve Problems
• Is usually told the tech stack to use
• Knows when something is good enough
• Needs to be told when something is overkill
• Knows what they know, but not what they don't

Jr Dev

• Can Solve Problems
• Needs to be told what tech and libraries to use
• Needs to be told when something is good enough
• Needs to be told when something is overkill
• Insecure about what they know

Expectations of a Jr. dev

When first getting started, orgs either:

In reality:

• JR devs can solve problems using software.
• JR Devs need code reviews
• JR Devs need pairing to see how you do it
• JR Devs need to feel cared after

JR Devs need a mentor

CONs:

Julia Claven

If you don't want the juniors you're investing in to leave when they get better, treat them from day one like you would after year one! 👌 - Aimee Knight

brandon hays

Every great developer you know got there by solving problems they were unqualified to solve until they actually did it. - Patrick McKenzie

Effective Mentoring

Hiring Process

If we speak in terms of hiring piano players: you're hiring the Chopins, Bachs, Liszts, and getting them to play Mary Had A Little Lamb. - Ryan Bigg

Generally Accepted Principle: "Tech Hiring is Broken"

Instead, maybe we:

• Unless you are paying them to write algorithms, you're probably paying them to create and maintain software.

• Give candidate piece of code, ask them to review it.

• What do they like about it?
• What would they do different?
• What could they optimize?

• Have a conversation about modeling data. Describe a problem, and ask them what tables / models they would use.

• Talk to them about their previous experiences; most JR devs had a career before software. This is an asset

Tips from What We've Seen at TIY

• Hire for aptitude, trajectory, and culture, not for technical skill level or prior experience. If that is what you want, you're not hiring a junior developer.

• Junior developers do not need a sink-or-swim mentality, to be treated like children, or excluded from the team.

• Just because you can do something in half the time, doesn't mean its what you should be working on a senior developer.

• No junior should be in charge of upgrading your system to a new major system, overhauling a test suite, or re-architecting your database structure.

• Encourage (i.e. require) pairing with juniors a few times a week. Especially on unfamiliar parts of the system.

• Junior developers need structure, honest expectations, and room to grow.

Thanks!