Attrition and Mindset

In this industry, attrition is fairly high, on average an engineer stays around for 16 months at a time. With this in mind, having an efficient and effective hiring process in place is pivotal, while understanding what type of engineer you need for your team.

I’ve spoken previously about my personal opinion of wanting engineers that challenge the default, think outside the box and be part of the software delivery process from start to finish. But recently have begun to understand that this isn’t ideal for every single scenario.

When quality is traded for throughput; freedom to think and challenge is lost and you end up with highly trained professionals delivering with no ability to make an impact outside of delivering software. I battle with the notion that delivery is the thing that we as a engineering function is measured on externally, so of course this is imperative, but it’s not the sole criteria that we as a function should be aiming for and be measured on internally.

While the average attrition is surprisingly high in this industry, I believe it is our jobs as leaders to ensure we create a space & culture that will keep hold of the engineers that are valued.

If we value engineers that challenge the default, get involved with building a product as opposed to just code and want to seek knowledge - we must create the environment for them to thrive. Trading all of this for throughput and short-term delivery will leave your team contributing negatively to this attrition statistic when your engineers don’t feel valued and are treated like type-writing animals.

Sometimes, a team has to dig in and deliver, I get it. But if this is a regular occurrence where the team do not have the breathing space to innovate, act on ideas and pull their creative threads, don’t be surprised when your superstars leave.

Work towards making your team the one people look back at, and think wow, this was the pinnacle. Otherwise, it’s a never-ending treadmill of uninspired delivery paycheck to paycheck.