diff --git a/docs/getting-started/contributors.md b/docs/getting-started/contributors.md
index 1bf3d6bc7d..aa60d99b8b 100644
--- a/docs/getting-started/contributors.md
+++ b/docs/getting-started/contributors.md
@@ -29,6 +29,7 @@ After you have cloned the Backstage repository, you should run the following
 commands once to set things up for development:
 
 ```bash
+$ cd backstage  # change to root directory of project
 $ yarn install  # fetch dependency packages - may take a while
 
 $ yarn tsc      # does a first run of type generation and checks