Building Strong Foundations: Mentorship in Early Career Development
Kristijan Pušić | January 30th, 2024
There are fewer knowledge gaps to fill later in your software development career if you find a mentor early on!
How do you explain to a mid-level developer that he is not yet a senior developer? What is the next thing for a junior developer to learn on the way to becoming a mid-level developer? How quickly can I become a senior developer? Developers at different levels have different questions at different times in their careers. It is important to show them all that there is more to learn in this ever-evolving IT world. Soft skills grow independently of their technical expertise, and it is a matter of their team and their project how fast they can develop in an ecosystem they are currently working in. Many IT companies have many different corporate cultures. To have a stable and predictable career in this new AI-driven landscape, you need to start mentoring early. Every junior developer’s career should start with a mentor. Filling in the gaps afterwards is a painful process. Get a mentor early in your career.
AI literacy to dominate the world of knowledge in the future!
World of AI is a reality and completing regular developer tasks has become easier and faster. Not every task is highly complex, and getting working pieces of quality code from an AI source is very likely. Mentoring at the beginning of a developer’s career is crucial to their growth in later stages. Learning on your own, or only from online resources, can lead to wrong assumptions, and as a result a developer’s technical knowledge will be damaged. Not using AI is just as bad as using it too much. A lot of junior developers overuse googling and AI services to solve everyday development tasks, which may seem good because it solves tasks faster, but in reality it’s not.
The problem is that today’s junior developers are more likely to be satisfied with the result and no deep learning has taken place. This is where our Setronica mentors step in and fill this gap for them. To connect the missing knowledge hidden in soft skills and competency matrices and to teach how to use AI’s assistants in a more beneficial way for him and for the owner of the code. Becoming an AI literal is a small goal for all of us, but for a future mid-level software engineer it is a must-have skill.
Deeper understanding and multilingualism in software development to combat the shallowness of an IT developer’s knowledge.
Many topics such as unit testing can seem boring or repetitive in a programming world, but when coupled with TDD (test driven development) and pair programming routines, for example, it becomes an invaluable teaching method. Sharing your thoughts in code with another person is a self-revelatory moment. Being aware of SOLID principles is not the same as following them and understanding each one. Maybe it can’t be practiced by the developer in his daily work, but it can be practiced with our Setronica mentor. The idea is to gain a deeper understanding of the concepts in order to reach new heights of knowledge.
Playing the game of software development in one language or framework is a waste of time. Many young developers fall into this trap. Being multilingual and having experience in working with different frameworks is a goal in a developer’s career. Deeper understanding comes from being able to connect the same ideas and concepts within different frameworks and languages. Understanding object-oriented programming, polymorphism and encapsulation gives developers the power to advance their knowledge and careers. Some concepts need to be understood in order to implement the language and a framework correctly. A moment where a mentee grows within a correctly built IT ecosystem with a Setronica mentor.
Enduring soft skills in IT development teams.
Being a developer means working in a team of developers, sharing a codebase with them, completing tasks within sprints as a team. It’s not possible to list and explain all the skills needed to play a team game of software development in one article, but on the other hand it is possible to explain that only a small part of a developer’s skills goes to strictly technical skills and competences. All the rest, the greater part, goes to different parts of the whole person. Uncovering the secrets or the competent competence matrix for each developer is the job of a mentor. Setronica is entering its 3rd decade of existence in the IT world and has bulletproof competence matrices to guide our mentors in reaching new heights of developer knowledge and skills quickly and professionally. Setronica’s corporate culture incorporates both agile and devops transformations to give our Setronica mentors the much needed knowledge and experience to mentor today’s mentees.
The future for junior developers is forever altered.
Every AI assistant around claims to be a junior developer when prompted to declare its own level of development knowledge. Whether this is true or not, it is no secret that each of them finds common bad development practices, so each of these AI assistants can review and give an opinion on any part of a code. The AI can even suggest improvements to any part of the code. Quite a handy tool if someone wants to learn and improve their own software development skills. Quite handy if you want to improve the quality of your code. The problem is that all this is useless without a deeper knowledge and understanding of the given solutions. How can a mentor see that part of the code is done by an AI? Let’s leave the answer to your future Setronica mentor. Setronica mentors are here to help overcome this obstacle in the life of an ordinary junior IT developer.
For a developer, achieving mid-level status means conforming to a set of common competency matrix entries. All over this beautiful IT planet, skill matrices are more or less the same. Find a Setronica mentor, learn something new and accelerate your career. The world of IT is a fun and interesting place, let Setronica help you unlock its secrets.
Ready to Enrich Your Team?
Kristijan Pušić
IT consultant and Business developer
Our consultant is at your disposal from 9 AM to 5 PM CET working days from Monday to Friday for any additional questions.
