What if senior developers were not allowed to write a single line of code?

What if senior developers were not allowed to write a single line of code alone? Instead, all the code and ideas have to go through the hands of less experienced developers during pairing/mobbing sessions.

How would this enabling constraint affect the world and dynamics in your team(s)?

Additionally, seniors starting as always navigators (expert/novice mode) and at one point seniors switching from “only navigator” to “only driver” mode. This would mean that previous novices have become experts in the whole process.
And that should make you happy :)

This post gained quite some traction on Twitter and LinkedIn. And it makes me happy to see that.

Having some comments in mind, I’d like to note that often times (always?) assumptions that we carry with us are the reflections of our previous experiences, so if this post provokes strong emotions in you, try to reflect on that and think what’s the thing that you’ve perhaps experienced that provoked such a reaction in you. Forget about the post itself. Reflecting on that emotion is the most important and valuable thing you can get at that moment.

Second note: If you work in environments with low trust and lack of psychological safety, forget about trying this out in any form. I’d say you have way more important things to focus on solving before that.