I'm a SWE. I work with people that I like on a personal level. However, the majority of my team feels like they're underperforming on an engineering level - they ask help on simple issues (without researching first), don't seem to understand basic architectural pitfalls, don't write unit tests without being prompted each time, etc. At first I was fine with taking time to assist and help people grow, but as time goes on and I see little long term change, I feel like I'm growing jaded and annoyed when asked the same basic questions over and over. It's also interfering with my day to day output, although I don't think that's actually very different - it's possible that in just more cognizant of how much it impacts my day, now that I'm jaded. Is there anything I can do to help change my outlook or my results? Is this just expected in a team of mostly lower levelled people? Is changing teams just a temporary fix - i.e the problem is mine? TC: 200K
Nice people tend to follow good examples. You can try setting a good example.
Get out before you get lazy and unknowingly take on these poor traits
Isn't this a good opportunity to shine? Just need to handle the useless questions. Pick a meeting room and act busy.
I actually end up doing very well at review time - my worry is long term stagnancy and/or attitude problems.
Don’t be so quick to judge. They may think the same if you.
Ya that's probably true, I suck
One thing that might help is a knowledge repository. We use slack so it’s easy for people to look up stuff. For more tribal knowledge related things, something like Confluence from Atlassian might help. Acts as an internal Wiki/FAQ they can quickly pull up to answer common questions or can give insight into why certain settings, features, etc were designed a certain way. Hope that helps!
That's a great idea. I like the idea of a wiki.
Are you the tech lead?
I'm not, I'm just the senior IC on the team.
Is that a diverse team? Is that a problem only with diversity hires?
Own it. Conduct a team seminar on FAQs. Develop a presentation - then hand it off to a promising junior. Repeat as needed. Don't get stuck as the "only" one who knows, you'll never get to advance that way.
I have the opposite problem. Guess you can’t have it both ways
Pick your team carefully, culture is the one hard thing to change in every organization.
Thanks for that fortune cookie advise! Very helpful!
Seems like op should get more cookies ...