Who Killed the Junior Developer? • Hacker News Board

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#181

Post by odiroot » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:07 AM UTC

AFNobody wrote: post #75

CydeWeys wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A key point that you're missing is that junior devs are likely to jump ship at least once in their career trajectory before they become senior devs. So yes, junior devs do need to be trained by someone , but if you're going to put in a lot of work and not receive much of the benefit, it's not in your best interest. There's a variety of reasons for why devs jump ship so often (including compensation), but unless you c…

Market rate compensation, non-toxic culture, and realistic expectations for work output solves 90% of the reasons reasonable people leave jobs. People claim all sorts of reasons for leaving jobs but its always one of those three or uncertainty about company longevity. (i.e. acquisition/financial difficulties for the company) The other 10% is people who are naive or have a family/relocation related issue that you can…

You may have a point in here. Provided I have productive working conditions and 5-10% YoY salary bump I'd probably never have the inertia to look for a new job myself.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#182

Post by techservative » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:08 AM UTC

welcome to the late stages of a giant tech bubble. Startup investment has fallen except in areas where very high amounts of academic background are useful such as AI, autonomous vehicles, biotech and so on.

Startups are the default training tool for software engineers. High risk, low pay yet most startups use the latest and greatest tools so juniors at least get highly marketable experience that is more modern.

When the startup ecosystem begins to fail, fewer developers can acquire these skills. The early stages of the hiring feeder system are broken.

No one wants to train junior developers when there are thousands of startups doing it for them.

I have worked at large companies, we get massive reams of potential interns and graduate hires. They all come from the very top schools only. They don’t even look past the top 20. Why? Because they are assholes and they can.

My recommendation: Start your own startup doing something in a valuable skill area. Identify what is trending.

People waiting in line to get chosen because they are great are going to be disappointed.

Don’t expect someone to pick you, time to hustle.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#183

Post by toomanybeersies » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:09 AM UTC

emodendroket wrote: post #36

maxxxxx wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's something I have noticed too. In the 90s most people I worked with were genuinely interested in the work and often came from very eclectic backgrounds. Almost nobody had a CS degree. Now it seems a lot of people go into programming because it pays well and looks like a good career but they don't really care for tech. I definitely found the industry more fun in the 90s but that may just be the fact it's becomin…

I don't think someone necessarily has to live and breathe code to be good at their job. That kind of focus is hard to maintain forever. When I was new I was constantly reading programming books and now, like, I'm still interested, but other things are going on in my life that also need my attention, you know?

I don't think you need to spend all your spare time making side projects or learning new technologies, but I do think a certain amount of professional curiosity is required as a software engineer, just like any other programming job.

I'll probably spend 15-30 minutes every day outside of work reading about new things, or tinkering around with something, even if it's just reading Hacker News, often these things I learn end up being used at work, so I gain new skills at work. It sounds like you're in the same boat.

My father is a network engineer, and he'll spend time in the evening doing things related to his field, he has a very impressive home networking setup. My friends that are electrical engineers play around with electronics in their spare time.

I think that for any professional, to be successful and have a good career you need to have at least some outside interest in your field. Obviously we all have hobbies, I don't sacrifice those because of work, but if you're working in a job where you have no interest you'll never get far.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#184

Post by EddieSpeaks » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:13 AM UTC

Also because of the #MeToo brouhaha, nobody wants to mentor young women (developers) anymore. It’s just scared away men altogether. Better to stay away than get into criminal trouble for passive aggression at someone.

http://yellowhammernews.com/opinion/metoo-request-good-men-d...

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#185

Post by odiroot » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:15 AM UTC

apthnz wrote: post #138

jfasi wrote: post #131

My two cents: simple supply and demand. The slow deflation of the startup bubble of the past five years or so has killed the junior developer. Once upon a time, there so much competition for engineering talent in the startup world that even developers with little to no experience and/or formal training were being handed lucrative jobs. Looking back we see clear signs of a seller's market in talent: companies went out…

As someone starting to teach myself how to code, I'd be interested to hear more about the basic coding tasks people are failing at.

For me it would be lack of intuition / imagination for building software.

