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When I worked for Eventful, I organized several study groups for beginners similar to this. Like the Stripe team, participants in these study groups also found
by rectang 10y ago
When I worked for Eventful, I organized several study groups for beginners similar to this.
Like the Stripe team, participants in these study groups also found that cross-departmental collaboration improved. After learning the fundamentals of coding, people understood better how to work with engineering teams.
We also found a few people out on the edge of the bell curve who had strong engineering aptitude, including one fellow who eventually became a stellar engineer for us.
The main difficulty is that you need a lead who enjoys teaching. Personally, I find the challenge of explaining concepts at varying audience-appropriate levels fascinating and stimulating. We had one other fellow lead a group, and he had a good experience too. But as you can see from this discussion, not everyone wants to take this on.
- korzun 10y agoI'm genuinely curious if this was pre or post firesale to CBS?
- rectang 10y agoBoth pre and post acquisition. I always had the support of Eventful CTO Chuck Norris (who is great to work for). Support from the business side varied over time. I got around that to a certain degree by scheduling most study sessions over lunch break and providing lunch. I also had strong support from the rest of the Eventful engineering team. Before leading the beginner study groups, I'd already been leading engineering study groups for years. Some of that overlapped with open source community study groups: https://wiki.apache.org/lucy/LucyBookClub https://wiki.apache.org/lucy/LucyBookClub
- kaishiro 10y agoI'm sorry - I'm woefully unknowledgeable about Eventful or it's history. However, I have to ask - was his name truly Chuck Norris?
- dba7dba 10y agoOne doesn't have to lead all lessons. Linux can be taught by Linux admins. Setting up personal workstations with Vagrant, etc can be taught by desktop team. HTML/CSS can be led by FrontEnd dev. Also, these training courses are great, but ultimately it costs $ to the company.
- bostik 10y agoEven the best investments incur short-term balance sheet deductions.
- rbg246 10y agoSorry to be pedantic, but you are buying an asset with another asset there is no deduction on the balance sheet.
- rectang 10y agoThese study groups were something I enjoyed and was dedicated to; they wound up being a nice perk for my colleagues -- good for morale and good for hiring. So while there was a cost, good value was generated in exchange and there was solid consensus around our team that the study groups were more than worthwhile. To reproduce this success, though, you shouldn't ordinarily look to someone in a line engineering role. Organizing these sessions is more of a management or onboarding and training task.
- richmarr 10y ago> ... but ultimately it costs $ to the company. I think "ultimately" is an interesting choice of word here, because spending the money is actually more of a beginning than an end (which is why people do it). You're increasing individual engagement, generating social capital within your team, and creating opportunities to benefit from untapped creativity... all of which are valuable, potentially extremely valuable.