Comment by _override | Hacker News Reader

Comment by _override | Hacker News Reader

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I didn't want to get into this in my original post, but this is definitely part of the problem. The development team needs modernization. We have a lot of excellent developers, but these developers have spent many years developing on a tech stack of PowerBuilder, COBOL, and SQL stored procedures. API development, testing, deployment, and maintenance are not anything that they have worked with before.

Finally after months of me complaining, the management team has gotten the approval to hire one additional developer who has experience with API development. To be honest though, I am skeptical if one developer is going to change anything, and I can imagine that a lot of skilled developers won't be staying here long when they see that we don't really have the personnel in place to deliver on the vision that the management team has set.

I definitely am not a people manager (nor do I want to be again, been there done that), but I can imagine that our engineering manager is in a tough place right now too. A lot of the development team are close to retirement age and he can't really push them too much due to the fear of them leaving and taking their years or decades of domain knowledge with them.

One good developer can start a shift but only if there's absolute buy-in from management (and you) to carve out the time the rest of the team needs to get up to speed.

Since you say the current developers are also decent but otherwise inexperienced with the kind of work you expect there's a chance that with the right organisational changes and support (i.e.: allowing the experienced new developer to work more as a mentor than being responsible for deliveries right away) and given time those people could become more effective.

The issue will land squarely on the engineering management though, they need to accept the current team is not up to par for the deliveries while not making them scared for their jobs (that would just make the current developers cynical, and doing whatever they can to claw back power before retirement). It's a long road ahead that requires a very competent engineering management team to pull off.

Ah, then I'd say this is definitely not a good job for you.

I would suggest just leaving as soon as possible. I know it's hard and I know the current market is difficult, but do make a firm decision to, if not immediately, leave in a fixed time frame, say in two months or before the new year or something else but put a limit on it. Not only will that push you into doing it, but seeing a clear exit will probably help with your peace of mind.

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