Software Engineering Onboarding: Defining The Rules of Fun

The onboarding process is the first thing every new employee will face after joining your company. First impressions are crucial, and good onboarding aims to make things as simple and fast as possible, allowing one to understand what is happening in the company without chasing 50 people and learning things only if they do something unexpected.

I’m sure you can recall some of your horrible onboarding experiences when you joined a new company? Going through hours and hours of online policy training in the form of boring videos? Reading long documents meant nothing to you as they are written in the corporate-fluff language? Trying to set up your local development stack without a proper introduction or manual… Or even worse — being asked to create a bunch of tickets to access any of the company resources and accounts and then waiting forever for an answer.

I have plenty of examples like that from my previous roles, and I would be surprised if you haven’t been exposed to any of them. It was needed. Needed to learn what I should pay attention to, how bad it can be, and ensure that nobody has to suffer the same faith again.

What is a good onboarding process?

A good onboarding process for new employees is one that can be completed within the first working day. That’s how long it should take anybody to get a snapshot of the company, understand the most crucial information and get ready to start coding (or doing whatever else they are supposed to do).

At ESGgen, the onboarding consists of a few most important stages:

• Each employee receives a checklist with things to do within the first week. It is also a checklist for us to ensure all preparations have been done (account, emails, access, et).
• A list of expectations for the first month and three months, the end of the probation period.
• The Rules of Fun is a simplified summary of “unwritten rules” written down and delivered lightly. This is the topic I will share today…
• Policies if they would like to read any, but it’s optional right now before we simplify them.

Today, I will only write about The Rules of Fun, one of the first things from the checklist each employee receives to read…

The Rules of Fun

Working overtime or weekends?

There is a lot of excitement from the business around new projects and deliverables, but we need to be mindful that our health comes first. Projects can only be delivered if we are well-rested, energised and motivated. So whilst we appreciate everyone trying to go above and beyond, you will not get a prize for working through the night or the weekend, and you will not be productive the day after when you do so.

Common misconception: If we work normal time, we will miss the deadline — that’s incorrect. A deadline is missed for one of these reasons: incorrect estimations, poor planning, unexpected issues, and unrealistic expectations.

Working hours

Our core working hours are 9–15 GMT/BST, but you can choose when you start and finish work based on an 8.5-hour working day (make sure you take 1hr lunch in the middle). Be mindful when you work and how it impacts people around you, especially when you need to communicate with your peers.

Operation Boy Scout

We will mark our territory and make the codebases we work with reflect our way of thinking and style of coding. Applying the boy scout rule: “Always leave the campground cleaner than you found it”, to more than just code quality, we will make small incremental changes in our code so we all feel warm and cosy whenever we open a file.

The Definition of Ready

As a developer, you are involved in refinements, plannings, and other project-related discussions. This is where you can ensure that the tickets you or your colleagues will be working on are up to scratch and contain all the vital information. We checked all requirements like analytics, testing, designs, etc. The definition of Ready improves tickets’ quality and gives you everything you need to make tasks painless.

1–1 with your manager?

Please don’t waste it talking about the projects. You will have plenty of time to do so throughout the week. It’s your time, and you can lead the conversations. It’s your time. Ask questions, raise concerns, ask for help if needed, and offer support if you feel like it. This is your opportunity to talk about anything you want, especially if it can make your life at work more manageable.

No Meetings Zone

Try to avoid any meetings before lunchtime. This is our “deep work” allocation, and we should expect minimum disruptions. It’s normal to block your own calendar from standup until lunchtime. Try to avoid setting up meetings at this time yourself.

You should only feel obligated to attend meetings during this time if deemed critical for the business. Otherwise, reject the invite and remind the meeting organiser about it.

Friday Learning Day

You are getting a big chunk of your life back [we are working 4 days week]. Investing in yourself is an opportunity to do the best thing possible. It will help you, help your family, help your friends and the company.

Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty.

Your growth, education, and knowledge will prepare you for challenges and benefit absolutely everybody around you, but most importantly — you. So, read books, watch tutorials, experiment with code, work on your emotions, and leave your comfort zone. Whatever you need.

Slacks messages out of hours

Remember that you’re not required to respond to any work-related Slack messages outside of your working hours, even if you’re online at the given moment. It’s up to you to decide whether or not to reply. Fridays are considered a day off, so you don’t have to answer Slack messages until Monday if you’ve been tagged.

If you’re not working, turn off Slack to avoid interruptions.

You may receive a WhatsApp message if something critical needs your attention outside of your working hours. However, we aim for this to never happen.

Need some time off?

We don’t need a thesis on why you need a day off. We don’t need to hear about the time your little one coughed twice, and you panicked. We don’t need any “I’m sorry’s” for having a life outside of work. Of course, we care about hitting those goals, but we also care about you. So, take a break, do your thing, and return to us refreshed and ready to conquer the world (or at least the Monday morning meeting).

Start simple and build up gradually

So far, our process has worked exceptionally well. Every software engineer who joined us had their first PRs ready for review within the first week, going live soon after. They are happy it takes so little time and everything is well set up and organised.

We’re always catching up with people after two weeks and asking how they enjoyed the whole process, what is missing and what could be done better. So we always get lovely feedback that improves it for the next generation.

Every onboarding is a learning opportunity for the company too!

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