Comment by mjr00

11 days ago

And what happens when the AI can't figure it out?

Same situation as when an engineer can't figure something out, they translate the problem into human terms for a product person, and the product person makes a high level decision that allows working around the problem.

  • Uh that's not what engineers do; do you not have any software development experience, or rather any outside of vibe coding? That would explain your perspective. (for context I am 15+ yr experience former FAANG dev)

    I don't meant this to sound inflammatory or anything; it's just that the idea that when a developer encounters a difficult bug they would go ask for help from the product manager of all people is so incredibly outlandish and unrealistic, I can't imagine anyone would think this would happen unless they've never actually worked as a developer.

    • As a product owner I ask you to make a button that when I click auto installs an extension without user confirmation.

    • Staff engineer (also at FAANG), so yes, I have at least comparable experience. I'm not trying to summarize every level of SWE in a few sentences. The point is that AI's infallibility is no different than human infallibility. You may fire a human for a mistake, but it won't solve the business problems they may have created, so I believe the accountability argument is bogus. You can hold the next layer up accountable. The new models are startling good at direction setting, technical to product translation, and providing leadership guidance on technical matters and providing multiple routes for roadblocks.

      We're starting to see engineers running into bugs and roadblocks feed input into AI and not only root causing the problem, but suggesting and implementing the fix and taking it into review.

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