growthmentorshipsoft-skills

Asked to mentor our new intern and realized I can't explain the 'obvious' stuff

Anonymous17 Jul 2026

Two years in and my lead paired me with the summer intern. First real question they asked was basically 'why do we even use branches' and I opened my mouth and nothing coherent came out. I know why. I could not teach why.

Turns out the stuff you do on autopilot is the hardest to put into words, and weirdly it's made me understand my own workflow better. Any advice for being a decent first mentor without overwhelming them?

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Anonymous19 Jul 2026
The thing nobody warns you about mentoring: it's the fastest way to find every gap in your own understanding. If you can't explain why you do something, you often don't fully know why either. I started jotting a note every time an intern asked "but why," and half of them turned into things I ended up fixing in my own habits.
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Anonymous17 Jul 2026
Being forced to explain the obvious is the fastest way to find the holes in your own understanding. One thing that helped me mentor: don't answer everything, sometimes ask 'how would you find out?' and let them try first. Dumping the whole picture on day one just makes them anxious. Small wins, then context.
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