This is the second part of this topic so if you haven't read the first post I would recommend to read part one before.

Let's continue with the points.

4. Learn and practice professional mailing and conference call etiquette.

Mails and calls are two very important communication channels that the entire company relies on and this becomes much more important when working from home. So read online about some ways to effectively communicate over these channels. It's important to be succinct and clear in all our conversations in the company. When you are working as a developer, if there are any changes in the requirements from the product owners, these emails become really important to verify if it was conveyed. Another tip here would be to always mail meeting minutes (a summarizing mail of the meeting) to your team leads or colleagues. Now this will not be required in the initial days, but as you get more responsibilities and have stories or requirements to work on, they will be an important proof of the conversation.

You might have seen me stressing on "PROOF" quite a lot in this point, this is because clients or product owners have to deal with a lot of people and end up changing or asking for features that weren’t discussed or maybe as a developer you might have a lot on your plate and could miss out some requirements causing problems later. I had to deal with this quite often, which is why I would suggest maintaining documentation of every conversation in the company.

5. Ask for help. Acknowledge if you don't understand anything.

Your senior developers have been in the industry for a long time and hence might speak in jargon or terms that would be completely new to you. It's essential to ask any doubts right away (even at the cost of sounding a noob). People (some not all) might even judge you for this but better to ask than be sorry as this can backfire on you for not stating earlier. I usually would google and figure things out without asking and that worked really well a lot of times but I did have a situation where asking and clearing out doubts would have saved me a lot of effort and time. So ask and you shall receive :)

6. Set your work boundaries.

This point can be a post on its own, but in brief, learn to set a balance between work and life. If you are supposed to work 9 hours, make sure to manage your time and log off when you have completed 9 hours. Any longer than this, won't pay you money but you'll end up losing your physical and mental health. That being said, at the beginning for a couple of months you would have to put in a little extra effort to learn and get up to speed, so as long as you are learning and not "working" it's acceptable to put in some more time. Remember to set these boundaries clearly from the beginning and stick to them at all costs.

That’s all for the tips, but as mentioned earlier you will learn and work your way up on the job so keep an open mind and be prepared to learn and absorb as much knowledge as you can from your seniors.

If you have any other tips from your experience as developer, feel free to comment below and I will compile them for everyone in a new post.