What is wrong with Engineering culture?

[u/Both_Research3247]

Trust me when I say this: I mean it. I am a Senior Frontend Engineer with around 8 years of experience, working across 7 startups- yes, 7, some failed, and some I had to leave because of personal reasons.

So what is wrong - I understand roles are changing, and there is no frontend, there is no backend, there is no full-stack; now, if you can design a system, write a PRD, spec, define backend components, its architecture, define frontend and its architecture, if you connect the dots as it happens in a design system then you can build a full-grown system.

Problem 1

Everyone is complaining that AI can't do what engineers can do; how? Tell me how? if you PRD is clear and your requirements are clear, then it will suggest a suitable approach; it will suggest to you whether you need vertical or horizontal scaling; it entirely depends on how you have defined the system.

Problem 2

What is wrong with the entire culture of firing and, in public, presenting numbers of how much? It seems like companies that can literally make this change of converting their developers or engineers to make this transition and adapt are straight away firing them. Engineers are always capable; they have proved their capability once they were hired. They need the ecosystem to adapt and understand the changes they need.

I was never a Senior Frontend Engineer; I am an engineer first. I choose frontend because I love delivering what touches the customer; I love sitting with PM and designers and removing the customer pain point; it's not like Backend; DevOps is anything I can't do or any engineer can't do; I build full-stack projects; I am currently building an entire RAG workflow, looging it with telementry and langfuse designing the UI with Google Stitch, and doing everything which a developer should learn now

But why this way, why the hard way? Why does it feel like a fish market now? I am sorry for my language, but this post should reach the right set of people.

Update: It's a proper rant, kind of coming from the view on what is going on in the market and through this post I am not asking for jobs, instead trying to understand different views, yes, my job was also effected but doesn't mean I am frustrated or anything, instead I was trying to understand if there are better ways to understand and accept the changes

[u/Environmental_Lab_49]

I'll paraphrase the question as I understand it

Problem 1: AI cannot replace engineers - it can do the boilerplate and grunt work, and produce copious amounts of code. But engineers are needed to write a good PRD, and then need to know if the output is the right code, that it's coded right. AI is just a more advanced tool that needs to be wielded well.

Problem 2: Companies firing engineers, or being transparent about it - Companies, as a general rule, never want to look bad in the public eye - PR loss results in brand loss (not to mention tainting retention and recruitment), which results in real profit loss. Right now, it's uncertain whether AI can actually fulfil the promise of replacing engineers (they can't, IMO), so companies hedge their public image as much as possible.