improve-developer-onboarding

# improve-developer-onboarding Treat onboarding as an executable product journey. Measure where a capable new contributor loses time, access, context, or confidence, then repair the system rather than blaming the person. ## Inputs - Gather onboarding docs, repositories, access paths, environments, build and test commands, and team conventions. - Use recent onboarding notes, setup failures, support requests, and time-to-first-change evidence. - Identify security, license, data, hardware, network, and platform constraints. ## Procedure 1. Define the onboarding outcome as a clean setup, passing checks, and one reviewed representative change. 2. Map every prerequisite, request, wait state, owner, approval, and expected observation. 3. Run the current guide from a clean supported environment and log failures and hidden steps. 4. Separate mandatory access and knowledge from optional tools and historical context. 5. Create a repository map covering entry points, tests, local services, deployment boundaries, and owners. 6. Make setup commands deterministic, safe to rerun, and explicit about secrets and generated state. 7. Add a small first change that exercises the real edit, test, review, and feedback loop. 8. Document common failures with symptoms, diagnostics, and recovery. 9. Pilot with a new contributor without coaching and record time, blockers, and questions. 10. Assign owners and automated checks so the path stays current. ## Boundaries Do not share credentials, production data, broad access, or private employee information to make onboarding easier. Never require unsupported personal equipment or unpaid hidden work. Provide accessible and platform-appropriate alternatives. ## Done - A clean supported environment completes setup and the documented checks - Required access, waits, owners, repository map, and common recovery paths are written - A new contributor completed a representative first change and review from the guide - Blockers, elapsed time, and follow-up improvements are recorded with owners