Kakao's New Crew Onboarding Code Reviewer Journey: Three Months of Growth with Clean Code Principles

Jenos from Kakao's SA Development Team shared his experience serving as a code reviewer during the onboarding process for new developers (New Crew) in 2021. He completed a training program receiving feedback from professional reviewers at NextStep, where he learned TDD, Refactoring, and Clean Code principles.

Rediscovering Clean Code Principles and the TDD Cycle

During the training period, he focused on learning the nine principles of 'Object-Oriented Life Gym.' By applying these principles while maintaining the TDD cycle (add failing test → implement → refactor), he experienced gradual code improvement. In particular, he corrected his habit of skipping the refactoring step and developed the habit of carefully reviewing code before committing.

Code Review Activities Driving Mutual Growth

In the actual review activities, he was responsible for three New Crew members and adhered to the guideline of leaving no more than 20 comments at a time. Through communication centered on questions and suggestions rather than directive tones, he encouraged New Crew members to think and solve problems on their own. Thanks to these efforts, New Crew members quickly reflected feedback and improved code quality, while the reviewer also learned new perspectives and experienced the value of 'growing together'. Post-activity surveys also showed positive responses regarding code reviews.