Betting on the potential of junior IT talent with Posti

Goran Gjorgievski, the Lead Software Developer in the parcel & ecommerce department of Posti - one of the leading delivery and fulfillment companies within Finland, Sweden, and Baltics - had a chat with us about how growing junior IT talent is mandatory in order to survive.

"It's no secret that we at Posti have been growing our in-house IT capacity quite heavily lately, and we will continue on this path in the future too," Goran begins.

When diving deeper into what kind of talent Posti is looking for, Goran replies:

"If we only think about software development, obviously senior developers are the easy way to go. It reduces risks when everyone is more experienced and familiar with general best practices - no arguments there. But when you hire junior talent, you think and invest in the future of the company too."

He emphasizes how companies should know by know that if they refuse to adapt to the change in IT talent supply, slowly but surely deadlines will be breached, development will lag, and talent will drain away. Changing mindset to betting on the potential of juniors is a matter of surviving in the long run.

It doesn't damage companies to give juniors more room

"What I would like to see more is that juniors would get the actual chance to work in real projects. It doesn't damage companies to give juniors more room," he says.

He does not agree when juniors are only given make-believe projects, demos, and tutorials to learn from.

Goran and we at Crowd Collective agree that hands-on, real production project experience, is what counts when the aim is to grow talent quickly and engage employees for the future. But this kind of approach requires senior resources too.

"Senior doesn't only mean years of experience. One of the desired abilities is to have a deep understanding in multiple areas from software development and being able to share or present that knowledge. This willingness to introduce all the various possibilities within software is essential so that the juniors can explore and find their own preferences," Goran continues.

The preferable way is to have the senior developer working on the same project with the junior instead of just checking in. Hands-on coaching is a must.

Providing continuous feedback to the juniors, regarding the exact mistakes and giving them examples in the code directly, while also encouraging and focusing on the ‘well done’ is very important to support their growth.

"At Posti we had the challenge of not having enough senior resources who could dedicate their time to mentor our juniors. There have been continuously demanding tasks and workload, that require strong focus on planning and coding from our seniors. Dividing the time got tricky," he explains.

Partnering up with Crowd Collective solved not one but two needs

The partnership between Posti and Crowd Collective started when Posti was eager to see if growing IT talent the Crowd Collective way would fit their needs.

"We wanted to recruit a junior developer, but we also had a need for a more senior resource, since the project was one of the most complex ones we have," Goran explains.

Crowd Collective provided Posti a senior developer with an impressive tech stack but also the soft skills needed for coaching and supporting others. The junior developer was found through Crowd Collective's sister company Academic Work.

"We decided to officially recruit the junior after just six months even though the original plan was to keep her as a consultant for one year. There were no doubts considering she was just so motivated and exceptional," Goran praises.

Posti got proof that the Crowd Collective concept, where senior consultants come in and take the lead in coaching and supporting junior resources while simultaneously working as a productive resource, works.

"Now we are building even bigger teams together with higher business value," Goran explains.

Crowd Collective seniors provide stability and Academic Work juniors bring potential with fresh ideas. That is a combo Posti wants to keep on investing in.

"With Crowd Collective's offer both senior and junior sides are covered. I definitively see more future projects for us. It has been nice to see how their mentoring is just excellent," Goran finishes.

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Our partnership with Posti is the perfect example of the type of cases we want to leave our fingerprints on in the future too.

We provide both senior and junior IT talent and Posti provides projects with ideal conditions to grow. In the end Posti gets to recruit the junior talent to become long term employees and our senior consultants get to move on to other exciting tech projects.

Get more familiar with how we work and can help your company grow in-house competence >>