Effective Learning & Skill Growth

Being a curious, effective learner is an ability important to any technologist, and valued at Pluribus. Like any ability, it can be developed and practiced.

But first... why is it important? When Pluribus employees grow their skills, it helps the business as well as to the individual. It helps us better deliver for our customers. It allows people to qualify for higher-level roles, allowing Pluribus to charge more for their time, and thus making promotions and compensation increases possible. Having more people with greater skills allows us to scale and seed new projects with trusted performers – so we can maintain high deliverystandards as we grow. TLDR: it’s vital to our business.

You own your growth. You are the director and actor of your growth story, not the audience. You shouldn’t depend on an employer to own your growth path – in part because it is something that is part of your larger career. A major chunk of that career will hopefully be here at Pluribus, but your career growth should serve your larger journey.

Pluribus provides support, tools, and community. Although you are directing the journey, you aren’t alone. You can count on Pluribus for material support: access to Udemy courses through our Udemy enterprise account, reimbursement for training materials, test fees, training time, event fees, etc. You can also tap into your colleagues for guidance and coaching in helping to find the next best step for you – which is the most important component of our performance management process.

There is no one single path. There are a few cases where the company may “push” certain skills or offer specific support – such as a training cohort for a certain certification path. However, there is not a standard set of trainings or skills that are right for every person in a given role. The next step for one frontend developer may be to learn backend. For another, it may make more sense to dive into UX methods, or perhaps people management. Each of those next steps can make sense – it depends on the person and context. It’s also 100% OK to follow your muse sometimes, and dive into something because it excites you – even if there’s no obvious career payoff.

On-project learning is ideal. The best learning is “on the job” – where you can immediately apply what you are learning. Sometimes it is feasible to simply learn incrementally – such as reading the docs for a new library and incorporating that into your project. This is great if you have some relevant grounding. For growth that is more of a stretch, doing some reading or coursework (e.g. a Udemy course) then immediately applying that knowledge on your project can be highly effective.

What if my project doesn’t have the opportunity? If your current assignment doesn’t seem to offer the ability to learn new skills on the job, there are still paths to growth. Ultimately, it may be time for you to talk to your manager about shifting teams in order to find that growth. Before that, there are a few things that may help. Let’s say you want to grow your React skills…

• If the team has React work, but you are doing backend development, then make your interest known to see if you can take on or support some stories in React. If simple self-advocacy doesn’t work, enlist your manager for support.
• If the team doesn’t have React work, but that is on the roadmap, perhaps you can help nudge the team to make the next feature the starting point for a shift to React.
• Ask your manager about opportunities to do some other React support (perhaps code challenges or other corporate projects).
• If you have the desire and bandwidth to volunteer, you may find some open source projects that could use your support. Organizations like Code for Good and US Digital Response are example organizations that coordinate such match making.

Formal training can help, sometimes. Well-done classroom experiences are, by design, a great way to learn. It is best to proceed only with an enthusiastic recommendation that it is worth the time & cost.

The Pluribus community is your friend. Tap into your colleagues. Someone here probably knows a lot about whatever you are trying to learn – and for other topics you’ll know more than just about anyone here. Engage in slack. Spin up a call or huddle on a topic. Share your knowledge.

External communities are great too. Communities, meetups, conferences, social media, blogs, and podcasts can be fantastic. They aren’t always exactly “training” – but help expose you to new concepts and decide what to dive into. Don’t go to events to learn, go in order to discover what you should be learning.”