Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Who Killed the Junior Developer?

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

361–370 of 803 posts

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#361

Post by ataturk »

g051051 wrote: post #318
virgilp wrote: post #223

> we don’t hire junior developers because we can’t afford to have our senior developers mentor them. That feels too dumb to be real (which is exactly why it's probably a real thing). You don't hire senior devs to code - good junior devs can code not only "just as fast", but probably faster too! You hire senior devs to guide you WHAT and HOW to code. And they can do that so much more effectively if they don't have to…

> good junior devs can code not only "just as fast", but probably faster too! Pfft. I'm about as "senior" as it gets and I'm generally the fastest developer in any team I'm on. I've never met a junior dev that could hold a candle to me, and most senior devs I know are the same...we're coding monsters.

Welp, get back to me when you're 50 Mr. Senior and we'll see how you fared over the long haul. Because "coding monster" or not, when you hit 40, companies will be less enthusiastic about hiring you, and by the time you're 50, you'll be out, so I hope you're making bank right now and saving as much of it as you possibly can because there are no do-overs.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#363

Post by jacquesm »

dep_b wrote: post #319
zemanel wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my current job, for a tech company with less than 12 people, at least 5 are interns. Two of them were recent hires (January) and before they were onboarded, i had a meeting with my boss and the other senior developer regarding the new interns and my boss stated he didn’t want me and other senior dev spending too much time mentoring the interns and that if they couldn’t manage by themselves, he would just let them…

The Netherlands is a special place in Software Hell. Where the non-suits are only a cost. "Devs can't be cheap enough! We can't find decent devs!"

That's a silly generalization. I've got a pretty good overview of software development in Western Europe and NL isn't a special place for better or worse compared to the surrounding countries.

If you want to get paid a lot more and you have the right skills the City or Silicon Valley are good options (assuming you are allowed to move there).

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#364

Post by vinceguidry »

There were never any junior dev jobs. You have always had to lie, cheat, and steal your way into the field. I have a buddy who legit cheated his way to the top Magento certification and now cycles through $150k+ jobs where they keep him on long enough to realize he doesn't have any coding skills then they fire him.

Reason is software is always an ancillary concern to the business. You see this in other fields, like say accounting, but the difference is that accountants leave school fully capable of employment. HR understands how to hire and manage accountants.

But programming is this black box in the corporate world that no one knows how to understand, value, or hire for. This is why every company wants rockstars, they're hoping that someone whose at least confident to present themselves as a rockstar won't be a net negative to the company.

Eventually they'll figure it out, took them a decade to figure out how to manage IT. Then companies will learn that they can't skimp on middle management for software developers. Some companies will need to give software a legit seat at the table and hire upper management. The political cover will allow shops to stabilize and with stabilization, you'll finally start seeing small and midsize organizations open up positions for juniors.

But it'll never happen so long as companies don't take software development seriously by giving them political cover. If you are a software developer nearing the middle or end of your career, you're pulling the ladder up behind you if you don't seriously consider moving into management. It's too important a job to ignore to go chase your dreams.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#365

Post by ataturk »

tensor wrote: post #19
lovich wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit of a chicken or the egg problem. Why stay at a company that doesn't invest in you?

Most developers doing the one year stint thing don't care about anything other than salary. No matter what you do for them they will jump after a year. Seeing that pattern on a resume a big warning sign. These people are simply mercenary and deserve to be treated as such.

Given everything that has been discussed on this very page, what's wrong with mercenary tactics? WTF? Companies hold no loyalty to anyone except maybe their inner circle, MBA types are the most mercenary pigs around, and yet you expect a developer with actual skills and something to offer to act differently? How about no?

You get maybe 25 years to make all the money you're ever really going to make as a developer. That's it! So you better fucking be a mercenary. What you're really saying when you see that on a resume is: "Here's someone I can't exploit, mistreat, or fuck over" and that terrifies you.

I'll change jobs whenever and however it suits me. Hell, I once quit a gig because the bathrooms stank too much!

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#366

Post by bobthechef »

Really? The "killing" of the junior developer seems like an anecdotal claim. Hasn't ageism been a concern here on HN? Doesn't that tend to suggest that older, and thus more senior developers are "discriminated against" in favor of younger, CHEAPER labor? The reasons being that either:

- you don't need a senior developer for your needs

- you can't fork out for a senior developer

- you could really use a senior developer, but won't fork out for a senior developer because your penny wise and pound foolish

- you don't understand the difference between a junior and a senior developer

- there is a labor shortage in software development and all you can hire are junior developers

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#367

Post by g051051 »

purerandomness wrote: post #335
g051051 wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> good junior devs can code not only "just as fast", but probably faster too! Pfft. I'm about as "senior" as it gets and I'm generally the fastest developer in any team I'm on. I've never met a junior dev that could hold a candle to me, and most senior devs I know are the same...we're coding monsters.

Dunning-Kruger called, they want their overblown ego steamroller back.

I can point to my well documented track record: code reviews, bonuses, promotions, code longevity, metrics, etc. as evidence. I can code multiple features in the time that a junior dev does one, even with me mentoring them. That doesn't mean they're bad, or even worse than average. It just means that after a career spent honing my craft, I'm much better than average.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#369

Post by austenallred »

vkou wrote: post #225
austenallred wrote: post #104

I’m the cofounder of a YC-backed Computer Science academy ( https://LambdaSchool.com/computer-science ), and we’ve noticed a few things: 1. The junior dev market is flooded. It’s also flooded with people that cannot code. We’ve done quite a bit of analysis, and we’re talking 10% can write fizzbuzz. Bootcamps are pumping people out as fast as they can collect money, and while some are solid juniors many are just compl…

> All that said, we take it for granted that we’re in an industry where people go from cold start to 6 figure salaries in 3-6 months. I’ve not aware of that ever having happened in the history of the world. There have been plenty of trained or semi-trained labour shortages in the history of the world, with similar results.

Not sure any have been at this scale and lasted for this long.

Re: Who Killed the Junior Developer?

#370

Post by ticviking »

dalbasal wrote: post #269
virgilp wrote: post #223

> we don’t hire junior developers because we can’t afford to have our senior developers mentor them. That feels too dumb to be real (which is exactly why it's probably a real thing). You don't hire senior devs to code - good junior devs can code not only "just as fast", but probably faster too! You hire senior devs to guide you WHAT and HOW to code. And they can do that so much more effectively if they don't have to…

The problem I've seen with mentoring, in practice, is the 1 in 3 juniors that takes up all the time. Maybe the particular job doesn't suit them. Maybe they shouldn't be a dev. Maybe it's personality. Some managers, mentors or such seem to deal with this well. But, in the cases that I've seen having an employee that is not producing value is stressful and time consuming. Largely, it's driven by empathy. You don't want…

If 1/3 of you developers are eating all of your mentoring time I would think that either you've made a hiring mistake, or lack appropriate teaching tools.

In one case you've hired someone who isn't ready to do the tasks you need without excessive scaffolding. In the other you're not providing enough structure and scaffolding for the intern to succeed with help.

Mentoring, particularly in the legal context of what makes an intern, an intern and not a Jr. Developer ought to be a short run project, and frankly if you can't commit time to providing an educational experience you shouldn't be filling your staffing needs with an intern at all.

Post reply on HN