Joining a new company can feel like being dropped into the middle of a busy highway. There are new faces, unfamiliar tools, and processes that are still a mystery. But the faster you ramp up, the sooner you can start making an impact. Here’s a guide to help you onboard like a pro, especially if you’re a product or frontend engineer.

When onboarding begins, you’ll likely have many meetings and tasks to manage. I just wanted to share how I approach my onboarding process to make it as fast and efficient as possible.

🔍 1. Start With Curiosity: Ask for Documentation

Also, all companies have a sort of documentation that can helps, so look for key resources:

  • Engineering handbook
  • Architecture overviews
  • Incident response guides
  • Release checklists
  • Feature lifecycle docs

Before you dive into the code, ask your team:

  • Do we have documentation on engineering workflows, release processes, or incident handling?

The best time to ask questions is during a meeting with your onboarding's meetings. If you need help from someone you don’t have a meeting with, take that as an opportunity to reach out and schedule a 1:1 meeting, introduce yourself, and have a quick chat with someone who knows the product well.

Tip: If documentation is outdated or missing, take notes and help improve it. It’ll help the next joiner (and solidify your knowledge).

🧠 2. Learn the Product, Not Just the Code

Understanding the product and customer pain points makes you a better product engineer. Don’t just look at functions, look at the why behind them. Some companies have walkthrough session, and they show you what is the product and how it works. This meeting ideally led by someone from PS or Sales who knows the platform in more detail. I really believe that having a solid understanding of the product and the business context helps us write better code. Ideally, this kind of session should happen in the first week of onboarding.

Regardless of whether we’re backend or frontend engineers, at the end of the day, we’re product engineers, and being able to see/feel the customer’s pain points puts us in a much stronger position to build meaningful solutions.

🛠️ 3. Understand the Codebase With Context

Don’t just randomly browse files and start with a map. Before diving into the code, familiarize yourself with the structure and flow. Understanding these will help you navigate the codebase effectively and contribute to the project faster:

  • Look for README files in each directory.
  • Ask for an architectural overview or a recorded engineering walkthrough.
  • Find out where feature flags, state management, and routing are handled.

Ask:

  • "What’s the entry point of the app?"
  • "How are new features usually added?"
  • "Is there a standard folder structure or naming convention we follow? Any documentation for it?"

🤝 Ask Designers: “What are our core user journeys?”

🔄 4. Shadow the Process: Releases, Bugs & Incidents

Not everything lives in a doc — real understanding often comes from observation. By shadowing key workflows like releases or incident handling, you'll get an inside look at how the team reacts under pressure, makes decisions, and collaborates. This hands-on exposure is invaluable for leveling up fast. I would say it’s tribal knowledge. Learn it by:

  • Shadowing a release or pairing on a hotfix
  • Asking what happens when a P1 bug comes in
  • Attending a postmortem or retro session

Tip: Join relevant Slack channels like #, #, or #. Just observing can teach you a lot.

⚙️ 4. Learn the Development Process

To become an effective contributor, it's crucial to understand how the team ships software. From how branches are managed to how features are released and bugs are tracked, learning these workflows early will help you navigate the codebase and collaborate efficiently with your team.

  • Understand the branching strategy (feature branches, etc.).
  • Learn the release cycle (weekly, bi-weekly, feature flags?).
  • Check how code reviews are done — are there PR templates, guidelines?
  • Figure out how bugs, tasks, and features are tracked (Jira, Linear, etc.)

📅 Ask: “What’s our process from task creation to deployment?”

✍️ Final Thoughts

Onboarding is a two-way street: you’re learning, but you can also provide value quickly by asking good questions, spotting gaps, and documenting what you learn. If you're intentional about it, you can go from new hire to high-impact team member in record time.

Let curiosity lead the way — and don’t be afraid to ask. The faster you understand how the business, product, and code fit together, the faster you'll build things that matter. Happy onboarding!