[crcarlson]

I had a stack of books that I felt were relevant on the new developer's desk the first day they showed up. The exact stack depends on what you are doing specifically, I started from the Joel List: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/navLinks/fog0000000262.html

Each week during our 1-on-1 I would review various concepts from each of the books and suggest reading for the following week. It was the best way I found to 1) get them up to speed on best practices and my expectations 2) help them see that my suggestions were (generally) founded on data.