Mentoring Developers: Best Practices From Uber Interview With Gergely Orosz

For example, Benett Garner, a Lead Backend Engineer, is one of those experts that not only loves to learn but also knows a lot of other developers who are like him. It’s easy to assume that the best developers are those who have worked in the field for a long time—but according to some experts, that’s not necessarily the case. It’s also worth the effort, they suggest, to practice active listening as a way to build connections with your mentees. This means that they will undertake software development tasks more efficiently, and most importantly, in record time. Remember, the aim is not to put them down and break their confidence. If you can point out one’s errors and shortcomings without necessarily causing any hurt, do it.

  • Learn how mentoring software engineers is rewarding and mutually beneficial for both the mentee and mentor.
  • To track results, to create awareness of such initiatives across the company and to incorporate them to their processes.
  • It is in this context that I see mentoring becoming a “bridge” between the new generation of software professionals and the current leadership in the industry.
  • Product managers play a crucial role in shaping a company.

My personal mantra ever since has been “work with people you admire”. So, I’m thinking of writing a book about modern pragmatic software engineering. There are lots of books out there, but I feel the engineering landscape has changed a lot in the past 10 years. Teamwork is a lot more prominent and remote teamwork especially.

Learn from the Best. Be the Best.

Everyone, regardless of intelligence, leadership skills, motivation, or ability, could benefit from some assistance. Plato is a mentorship platform for engineering managers & product managers. Its mentors are tech industry’s leaders from companies like Facebook, Lyft, Slack, Airbnb, Gusto, and more. https://g-markets.net/software-development/cyber-security-specialist-job-description-and/ Working on a project, as part of a team is another situation where mentorship is given and received. It might be during planning meetings, architecture discussions, whiteboarding, retrospectives, or something else. When working closely with other developers, feedback and learning naturally happen.

mentoring software engineers

He or she usually doesn’t provide just lectures, but they can help guide you through your learnings. People with a mentor tend to be very self-directed and are often successful in their careers. An experienced mentor and their life experience are invaluable.

DevOps Engineer Skills Matrix: A Roadmap to a Career in DevOps

Reflecting on how you experienced a similarly challenging situation back in the day, and how you also struggled with it can help the mentee feel less anxious. From everything that’s been said, it’s clear that the best mentorship should be more than just handing mentees everything on a silver plate. Well, it’s a metaphor for supporting your mentees so that they can learn to solve problems independently instead of relying on your help for everything. The benefit of sharing your own experiences through storytelling is that it gives mentees the opportunity to learn from your setbacks as well as successes. Moreover, Gergely believes that if he had a formal mentor during his developer years, he would be able to grow faster. Formal mentorship means that there is some kind of structure for the mentor-mentee relationship, such as a one-on-one meeting frequency or a term limit.

A software engineer myself, I often get asked how people can get started with mentoring. Here are a few things to keep in mind if you’re thinking about becoming a mentor. If you’ve read this far, you may realize that nothing I’ve said is specific
to software engineering. Mentoring is a general skill; your experience makes
it industry-specific.

The benefits of developers’ mentorship for your organization

You also engage in the form of curating, in which you selectively share only the most valuable information and discard the rest. You get to know other people in your industry, which can be beneficial down the road. This process of putting your thoughts Chapter 9: Java I O Fundamentals Oracle Certified Professional Java SE 8 Programmer Exam 1Z0-809: A Comprehensive OCPJP 8 Certification Guide Book into words can help you evaluate your strategy and identify its benefits and drawbacks. Ace AI uses Git data to find skills gaps and recommends the best mentor from your team and external platforms like Codementor, Growth Mentor, and others.

  • Mentorship programs can help mentees expand their professional networks.
  • Keep everything confidential, even with the mentee’s manager.
  • Take a sincere interest in the life of your mentee – aspirations, goals, or dreams.
  • Moreover, a coding mentor with more experience in tech companies is in a better position to offer advice and impart wisdom to their mentee.

Then, I moved to the UK and worked at JPMorgan, Skype, and also Microsoft at the same time. I moved to Skyscanner, and I’ve been at Uber for the past three years and became a manager. Mentoring is underutilized in the software development industry today.

Weekly check-ins are usually a healthy way to see how each other is doing, handle any urgent questions and build up a level of trust and habit. Weirdly, in one job interview they asked if I was willing to mentor junior devs. I said yes, they hired me, but the subject never came up after that. In another, the topic never came up at all, nobody approached me for mentoring at the job, but my management later hassled me about missing their expectations about it.

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