Computer Scientist Uses AI to Create AI

While technology skills need to continuously evolve, tech industry leaders note that creativity, creative thinking, problem solving, communication and empathy will always be necessary tools for careers focused on technology skills.

John Giorgi (JG) is a (coincidentally White) 29-year-old computer scientist who creates software for a health care start-up that records and summarizes patient visits to doctors, freeing them from hours spent typing up their clinical notes.

To do so, JG has his own timesaving helper: an A.I. coding assistant. He taps a few keys, and the software tool suggests the rest of the line of code. It can also recommend changes, fetch data, identify bugs and run basic tests. Even though the A.I. makes some mistakes, it saves him up to an hour on many days.

“I can’t imagine working without it now,” said JG.

That sentiment is increasingly common among software developers, who are at the forefront of adopting A.I. agents, assistant programs tailored to help employees do their jobs in fields including customer service and manufacturing.
The rapid improvement of the technology has been accompanied by dire warnings that A.I. could soon automate away millions of jobs – and software developers have been singled out as prime targets.

But the outlook for software developers is more likely evolution than extinction, according to experienced software engineers, industry analysts and academics. 

For decades, better tools have automated some coding tasks, but the demand for software and the people who make it has only increased. A.I., they say, will accelerate that trend and level up the art and craft of software design.

“The skills software developers need will change significantly, but A.I. will not eliminate the need for them,” said Arnal Dayaratna, an analyst at IDC, a technology research firm. “Not anytime soon anyway.”

The outlook for software engineers offers a window into the impact that generative A.I. – the kind behind chatbots like Open-S.I.’s ChatGPT – is likely to have on knowledge workers across the economy, from doctors and lawyers to marketing managers and financial analysts. Predictions about the technology’s consequences vary widely, from wiping out whole swaths of the workforce to hyper-charging productivity as an elixir for economic growth than a chatbot trained on the rambling cacophony of the internet as a whole.

The A.I. coding helpers, software engineers say, are steadily becoming more capable and reliable. Fueling the progress is a wealth of high-quality data used to train them – online software portfolios, coding question-and-answer websites, and documentation and problem-solving ideas posted by developers.

The A.I. software can then generate more accurate results with far fewer  wayward “hallucinations,” (which offer false or nonsensical information), than a chatbot trained on the rambling cacophony of the internet as a whole.

So far, the A.I. agents appear to improve the daily productivity of developers in actual business settings between 10 percent and 30 percent, according to studies. At KPMG, an accounting and consulting firm, developers using GitHub Copilot are saving 4.5 hours a week on average and report that the quality of their code has improved, based on a survey by the firm. 

JG, the health care start-up software writer, uses his A.I. assistant for some tasks he might otherwise assign to a human intern, he said. The Toronto-based computer scientist, who holds a Ph.D, said he was not too concerned yet about A.I.’s coming for his job. 

“But I would be worried if I were a junior developer entering the field now,” and “would be scrambling to learn A.I. coding skills”, said JG, who works for Abridge, a health care start-up based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

The recent demand for junior software engineers, defined as those with three years’ experience or less, has been weak. But it is still early to pin down how much A.I. is contributing to the hiring softness, labor market analysts say. 

Some job-training programs are moving quickly to adapt to the A.I. coding era. Per Scholas, a national nonprofit that prepares lower-income workers for careers in technology, overhauled its curriculum last year. 

The training program – a mix of online and in-person instruction – now offers an “A.I. fundamentals” course. Then, after the software engineering students learn all the basics of programming, they get hands-on experience using an A.I. assistant to write software applications.

“We’re encouraging them to really embrace it, understand its importance, because A.I. is pretty much necessary to be relevant to the work force of the future,” said Bolaji Saibu, a Per Scholas vice president who oversees course design.

Ismail FoFana (coincidentally Black) is one of those students, now part of a six-month program of coursework at Per Scholas followed by a yearlong apprenticeship run by PeopleShores, a job-training organization, in partnership with Accenture, the technology services and consulting firm. Mr. FoFana, a former restaurant manager, said his training so far has made him consider A.I. “definitely more friend than foe.”

He describes his A.I. work companion as part assistant, part teacher. As a beginner, he can ask it coding questions to learn on his own, enabling him to contribute faster to the application development and maintenance teams he works with at Accenture.

In discussing the skills he will need in the future, Mr. FoFana echoes the advice of veteran software engineers and academics. The fundamentals of computer science, they say, will still be crucial. But wizardry in a particular programming language, for example, will matter less.

“Creativity, critical thinking, problem solving, communication, empathy – these are the skill sets people will need to cultivate in the future to be more effective, “ Mr. FoFana said. “And, of course, learning how to manage the A.I. tools.”

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This career-related story essentially republishes a news article (with minor editing) well written by Steve Lohr, published by The New York Times on March 4, 2025.