𝗬𝗼𝘂'𝗿𝗲 𝗪𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗬𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗕𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗘𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗦𝗸𝗶𝗹𝗹
The best engineers are doing things they are bad at.
They are not bad at writing code. They are incredible at it. But they stopped doing their best work. They drifted into tasks that waste their time.
I did this during a large repo migration. I used Claude Code and did not notice my mistake until I looked at my time.
The work has changed. Preparation is the work.
You are not writing code or debugging anymore. You are managing context.
Think like an air traffic controller. The controller does not fly the planes. They sequence the planes so they do not collide. They manage the airspace.
Claude handles the flying. You handle the coordination. You decide which files to show it. You decide the order of work. You set the constraints.
If you prepare well, Claude succeeds. If you do not, you spend hours fighting an AI that builds the wrong thing.
Here is how to master this new skill:
- Scope tasks extremely small. One task per prompt. One change per PR. Build the skeleton first.
- Do one task manually first. Do it start to finish without shortcuts. This teaches you where the AI struggles and what context it needs.
- Tell the AI which layer to work in. Specify if logic belongs in layer A or layer B. If you do not specify, the AI will guess wrong.
- Use reference patterns. Give the AI a file path and line numbers. Do not just describe the code.
- Document mistakes. When the AI fails, tell it to update its own rules. Build a playbook of what went wrong.
Stop trying to write clever prompts. Start focusing on setup.
Two final rules for complex work:
- Separate thinking from doing. Ask the AI to output a plan first. Review the plan. Then tell it to execute.
- Know when to reset. Long sessions lose quality. If the AI starts ignoring your rules, kill the session and start a fresh one.
You are no longer measured by how much code you write. You are measured by how well you prepare.
Source: https://dev.to/alextongme/youre-wasting-your-best-engineering-skill-191m
Optional learning community: https://t.me/GyaanSetuAi