The Six-Month Onboarding Lie: Why Most Teams...

There’s a quiet lie a lot of engineering teams tell themselves: “Onboarding takes six months. That’s just how it is.” On paper, it sounds reasonable. Plenty of HR articles say it takes anywhere from a few months up to a year for a new hire to reach “full productivity,” especially in complex or technical roles. Six months feels like a safe middle number. But in day‑to‑day reality, that “six months” line often turns into something more dangerous: an excuse. It’s a way to justify new developers spe