"Just start iterating in chunks alongside the LLM".
For those types of tasks it probably takes the same amount of time to form the idea without AI as with AI, this is what Metr found in its study of developer productivity.
That study design has some issues. But let's say it takes me the same amount of time, the agentic flow is still beneficial to me. It provides useful structure, helps with breaking down the problem. I can rubber duck, send off web research tasks, come back to answer questions, etc., all within a single interface. That's useful to me, and especially so if you have to jump around different projects a lot (consultancy). YMMV.
For those types of tasks it probably takes the same amount of time to form the idea without AI as with AI, this is what Metr found in its study of developer productivity.
https://metr.org/blog/2025-07-10-early-2025-ai-experienced-o... https://arxiv.org/abs/2507.09089