You Need Better Senior Software Developers
Looking for a job at a company trying to save the world? Check out GoodJobs. It’s a job board I built with hand-picked engineering positions at companies trying to fix problems like climate-change and food insecurity.
For many companies, senior software developers have a sort of ‘holy grail’ status; companies want them, aggressively try to acquire them, but have lots of trouble doing so. Because of a booming tech industry, a flood of newly minted junior developers, and project complexity that just keeps increasing, senior software developers are in greater demand than ever before. Companies are willing to pay seniors a lot of money — as long as they have in-demand skills, experience with the latest tools, and are quick to provide value to the project they’re tasked with. However, while these are the reasons most companies try to hire seniors, my argument is that a large skillset and minimum time to productivity are among the last reasons companies should be trying to hire senior software developers.
In this article I’ll dive into three areas where seniors provide the most value, namely mentoring, acceleration and perspective. Afterwards, I’ll then touch on the disconnect between attributes that companies value but that aren’t nearly as important.
