Mighty Bluebird asked
answered 2h ago
Hey Philip,
I was looking for advice on navigating early software career struggles in this era of increasingly capable AI. I feel scared that the career ladder is being pulled away from people like me who are still in a phase where they are trying to learn and grow and instead be replaced by seniors whose contributions can be multiplied by AI.
I'd love your perspective on how to stand out as a strong candidate now. I'm trying to figure out how to signal good engineering judgment rather than just shipping code, since code output has become the easy part. I was wondering how you would try to show that if you were an early career candidate applying to jobs? Thanks!!
Philip's answer
A tough and highly relevant question.
First, the good news: when it comes to junior hiring, that's only fallen by ~19% since AI impacted the industry. 19% is from one perspective very high (e.g. the highest unemployment recorded in US history was the Great Depression, at 25%). But on the other, it means 4 out of every 5 junior people are getting jobs.
You can likely stand out within the top 80% of junior candidates. As you mentioned, things have gone way beyond code production as the main gauge of junior capabilities. I'd recommend spending a lot of time building with different AI approaches (models, harnesses, tools), and creating real projects (even side projects) which help hone your judgment about how best to use AI as a force multiplier. There is, in some senses, no way to speed up the type of learning you want other than to spend more hours doing highly-leveraged learning in those key areas (e.g. of better judgment around how to structure components or build the most impactful things).
Wishing you the best! It's a tough environment out there... but you only need to outrun 1 of every 5 people. You can do it!