[kadhirvelm]

Curious what other teams are doing to keep encouraging people to think critically about their code? I’ve been finding it harder to keep people motivated, keep them engaged with all the changes coming in. And I can’t blame them, it’s been overwhelming. Is everyone else just using more AI..?

[zeeveener]

Personally, guiding junior teammates down the path away from purely "Writer of Code" to "Implementer of Functionality" has been working well for me.

If you get them involved in the design process, they feel heard. Feeling heard is one surefire way to have a person feel involved. Feeling involved fosters a sense of ownership and pride which in turn helps keep a person engaged.

[kadhirvelm]

Yeah I like that, there’s probably something to this full stack builder persona that could keep people motivated long term. So long as they feel ownership, seems like that’s a pretty good bet for long term engagement

[copperx]

Management 101.

[sanderjd]

Yeah this is a good call out. What I've been doing so far is just hoping and praying that people naturally evolve their entire way of working without becoming demotivated or burned out. Seems like a bad strategy.

[evilduck]

I had a senior engineer last week just completely fail to implement an entire subsection of acceptance criteria on a story before creating a PR and got the answer/attempted excuse that the AI agent "missed it" and they didn't double check the work. This is something I haven't seen a senior engineer do in recent memory prior to AI entering the workplace, they at least read the requirements back then even if they misinterpreted them.

Literally just a few minutes ago I had a senior architect send out a clearly Claude-generated .docx project proposal filled to the brim with stuff that is outright not permitted in our organization due to legal constraints and IT policy decisions. This guy has been with the organization for a few years so none of our limitations should have been a surprise. I got to page two before I replied that it was unprofessional to send me AI slop and expect me to be the first to read it.

Some people seem really great with AI as a force multiplier. For others their brain just shuts off entirely. Sorting out how it will affect each person is the real challenge now. We don't even mandate AI usage, it's just there if you want to use it which makes it even more frustrating. As for my approach? A one on one discussion reiterating my expectations that they remain thoughtfully engaged and if needed followed up by formal verbal warnings and then PIPs.

[somewhatgoated]

More AI is always the answer.