Do you work at a company that is “difficult” or “not set up for” juniors? Do you care about diversity and inclusion of under-represented groups at your workplace? Do you ever stay awake at night with the gnawing feeling that these two ideas are somehow incompatible, but can’t put a finger on why or explain to your company how? This talk is for you. Often, the endeavors of hiring and mentoring junior engineers and of bolstering diversity and inclusion efforts are seen as “nice to haves” at best and “extraneous” (or even “impossible”!) at worst. But in reality, building diversity and inclusivity and fostering the ability to incorporate and mentor junior engineers go hand-in-hand. Engineering teams would do well to approach each of these efforts in service of the other. Together, we’ll articulate the value of investing in mentorship efforts in terms of its impact on the ability to attract and retain diversity at your company. As an attendee, you will walk away with a clearer understanding of the connection between the two efforts, and ideas for incorporating mentorship and D&I processes at your place of work. Alex is a programmer with a passion for work that has real-world impact. As a Web Application Developer at Newsela, she writes software that helps students read and teachers teach. When she's not thinking about refactoring her Ruby or good object-oriented front-end patterns, Alex spends a lot of time thinking about secular space/discourse, ethics in communicating “othered” experiences, how many cats are too many cats, and if she’ll ever write a novel.