4 ms·

One of my most valuable lessons, when I was a junior engineer, is asking questions. I was shy, quiet, and trying to carry the weight of the world on my shoulder

by hiepph 5y ago

One of my most valuable lessons, when I was a junior engineer, is asking questions. I was shy, quiet, and trying to carry the weight of the world on my shoulder. But I learned that building software is a community/team game. By asking a question and asking for opinions, I learned a lot from the feedback. Though I'm still shy and quiet (it's my personality and I can't simply get rid of it), now I know how to interact with people within my constraint. That fact doesn't block me from joining tech discussions on forums, asking for feedback or even giving a tech talk to my team.

jwmcglynn 5y ago
+1 to this. As a senior engineer, one of the big things I've learned is asking good questions, finding who to ask, and having the confidence to do so. Junior engineers aren't expected to do this alone, your senior engineers should be there to help you as you learn to do this yourself. For me, it's still a bit intimidating asking questions to people 2+ levels above me, but the biggest thing I've learned is that those people want to help me. For more senior engineers, it's their job to help you: You're not wasting their time.
delecti 5y ago
I'm a senior engineer now and I'm still learning to make myself ask questions; it's incredibly valuable at all stages of a career. As a junior dev, there's lots you just don't know; you need to ask questions so you can get unblocked all the time, and that's not a problem. And as a senior dev, you know enough to identify questions which don't have clear answers yet, and when you ask a question out loud and the answer is "we never thought of that", you just provided a ton of value in asking the question. And if, as a senior dev, you ask a question which does have a clear answer, if you had to ask then someone else probably had that question too.

4 ms·

One of my most valuable lessons, when I was a junior engineer, is asking questions. I was shy, quiet, and trying to carry the weight of the world on my shoulder

by hiepph 5y ago

jwmcglynn 5y ago
+1 to this. As a senior engineer, one of the big things I've learned is asking good questions, finding who to ask, and having the confidence to do so. Junior engineers aren't expected to do this alone, your senior engineers should be there to help you as you learn to do this yourself. For me, it's still a bit intimidating asking questions to people 2+ levels above me, but the biggest thing I've learned is that those people want to help me. For more senior engineers, it's their job to help you: You're not wasting their time.
delecti 5y ago
I'm a senior engineer now and I'm still learning to make myself ask questions; it's incredibly valuable at all stages of a career. As a junior dev, there's lots you just don't know; you need to ask questions so you can get unblocked all the time, and that's not a problem. And as a senior dev, you know enough to identify questions which don't have clear answers yet, and when you ask a question out loud and the answer is "we never thought of that", you just provided a ton of value in asking the question. And if, as a senior dev, you ask a question which does have a clear answer, if you had to ask then someone else probably had that question too.