Ask HN: Working with a lot more experience co-workers, recommendations

3 points by ale7714 11 years ago | 10 comments

Hi,

I have over 5 years of experience working in mobile and software development (backend mostly in Rails). In my previous work I felt extremely confident because it was a small team with little CS experience and most of my solutions were basically the best even when I knew maybe that wasn't true. After a year I decided to go looking for another job opportunity and landed a job and now I feel kind of lost all my colleagues have a lot more experience and even when I'm trying to catch up with everything, trying to learn and use better ruby programing patterns, learning Redis and Ember, I feel behind. My confidence have drop a lot and even I have hard time proposing ideas or making an opinion because I feel insecure about what I know.

Does anyone have an opinion or a recommendation?

seren 11 years ago |

How long have you been there ?

If you are at a new place, and you don't have a clear view of the overall architecture, which parts are in good shape, which are not, etc, it is natural to be less confident in proposing a solution, particularly if people have been there for a long time.

However, it should not stop you of asking open ended question like "Why did module X have been developed with Y instead of Z ?" You'll probably learn quite a bit on the historical, political or time constraint reasons. And you could stumble upon a good suggestion because no one had the idea or will to change the status quo.

The advantage of being new is that you can assess the code base or practice with a "fresh" look. I don't think that anyone is expecting you to have the best idea on every proposal, you should maybe relax a little bit on the image you want to project. You can't be "the expert" in two months. Try to focus on a very narrow part of the project where you feel you have a related experience or can contribute something meaningful.

ale7714 11 years ago | |

Two months. Yes, you're right my main concern shouldn't be the image that I'm projecting. Thanks for writing.

hkarthik 11 years ago |

Pair program as much as you can in this situation. You'll pick up a lot, and gain confidence to suggest improvements by starting with one-on-one interactions with your pair.

Then find a new partner, ideally someone less strong than your first partner where you feel even more confidence offering suggestions.

Repeat this process until you feel comfortable pairing with anyone on this team. Then you know you've made it.

ale7714 11 years ago | |

I like your suggestion a lot

alain94040 11 years ago |

You are in the best position possible. You'll be gaining new experience quickly. In your previous position, you most likely were not growing/learning much if at all.

Most successful entrepreneurs will tell you they always want to be surrounded by people smarter than them. Congratulations, you are in that position.

ale7714 11 years ago | |

That is true

antino 11 years ago |

I'm in the same boat, buddy. feels

ale7714 11 years ago | |

How have you handling it so far?. I'm turning 2 months today. I been reading and documenting a lot on free time but still not enough.

antino 11 years ago | | |

Well, I guess mostly by revising work I've done in the past. Reviewing it and thinking about how it could be improved if I were to apply methods that my coworkers would use.

I know it could be difficult for you, but consider just asking them for advice on the systems you're building/proposing. If you think they're likely to turn down the ideas you have, you may as well pre-empt that and get down to the business of figuring out a compromise. It may not make you look like some rockstar programmer, but at least you'll be learning something as quickly as possible. Also, depending on how down to earth your employers are, appearing humble before your superiors/more experienced colleagues and wanting of knowledge will only cast a good light on you.