Importance of grooming fresh engineers in the software industry
It has been ~8 years since I started my career as a software engineer and I still have the same question in mind. Why companies do not focus on mentoring freshers. When I say words like grooming, mentoring, coaching, etc. I by any means do not refer to those sessions, induction programs, and KTs that happen as a part of the standard process. What I am referring to is a process that mentors a person professionally as well as mentally.
Professional mentoring refers to building up a mindset of continuously polishing skills and acquiring new skills and on a mental level, it refers to how a person should respond in a particular situation, how to handle pressure, when to say NO and many more aspects.
If you want to know how technically sound a team is, just talk to a couple of freshers in that team and you will get to know if a team is sound or not. By freshers, I refer to all engineers below 2 years of experience. This might be a very strong statement but reflects the truth. A fresh engineer is like a newborn who learns what his/her parents/siblings do. He has a mind that is not pre-occupied with strong beliefs and opinions. He picks up everything that he sees, how the seniors interact with each other, how they write the code, how they engage in meetings, and if a wrong impression is imprinted, it lasts forever and very few are able to unlearn things.
I have seen senior members of the team not giving enough attention to junior members. It happened to me also when I was a fresher( I won’t name any company here). When I went to a senior engineer asking some questions, the reply was: Google it! You are not in school and I am not your teacher. I sometimes took this concern to my managers, the reply I got was, no one is here to teach you, you have to learn yourself. It is true that newbies need to put in lots of effort to learn new things and perfecting skills but, senior members should remember that without potter’s guidance, clay will never take that beautiful shape that has tremendous value, and if raw clay hardens with time, it has no value. The same happens with an engineer, if they are not shaped and guided in their initial days, they will turn out to be arrogant, unruly, and will be filled with false ego and I know it all attitude.
It is very important to train, guide, and mentor fresh engineers, it is almost as important as hiring new ones. Companies put lots of effort and money in hiring, but when it comes to training the majority rely on induction programs and standard KTs. That helps only is giving an overview but does not help in mentoring and inculcating company culture into the nerves of a fresh mind. Once this fresh engineer moves one ladder up, the existing state of mind hardens and now, he has his own opinion which is not in line with the team.
Now moving to what can be done, to improve this. I remember when I was a kid, and I did something wrong, in my society my parents were questioned. When I did not complete my assignments by parents were questioned. When I was not able to learn things properly my teachers were held responsible for that. The first thing which I could see is a lack of responsibility for junior members in the team, no one takes on the responsibility and the management never questions the senior members about their performance. Each fresh engineer should be tagged to a mentor, and it is the mentor's responsibility to coach him, guide him, and let him do mistakes and learn. When someone works under the pressure that, there is no one to hold me when I fall, the performance degrades, this is true for senior engineers too to some extent.
They should be included in design discussions, code reviews, and should be asked to prepare for it. It is very important to make sure that their thoughts are heard and are shaped well so that they can be future mentors. Otherwise, the statement “ A Jerk will always bring in another jerk” will become true. They should be asked to come up with the feature design(Once they have some experience in the product) in the meetings and should be questioned about the approach. They should shadow in the interviews so that they know, what concepts they need to learn as interview questions are different from the real day to day work but play an important role in developing a logical thought process.
From the cost perspective, not able to groom freshers cost companies big time. To bring in new engineers, you need to spend a senior engineer’s time and have to onboard a new person and go through all the process again.
This brings another aspect of the discussion, how much time should be spent in mentoring these new guys. Senior members could allocate some time on a weekly basis to see what they have learned and how are they improving themselves. I am not very comfortable with the fact of babysitting anyone, as it will cost your time in return. Mentors should make sure, that their mentees are trying enough before seeking any help, if that is not the case, then any help should not be extended.
With these ideas, I conclude this article. Please let me know any thoughts which you have in your mind.
