Crowdsourced career mentorship for female developers

gistfile1.md

I was inspired by Selena Deckelmann's list of Career Resources for Women (http://www.chesnok.com/daily/career-resources-for-women/), but couldn't think of much to contribute. So I thought maybe those of us already in the field and in a position to mentor could work on creating more. Please fork or comment and add your own!

Also: there is a wealth of info online and elsewhere dating back to the first time it occurred to our species to exchange labor for currency on these topics in general. What I hope we can provide here is our take as individuals. What we would say to someone if we were sitting across from her acting as a mentor. I don't think we should worry about being objectively "right", or about duplicating topics. I add this bit of anti-editorializing in hopes that women will contribute without feeling pressured to be experts, which I worry might prevent them from doing so. TY. :)

Applying for jobs

• "developer resumes in < 5 minutes" from @garann https://vimeo.com/47550018
• "Cover Letters in 5 minutes" from @selenamarie https://vimeo.com/47559205

Interviewing

Professional behavior

• "being nice at work" from @garann https://vimeo.com/47560508

Negotiation

• "Salary Negotiation: Make More Money, Be More Valued" from Patrick http://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/01/23/salary-negotiation/

Conflict resolution

• "Conflict Resolution" from @selenamarie http://vimeo.com/47562873

Money

• "getting paid what you're worth" from @garann https://vimeo.com/47628626

Long-term goals

From my experience as a front-end Web developer:

Warning signs about a company when you're interviewing

• none of the developers you talk to has much of an online presence--no blogs, no personal Web sites, not even active GitHub accounts. Yes, we all have other interests outside work, but people with so little passion about development it's exhausted by their day jobs are uninspiring to work with.
• hideous, noisy workspaces. If this company stuffs its developers into drab cubicles with harsh overhead lighting, next to the sales department or call center, it's an indication developers aren't held in much regard and their work process poorly understood.

At your onsite interview, insist on getting out of that conference room to see where the developers sit. If they won't show you, that's another warning sign.

• they phone-screen you on a speaker phone, but don't reveal who is listening until the conversation is well underway. Phone screens are a great way for you and this company to determine if you're compatible. Speaker phones are a good way to conduct a phone screen with multiple people. However, some companies misinterpret the phone screen as an occasion for a power trip. If they treat you this poorly as a candidate, they'll be twice as arrogant when you're their employee.

Re: handling forks--will you incorporating changes on any schedule, or waiting for us to notify you when our forks are ready for merge?

@selenamarie - Awesome! I think tumblr's perfect for this.

@mejarc - No, no schedule. It looks like @selenamarie has a nice permanent home, though, so perhaps that can become a moot point, since tumblr so easily allows submissions. :)

@garann - great/interesting article on startup salary negoriation trended on HN today. Can't send pull request, so here you go: https://gist.github.com/3419610