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IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

fortune.com

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Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#131

Post by Morromist »

belter wrote: post #113
edoceo wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> measurable productivity Which measure? Like when folk say something is more "efficient" it's more time-efficient to fly but one trades other efficiency. Efficiency, like productivity needs a second word with it to properly communicate. Whtys more productive? Lines of code (a weak measure). Features shipped? Bugs fixed? Time by company saved? Time for client? Shareholders value (lame). I don't know the answer but th…

I used to write bugs in 8 hours. Now I write the same bugs in 4. My Productivity doubled. \s

I hear this every day, and I'm sure its true sometimes, but where is the tsunami of amazing software LLM users are producing? Where are the games that make the old games look like things from a bygone era? Where are the updates to the software that I currently use that greatly increase it capabilities? I have seen none of this.

I get that it takes a long time to make software, but people were making big promises a year ago and I think its time to start expecting some results.

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#132

Post by SoftTalker »

Nextgrid wrote: post #21
alienbaby wrote: post #19

"software engineers will spend less time on routine coding—and more on interacting with customers" Ahh, what could possibly go wrong!

Why is that bad? You write better code when you actually understand the business domain and the requirement. It's much easier to understand it when you get it direct from the source than filtered down through dozens of product managers and JIRA tickets.

Engineers and customers often talk past each other. They focus on different things. They use different vocabulary.

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#133

Post by Ancalagon »

K0balt wrote: post #103
vb-8448 wrote: post #54

It must be refactored: IBM is hopping that juniors(less paid) with AI can be sold as seniors.

Tbh, getting good results from ai requires senior level intuition. You can be rusty as hell and not even middling in the language being used, but you have to understand data structures and architecture more than ever to get non-shit results. If you just vibe it, you’ll eventually end up with a mountain of crap that works sort of, and since you’re not doing the coding, you can’t really figure it out as you go along. S…

This mirrors my experience exactly. Vibe coding straight up does not work for any serious code.

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#134

Post by collingreen »

SoftTalker wrote: post #130
belter wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to write bugs in 8 hours. Now I write the same bugs in 4. My Productivity doubled. \s

Even better, I write more bugs in 4 hours than I used to in 8.

And the bugs take me WAY longer to find and fix now!

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#135

Post by [deleted] »

xp84 wrote: post #122
slopinthebag wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where does it say those cuts were senior software developers? Obviously they want new workers to use AI but I don't really see anything to suggest they're so successful with AI that they're firing all their seniors and hiring juniors to be meatbags for LLMs.

This just doesn't make any sense. Juniors + AI just does not equal seniors, except for prototyping greenfield projects. Who knows about 2 months from now, it moves fast and stuff, but not right now.

[deleted]

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#136

Post by pickettd »

Morromist wrote: post #131
belter wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to write bugs in 8 hours. Now I write the same bugs in 4. My Productivity doubled. \s

I hear this every day, and I'm sure its true sometimes, but where is the tsunami of amazing software LLM users are producing? Where are the games that make the old games look like things from a bygone era? Where are the updates to the software that I currently use that greatly increase it capabilities? I have seen none of this. I get that it takes a long time to make software, but people were making big promises a ye…

Reddit and GitHub are littered with people launching new projects and appear to be way more feature-rich than new tool/app launches from previous years. I think it is a lot harder to get noticed with a new tool/app new because of this increase in volume of launches.

Also weekend hackathon events have completely/drastically changed as an experience in the last 2-3 years (expectations and also feature-set/polish of working code by the end of the weekend).

And as another example, you see people producing CUDA kernels and MLX ports as an individual (with AI) way more these days (compared to 1-2 years ago), like this: https://huggingface.co/blog/custom-cuda-kernels-agent-skills

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#137

Post by neya »

K0balt wrote: post #103
vb-8448 wrote: post #54

It must be refactored: IBM is hopping that juniors(less paid) with AI can be sold as seniors.

Tbh, getting good results from ai requires senior level intuition. You can be rusty as hell and not even middling in the language being used, but you have to understand data structures and architecture more than ever to get non-shit results. If you just vibe it, you’ll eventually end up with a mountain of crap that works sort of, and since you’re not doing the coding, you can’t really figure it out as you go along. S…

100% accurate. The architect matters so much more than people think. The most common counter argument to this I've seen on reddit are the vibe coders (particularly inside v0 and lovable subreddits) claiming they built an app that makes $x0,000 over a weekend, so who needs (senior) software engineers and the like? A few weeks later, there's almost always a listing for a technical co-founder or a CTO with experience on their careers page or LinkedIn :)))

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#138

Post by yrds96 »

ChadMoran wrote: post #94
slopinthebag wrote: post #76

You know when someone is singing the praises about AI and they get asked "if you're so much more productive with AI, what have you built with it"? Well I think a bunch of companies are asking this same question to their employees and realising that the productivity gains they are betting on were overhyped. LLM's can be a very useful tool and will probably lead to measurable productivity increases in the future, at th…

[flagged]

I'm not doubting of you or anything, but you just proved point above by saying you have a successful project without even mentioning which project is that.

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#139

Post by fragmede »

Ancalagon wrote: post #133
K0balt wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tbh, getting good results from ai requires senior level intuition. You can be rusty as hell and not even middling in the language being used, but you have to understand data structures and architecture more than ever to get non-shit results. If you just vibe it, you’ll eventually end up with a mountain of crap that works sort of, and since you’re not doing the coding, you can’t really figure it out as you go along. S…

This mirrors my experience exactly. Vibe coding straight up does not work for any serious code.

Todo web apps aren't serious code, I can buy that, but in your mind, what is? Are compilers "serious code"?

https://www.anthropic.com/engineering/building-c-compiler

Like, I'm sure it's just laundering gcc's source at some level, but if Claude can handle making a compiler, either we have to reframe a compiler as "not serious", or, well, come up with a different definition for what entails "serious" code.

Re: IBM tripling entry-level jobs after finding the limits of AI adoption

#140

Post by milchek »

slopinthebag wrote: post #76

You know when someone is singing the praises about AI and they get asked "if you're so much more productive with AI, what have you built with it"? Well I think a bunch of companies are asking this same question to their employees and realising that the productivity gains they are betting on were overhyped. LLM's can be a very useful tool and will probably lead to measurable productivity increases in the future, at th…

I think for a lot of folks it basically comes down to just using AI to make the tasks they have to do easier and to free up time for themselves.

I’d argue the majority use AI this way. The minority “10x” workers who are using it to churn through more tasks are the motivated ones driving real business value being added - but let’s be honest, in a soulless enterprise 9-5 these folks are few and far between.

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