Leigh Lawhon
Aug 24, 2017 · 1 min read

Another great article!

One of the companies I worked for, one that touted an “informal mentorship program” (aka lip service) was know for hiring very young developers. I recommended some brown bags and mentorship when I realized I was on a project with a particularly large group of them. I was told, “They are computer scientists. They will figure it out.” It was also a company where it was difficult to get the technical mentorship I wanted because anyone could (and would) come in at any time and rewrite your code without discussion and not necessarily for the better. I don’t say this in defense of ownership, but in acknowledgement of missed teaching opportunities in cases where the changes improved the project.

In the end I left that company. I didn’t want to work in “figured out code”. Moral of the story: a more robust mentoring structure would have gone a long way in retention (as mentioned). A side note: I was a senior female developer on a large team with very poor diversity numbers. A strong mentorship program would have help their diversity problem as well.

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    Leigh Lawhon

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