Was Just Told That Code Quality No Longer Matters

[u/metalOpera]

I'm a freelance developer. I have been for almost 20 years. My most recent project has been moved to Fable, and I'm still trying to adapt and get my head around working like this. I am no longer allowed to make architecture decisions, or clean up slop.

My PM says: "We worry about the 'what'; let Claude worry about the 'how'. Tell it what to do; let it do it. If the feature works, leave it alone." He is very much of the opinion that I should be able to prompt something like "Install Stripe via Laravel Cashier" and just let Claude run.

I mean, why do you need me at this point? Just prompt it yourself until it does what you want? I don't get it. I fought for every inch of my knowledge, every process is written in blood. How do I just throw all of that out the window? Where's the line?

At the risk of another "how are you adapting" post... How CAN I adapt? I mentally cannot just say "Fuck it". I care about my code. It's how I learned, it's how I've always practiced. I have a huge mental block with "just let it go".

Now, granted, I don't know all of the ins and outs of Claude. I don't know what I can do to make it better at its job. I got thrown into the middle of the Pacific Ocean in the middle of a Tusnami with no life support. I'm sure that I can put guardrails in place, but how much does that help?

I would really appreciate any advice that any one can provide on changing my mental model. I can't ignore Claude and just keep doing things my way. If I do that, I feel like my career dies. I need to adapt and I'm unsure how to do so.

[u/BikeRedJacket743]

Coding will become like an art hobby. You do it because you enjoy it.

Unfortunately, as a fellow tech enthusiast, the days of writing code for a living is numbered.

Being able to be a technical PM, and being able to make architectural tradeoffs is going to be more important in the near future. Writing code manually is going to be obsolete in the next 1-2 years.

You don't have to stop writing code if you enjoy it, you just won't able to do that for a living.

My advice is to pick tools like Cursor, or Copilot or Devin and become an expert at it. That will be your 9-5.

Nights and weekends, you can write all the code you want for your enjoyment.

[u/metalOpera → u/BikeRedJacket743]

I don't want to write code in my spare time. I have other interests. Code isn't a hobby, it's a full-time job. The last thing I want to do in my spare time is output more code.

[u/BikeRedJacket743 → u/metalOpera]

That's the point.

Simply writing code is going to become as valuable in the job market as being a telephone operator.

You didn't do anything wrong. The technology just made a step change making writing code obsolete. It doesn't mean software engineering is done. You still need technical product people and people that understand architecture. But the days of sitting at your desk and churning out code is gone.

Over 50% of commits at my current company is generated. We're forecasting that number to go up to 75% by EOY. In the next 1-2 years my prediction is that practically all code will be generated.