Kakao Reveals 4-Week Technical Onboarding Program for 2024 Winter Internship New Crews

Kakao conducted a 4-week backend technical onboarding program for new crews who joined as full-time employees after completing the 2024 recruitment-linked winter internship. This program was designed to strengthen development capabilities and teamwork before deployment to actual work, consisting of systematic learning and practice centered on Java and Spring.

Mission-Based Practice and TDD Application

The curriculum proceeded by completing a total of 3 missions. In the first Car Racing Mission, participants gained experience writing domain code by applying TDD (Test-Driven Development) under limited rules. In the subsequent Lotto Mission, they learned flexibility to respond to requirement changes while adhering to Object-Oriented Life Gymnastics principles. In the final WAS Implementation Mission, they gained a deep understanding of the core structure and architectural principles of web technologies by directly implementing an HTTP server without a framework.

Pair Programming and Code Review

New crews conducted pair programming in pairs of two with crews from other roles, including Server, FE, and Infra. Through this, they shared their respective expertise and broadened their perspective on solving problems from various viewpoints. All code was submitted via GitHub, and refactoring was performed through a 2-stage code review process involving peer and individual stages. Reviewers focused on checking adherence to object-oriented principles and the quality of test code.

Continuous Improvement Through Retrospectives

Through retrospective sessions held daily and weekly, participants shared emotions and achievements during the learning process. In daily retrospectives, shortcomings from the previous day were immediately fed back to reduce mistakes, while in weekly retrospectives, they reflected on emotional growth during pair programming to strengthen bonds among team members. Through this process, new crews established a foundation for solidifying their basics as developers and improving their adaptability to actual work.