The Practical Guide to Building an Apprenticeship

Presented at RubyConfPH on March 16, 2018

Currently, our industry has a surplus of bright junior developers, but a lack of open junior positions. Building a developer apprenticeship in your organization is a great way to provide a haven for these talented devs, while simultaneously making your team more productive and easing the pain of hiring.

In this talk, you'll learn from the mistakes I've made and wins I've had in creating an apprenticeship. From pitching the idea to growing your apprentices, you'll gain a step-by-step guide to successfully building your own apprenticeship program.

Transcript

1. The Practical Guide to Building an Apprenticeship Megan Tiu RubyConfPH March 16, 2018
2. Hello there I am: Senior Software Engineer at CallRail @megantiu on Twitter megantiu on GitHub
5. apprenticeship
6. fulfill a real need
7. "there’s a widening gap between educational institutions and the companies hiring" Lia James @Lia_James http://blog.humanpredictions.io/apprenticeships-the-building- blocks/
8. unify and engage your team
9. create more diverse & inclusive organizations
10. what’s an apprenticeship?
11. what’s an apprenticeship?
12. how’s it different from an internship?
13. Internship Focus on one specific project Implies they’ll do the dirty work Short-term
14. Internship Focus on one specific project Implies they’ll do the dirty work Short-term Apprenticeship Focus on sustainable growth Implies they’ll be honing their craft Long-term
15. laying the ground work
16. pitching planning preparation
17. what do you need to get it going?
18. what do you need? a plan cash buy-in
19. convince your boss
20. Material Eliminate onboarding costs Eliminate recruiting costs Easier hiring of seniors
21. Material Eliminate onboarding costs Eliminate recruiting costs Easier hiring of seniors Immaterial Increase diversity of background and skill Improve team connectivity Increase developer productivity
22. key factors to decide program length number of apprentices who’s going to do what
23. key factors to decide what should they know? what should they learn? how will they learn it?
24. you need a game plan
25. i. goals ii. who to target i. potential places to advertise iii. timeline i. month 1 ii. month 2 iii. months 3 and 4 iv. projects i. specific possible projects ii. general qualities iii. examples v. process i. division of work ii. moving between teams iii. supplemental reading iv. mentorship vi. logistics i. interview process ii. involving the team iii. post-apprenticeship hiring iv. work setup vii. items to consider
26. implementation
27. hiring onboarding growing
28. hiring
29. goal establish an unbiased, even playing field for candidates
30. how we did it application code challenge final interview
31. how we did it end-to-end anonymization throughout the entire process
32. application
35. what does your background bring to the table?
36. candidates consistently try to "make up" for the fact that they don’t have previous technical experience
37. tell us about a problem that challenged you while learning, but you ultimately conquered.
38. tell us about a problem that challenged you while learning, but you ultimately conquered. ✨
39. application review
41. reviewers rated each application on: eagerness/excitement curiosity drive
42. how we did it: hiring make data-driven conclusions (including early cuts and acceptances)
43. code challenge
44. how we did it: code challenge decide what we want to know figure out what format we want write the code challenge
45. how we did it: code challenge each candidate had their own GitHub repo
48. class Grader end
49. describe '#score' do # the student forgot to answer a question context 'when passed nil for an answer' do let(:answers) { ['A', 'B', nil, 'D'] } it 'counts the nil as incorrect' do expect(grader.score(answers)).to eq(75.0) end end end
50. how we did it: code challenge code comments are the only context your candidates have
51. how we did it: code challenge a script scrubbed commits’ author info, then submitted a PR to a separate submissions- only repo
52. how we did it: code challenge preserved commit history without risk of identifying candidates
53. how we did it: code challenge the pull request format allowed reviewers to assess submissions in a familiar environment
54. code challenge review
56. if you could provide feedback to the candidate on their submission, what would you say?
57. final interview
58. how we did it: final interview product/company intro technical conversation behavioral conversation
59. how we did it: technical chat what challenged you while completing the code challenge?
60. how we did it: technical chat see how they react to feedback using the suggestions from the code challenge review
61. how we did it: behavioral chat what would you change about the school you attended?
62. ways to improve use an HR platform
63. ways to improve don’t limit the code challenge to one programming language
64. ways to improve be more direct with application questions ask what you want to know
65. onboarding
66. goals set the apprentices up for success teach them essential concepts
67. how we did it give them the same onboarding experience as the rest of our developers
68. how we did it scavenger hunt!
69. how we did it lessons on foundational concepts like OOP, debugging
70. ways to improve give them earlier exposure to practices like sprint planning, point estimation
71. growing
72. goals anticipate needs provide an inclusive, friendly environment to grow and learn increase apprentice independence
73. how we did it an initial ramping-up period small changes, bug fixes, internal-facing work
74. how we did it team rotations doing customer-facing work exposure to all stack levels
75. how we did it set early expectations
77. how we did it establish regular communication through 1:1s and more
78. how we did it include them in their team rotation decisions
79. how we did it don’t be afraid to let them fail
80. ways to improve look for early warning signs and be proactive about intervening
81. ways to improve ensure everyone involved is on the same page regarding expectations
82. wrapping up
83. planning hiring onboarding growing
84. our results
85. we hired both of our apprentices!
86. they’re both productive members of teams
87. lessons learned
88. listen to early hunches about candidates
89. give yourself lots of time for this process
90. always work with your goals in mind
91. make a real impact
92. we provided W2 jobs that pay a living wage and include full benefits!!
93. Big movements are comprised of small shifts.
94. This is a chance to take action.
95. Go start an apprenticeship.
96. Thank you! I am: Senior Software Engineer at CallRail @megantiu on Twitter megantiu on GitHub
97. thank you! Loren Crawford @LCrawfish Pamela Vickers @pwnela Kylie Stradley @kyfast Robby Ranshous @rranshous Steve Jackson @stevejxsn Elliott Wood @ewoodh20 Rachael Wright @chaelcodes Pete Holiday @toomuchpete
98. Thank you! I am: Senior Software Engineer at CallRail @megantiu on Twitter megantiu on GitHub