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Comment by chairmankaga | Hacker News Reader

How would you find such a mentor?

So far every job I've joined since finishing school in 2012 I've been the "smartest person in the room". It's been incredibly frustrating to not have peers to learn from technically.

It was so bad that I left my city (Recruiters and the jobs felt very toxic to me) and became an expat, started self learning what I wanted until I could consult enough to sustain myself.

Now I joined a large company for a large project in asia and I'm STILL missing people I can learn from.

I'm reaching my 30's, and have only worked at small to medium places with near zero mentorship.

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Some people would question your experience, and there is a chance that you are failing to appreciate others.

However you may also accidentally be the big fish in a small pond. If that's the case try to get to the bigger pond. If you get to one of the big tech companies and find even there nobody is competent enough to mentor you then your either a genius or oblivious.

Thanks, you're 100% correct and when I recently explained my history to startups out here they have the exact same reaction.

I've been jumping from small pond to small pond until now.

This large company's project is outsourced to over 30+ people where none of the devs have even touched React and come from an Enterprise Java background. It's 6+ months and late, when really the product would take a team of about 8 to do in 4 months. I come in and suddenly I'm tech lead managing and mentoring others.

I understand even this post feels like I'm unappreciative but it wasn't until two months ago that I had a teammate I could feel happy working with rather than me mentoring them.

I don't consider myself great or a genius, but this pain of knowing you can only teach yourself so much has bothered me since my first job.

Hence, how does one find a mentor?

I was serious, if this is actually the case you literally have to go where people of talent congregate. As you increase in skill those places become fewer - you may have to move.

Thankfully things are changing positively for me.

But I fully agree with what you've said and I will keep it in mind moving forward.

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