Multiplying Your Impact Through Mentoring - Chicago Roboto 2017

by maltzj

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Jonathan Maltz [email protected] / @maltzj (github/twitter) Multiplying Your Impact Through Mentoring

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Yelp’s Mission Connecting people with great local businesses.

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Hi! I’m Maltz! ● Full-Stack at Yelp Eat24 ● Previously: Yelp Consumer App ● Mentored 6 new engineers over 2 years ● Now mentoring-mentors

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Why Am I Here?

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What Am I Here To Talk About? Mentoring New-Hires

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Why

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Why?

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Most powerful lever to improve your team

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Multiplies your own impact

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Helps you hire and retain great people

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But NO ONE talks about it

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Let’s change that!

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What will we talk about? ● Preparing for onboarding ● The first couple months ● Handling your mentee’s questions

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Preparing For Onboarding

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What does this mean? ● Understand what makes a great engineer on your team ○ Technical skills ○ Non-technical skills ○ Understanding of team processes ○ Cultural things ● Write these down so you can reference them!

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A brief sample of ours (don’t worry about reading it)

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But I Don’t Have Time!

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But I Don’t Have Time!

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But I Don’t Have Time!

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Next: Design a ramp-up process ● Aim for breadth of topics + velocity of completion ● Add complexity gradually ● Create a script for this as much as possible

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Don’t Forget About Numero Uno

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Don’t Forget About Numero Uno ● Set expectations with external stakeholders ● Be willing to give up your own productivity for a few weeks. ○ It’s better in the long run!

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● Understand the engineer you want them to become. ● Define a ramp-up process ● Don’t forget about numero uno Summary: Preparing for onboarding

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The First Couple Months

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Goal: Make them the engineer you want ASAP

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How NOT To Do This ● Forget about them ● Throw them in the deep end and hope they swim ● Do your own work instead of helping your mentee ● Delegating helping to someone else

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How TO DO This?

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Start with a High Standard

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Celebrate The Successes

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Check-in Frequently The First 2-3 Weeks

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Schedule 1:1s and Use Them!

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Don’t Give Answers Give Tools

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● Don’t forget about them ● Start with a high standard ● Check-in frequently ● Celebrate the successes ● Schedule 1:1s and use them ● Don’t give answers, give tools. Summary: The First Couple Months

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Handling Your Mentee’s Questions

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Handling Your Mentee’s Questions

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4 Step Process

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1. Figure Out The Path To The Answer

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2. Take a Ranging Shot

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3. Find What They Can Learn From This

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4. Help Them Get To The Answer

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Scale of Gaining Knowledge Given to you Self-discovered

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Scale of Gaining Knowledge Given to you Self-discovered Try to get your mentees to live over here

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Be Like This Guy

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● Figure out the answer first ● Take a ranging shot ● Figure out what they can learn ● Help them get to the answer Summary: Handling Your Mentee’s Question

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The 3 Things To Take Home ● Take time to understand the end goal of mentoring ● Build good habits, especially high quality, early on ● Give tools, not answers

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Additional Resources ● How To Ask Good Questions - Julia Evans ● Your Brain’s API: Giving and Getting Technical Help - Sasha Laundy (PyCon 2015) ● Power of Habit - Charles Duhig ● Crucial Conversations - Various ● Software Lead Weekly (an awesome newsletter that touches on these topics)