Claude Is a Better Engineer Than I Am

Claude code is better than me at writing code almost every time, at least on the dimensions that matter where I've worked my whole career.

When I review what it outputs given the context I can give it, 80% of the time it's either what I would have done or something slightly better. It also does it in way less time than it would have taken me or most folks I've worked with, and at a dramatically lower cost.

If you add the right layered + automated review system, it's better 99.9% of the time in my experience. With way better test coverage. I review the plan and redirect on the increasingly rare occasions I need to, and we're off to the races.

Claude code is better at debugging than I am. Instead of diving into the logs myself, I ask the agent to do it. God knows I never memorized the aws cli commands needed to not have to slog through clicking 100 things in the aws console. But Claude knows them.

Claude code is a WAY better designer than me, especially if you mix in a skill or two so it doesn't look like the same mediocre things it spits out by default. My taste is way more refined than my own skill here.

I do think good human product design can be a true differentiator in a world of abundant software so I'm keeping an eye out for a good collaborator here to take what I can do to the next level.

So what am I good for? I'm a way better product manager than Claude. I'm really good at figuring out what the right things are to do next when the possibilities are more abundant than ever, and the cost of making a bet with software keeps going down.

I'm a really good tech lead and architect with intuition for how to make something maintainable, reliable, and secure while maintaining optionality.

Combine those together and I feel like I'm in a sweet spot right now. That could change tomorrow, but not yet. And there's lots of opportunity to chase right now, maybe more than at any other time in my career.

My advice? Retrain your brain to lean into where you can most add value in a world where what used to be scarce is now abundant.

What is your team doing to lean into what's important and let the agents handle the rest? This is what I help teams figure out.

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