Pair Programming/Collaboration in a small company

manpreet Best Answer 2 years ago

I work at a small development company as the lead developer. We have two other developers, as well as my boss who is a developer, but doesn't really do much of the actual coding anymore.

The problem I am trying to overcome is multifaceted. We have a tendency all to work on our own projects without much collaboration between us. As a matter of fact, I (as the most advanced developer) ask for the others' opinion/help more than they do mine, because I value the input of an outside eye.

I want to increase our collaboration, and have expressed that to them. In large part because I'd like to show them some things about how to become better developers and follow better practices. But given our other developers' personality types, I think they are more comfortable working alone.

I've been reading about pair programming, and I have read (in some forums) that it doesn't work well when you have one developer being more advanced than the others (which I am). And yet, I feel it is imperative that we start to collaborate so that our work is not so disparate.

My question is whether anyone has ever been in a similar situation, and what worked for them?

I realize this is not a one-size-fits-all situation, but I'm willing to give multiple approaches a shot.

We all work in a common area, developers don't have have individual offices / cubicles.