Some people just cannot come up with a high level idea of a solution. Many of them immediately jumps into code, even worse so it's usually some UI code.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#186

Post by fyfy18 » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:18 AM UTC

whiskyant wrote: post #113

nathanaldensr wrote: post #6

I love mentoring. I always have. I used to help out other kids in my high school programming classes. Despite holding several high-level software development positions, what is the total number of times I've been asked by management to mentor more junior folks? Zero. I did it because I love sharing knowledge and I like seeing looks of understanding appear on my colleagues' faces when they "get something" for the firs…

I don't think dedicated mentorship is required for junior devs. There's usually code reviews in which they can pick up on a lot, a mountain of resources online, and there's nothing stopping them from asking for help/opinions from fellow co-workers when tackling a problem.

When I started my first job out of university I worked in a team where we were tasked with fixing various issues and requests (e.g. reports or minor features) from the business, so that teams working on features could focus on those. Even senior developers would be rotated around into this team, but as a junior develop it was where you first started, to learn the ropes.

It was a great experience, as other members of the team, who were more senior than you, may not have even understood how the application you were looking at worked (we had ~40 applications/services), so you would have to work together to figure it out - both completely clueless. Usually we would pair because of the unfamiliarity, but if we were familiar with the application we would occasionally work solo, even as a junior.

The best bit was the management: there was enough pressure that you knew you had to get this fixed soon, but not so much that you were stressing out.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#187

Post by kbart » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:19 AM UTC

nathanaldensr wrote: post #6

I love mentoring. I always have. I used to help out other kids in my high school programming classes. Despite holding several high-level software development positions, what is the total number of times I've been asked by management to mentor more junior folks? Zero. I did it because I love sharing knowledge and I like seeing looks of understanding appear on my colleagues' faces when they "get something" for the firs…

Well, you don't have to be asked directly to do that. I assume, you work in senior position, so read your role description and contract, for most senior positions I have seen "mentoring" and "team leading" is explicitly written there. Sure, don't expect to get assigned time and classroom with whiteboard for teaching in typical company, as it is expected to be done on fly ("don't know something? go ask our guru").

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#188

Post by pbourke » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:19 AM UTC

godot wrote: post #152

nathanaldensr wrote: post #6

I love mentoring. I always have. I used to help out other kids in my high school programming classes. Despite holding several high-level software development positions, what is the total number of times I've been asked by management to mentor more junior folks? Zero. I did it because I love sharing knowledge and I like seeing looks of understanding appear on my colleagues' faces when they "get something" for the firs…

I feel like the current trend of agile development process common in startups now somewhat works against senior devs' interests to mentor junior devs. There simply isn't time allocated for this. Senior devs are held accountable for what they deliver, and doing so on time. This is among other things like code reviewing PRs and attending meetings. For most senior devs working under this circumstance, the best they coul…

> I feel like the current trend of agile development process common in startups now somewhat works against senior devs' interests to mentor junior devs. There simply isn't time allocated for this.

If you're a senior dev, you should be gaming the system a bit to create the time needed to fulfill your role. Never let the keeners fill your time up to 100%, unless it's truly neccessary. There's always going to be some infrastructure that needs fixing, research that needs doing, refactoring that should happen, etc. And you should always have some slack for mentoring and whiteboard discussions.

I almost always start an agile sprint with a self-generated task or two already in my queue for just this reason.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#189

Post by RangerScience » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:23 AM UTC

People talk about a "developer's union" ever so often, and one of the most commonly brought up counter-points is "well, but what would we need to fight for as a union?" (not that I agree there isn't anything (else) to fight for, but:) it occurs to me that this is an excellent possibility.

Devs change jobs. This is good, but (as pointed out) means you maybe don't want to train people up; it's the next company that benefits, not yours. But, maybe if everyone paid in - companies AND people - a scheme could be figured out where you'd know that it's fine to train up, since you'll get the benefit of someone else being trained up.

It's still long-term thinking, which others are pointing out isn't common.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#190

Post by Double_a_92 » Wed, Feb 14, 2018, 7:26 AM UTC

a-saleh wrote: post #164

We kinda did. This is because we like to hire interns. Usually intern in our area: * studies programming at a university * costs around a 1/2 of a junior * is part-time with really erratic schedule * work output still on on par with few juniors we hired I suspect this is mostly because there isn't as much of a difference between what can one work in 8h compared to 4h (I spend 2h out of those on meetings an email anyw…

> I suspect this is mostly because there isn't as much of a difference between what can one work in 8h compared to 4h

This is so true. I don't really understand why 8h workdays are the standard for "creative" jobs. Most people can't fully focus for that long. Tbh I personally just spread out 3-4 hours of proper work time to just fill the 8 hours. Otherwise I'd just run out of power / focus in the early afternoon.