Ask HN: With O3 progression, how should juniors plan our careers

[whizusukite]

With the advent of new O3 progressions, what are some recommendations for early/mid-career software engineers to maximize their job growth prospects in the future? What skills will be more sought after? What skills will be the most important? It seems more generic software engineer roles may become more saturated. Curious to hear other thoughts on this.

[extr]

If every car is self driving, there is still the question of where to go.

[whizusukite]

That's true. My thoughts are that at a more junior/mid-level, many of the problems assigned to engineers are smaller and more well-defined. They also involve a lower depth compared to projects at a senior levels or above. I can imagine these tasks are more along the lines of what O3 or similar AIs will excel at.

I'm interested in where junior/mid-level engineers should target their learnings to adapt to these areas.

[jryan49]

I would suggest to stop trying to predict the future, and carry on as normal... There is no way to really predict how AI will pan out. There always has been a trade off of being a generalist vs specialist. Probably good to try to be both. If something actually happens that require us to adapt we can figure it out then.

[marssaxman]

What are "O3 progressions"? This thread is the first result when I search, and everything else on the page has something to do with military ranks.

[Jtsummers]

o3: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2024/12/opena...

Or this discussion at #1 now and on the front page for several hours: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42473321

[marssaxman]

Thanks!