Dear Clients, AI is Not Your Engineer!

Introduction

I’ve spent over five years working with startups backed by AWS, NVIDIA Inception, MongoDB Startups Accelerator, and Microsoft for Startups. I’ve seen firsthand how clients worldwide are trying to shove AI down engineers’ throats like some magic cure-all. Every most non-techy client out there going around screaming "Why do you even need a month to develop this when Bolt, Builder.io or Lovable can do this in 2 days?" Well, yeah, they can, but can you use them, really?

Look, we get it. AI is the shiny new toy in tech. It can chat, it can code, and it can even write bad poetry. But let’s be real for a second—AI is not an engineer. It’s not going to replace real developers, no matter how many LinkedIn influencers try to convince you otherwise. If you think AI is going to single-handedly build your next million-dollar app, you might as well ask a toaster to design a spaceship.

AI Is a Tool, Not a Magician

Artificial Intelligence has made coding faster and automation smoother, but let’s be clear—it’s not thinking, it’s predicting. It's like doing the prediction maths where you predict how many times you will get a 6 if you roll the dice 3 times, but well, you know, real world doesn't always work on predictions when you have an application with millions of users, right? AI doesn’t understand your business, your users, or why your startup’s idea is the "next Uber but for hot single moms!" It’s just regurgitating patterns from existing data. Expecting AI to replace an engineer is like expecting a paintbrush to replace Picasso.

AI Has the IQ of a Goldfish

Okay, maybe that’s an exaggeration—but only slightly. AI doesn’t solve problems; it guesses at solutions. Throw it a complex coding issue, and it might spit out something that looks right but is actually a security nightmare waiting to happen. AI-generated code can be bloated, inefficient, and sometimes just plain wrong. And if you don’t have a real developer checking it? Well, let’s just say, you have a code pushed to production that looked good and now millions of users are using your applications, hope you enjoy the cyberattacks.

I once worked with a startup founder who bragged about how AI was building his MVP. Fast forward two months, and he was begging me to untangle the spaghetti code AI had puked out. Turns out, AI-generated code doesn’t debug itself smoothly. Who knew?

AI Is Your Enthusiastic Freshman Intern, Not Your Senior Engineer

Picture your most junior intern. The one who shows up on day one vibrating with enthusiasm, having memorized all the programming language syntax they could find on Stack Overflow, eager to rewrite your entire codebase using whatever framework was trending on Hacker News that morning.

That's AI. It's confident. It's fast. It speaks the language. And much like that intern, it has absolutely no idea what it's doing at a fundamental level.

Your AI assistant will happily generate code that looks perfectly reasonable, compiles without errors, and completely tanks your production database at 2 AM on a Sunday. It will architect systems with security holes big enough to drive a truck through while assuring you everything is "industry standard." It will implement features you never asked for while missing the critical requirements you explicitly stated.

But unlike the intern, you can't take AI out for coffee and explain where it went wrong. Or, can you?

Why Real Engineers Still Matter (And Always Will)

1. Context Matters—AI Doesn't Get It

AI doesn’t know why you need a feature—it just knows other people have needed something similar. Engineers, on the other hand, ask the important questions: "Is this the best approach? Will it scale? Will it break everything the moment we get 100 users?" AI won’t question your bad ideas—it’ll just build them faster.

Your codebase isn't just a collection of functions and classes. It's the crystallized form of your business decisions, your product evolution, your customer feedback, and countless engineering trade-offs made over years.

Your engineers don't just know what the code does; they know why it does it that way. They remember the production outage that led to the odd-looking error handling in the payment processor. They understand why certain parts of the legacy system remain untouched despite looking outdated.

AI has none of this context. It sees your codebase as a blank slate, ready to be "optimized" and "modernized" without understanding the hard-won wisdom embedded in every quirk and comment.

Had a client once who insisted AI could “just write the backend.” When it crashed on launch day, he called me in a panic. Turns out, AI doesn’t ask if the database structure actually makes sense—it just copies what it found online. Oops!

2. Creativity Can’t Be Automated

Real engineers innovate. They dream up solutions, optimize for performance, and build beyond what already exists. AI just stitches together what’s already out there, like Frankenstein’s monster, but with less charm and more bugs.

Your human engineers aren't valuable because they can type quickly; they're valuable because they can think critically about your business problems. They can tell you when a feature request is solving the wrong problem, when a technology choice will lead to maintenance headaches, or when a simpler approach would better serve your customers.

AI will never tell you that your brilliant feature idea is actually terrible.

3. Debugging: AI Creates Problems, Humans Fix Them

You ever seen AI try to debug its own mistakes? It’s like watching a cat chase its tail. AI can suggest fixes, but real engineers actually understand the problem. They don’t just slap on a patch—they dig deep, optimize, and prevent future disasters. AI might give you a band-aid; an engineer will actually heal the wound.

Had a client send me AI-generated code for “final review.” I found hardcoded API keys in there. AI doesn’t care if it exposes your entire system to hackers—it just wants to finish the task. Yeah, recently AI agents have improved a lot, but, you know, you are not an engineer (maybe), so knowing what to keep and what not to—is the engineering knowledge.

4. Security and Compliance? AI Doesn't Care

You know what happens when you let AI handle security? Data leaks, lawsuits, and PR nightmares. AI doesn’t completely understand regulations like GDPR or HIPAA—it just throws together code that “looks fine.” A real engineer knows how to secure your app and keep regulators off your back. So, when you run around in a courtroom, your engineer knows where and how to defend your project. Where's your GPT now?

5. Collaboration: AI Can’t Join the Standup Meeting (Yet!)

Software development is a team sport. Engineers brainstorm, debate, and refine solutions together. AI? It just does whatever you tell it to, no questions asked. If you want mindless execution with zero accountability, sure—AI’s great. If you want a successful project, you need humans.

AI: The Assistant, Not the Boss

Instead of replacing engineers, AI should be helping them. Here’s how to use AI without setting your project on fire:

1. Use AI for Boring Stuff

Let AI write boilerplate code, generate documentation, and handle repetitive tasks. Let engineers focus on the real work. Those tedious CRUD operations, standard API endpoints, and basic UI components can be good candidates for AI assistance.

2. Prototype Faster, But Don’t Trust It Blindly

AI can help you build a rough draft, but a human needs to refine it. Would you trust a cake that an AI “thought” was baked? Didn’t think so.

3. AI Can Suggest, But Engineers Decide

Let AI suggest code improvements, but always have an engineer verify them. Otherwise, you’re just letting a robot play Russian roulette with your software.

4. Automate Tests, But Don’t Skip Human Review

AI can run automated tests, but only engineers know how to interpret the results and fix the deeper issues.

Conclusion

AI is cool, but it’s not your engineer. It doesn’t think, it doesn’t problem-solve, and it definitely doesn’t care if your product succeeds or crashes and burns. If you want to build something great, hire real developers. Use AI wisely—as a tool, not a replacement—unless you enjoy chaos, lawsuits, and bug-ridden nightmares.

I’ve worked with countless startups, met founders worldwide, and seen AI hype destroy projects before they even launched. Clients, stop trying to cut corners with AI—your business deserves better.

So the next time a vendor shows you a flashy demo where AI generates a simple app in minutes, remember what you're not seeing: the hours of cleanup required afterward, the critical business logic it missed, the security vulnerabilities introduced, the maintenance nightmare created, and the frustrated engineers who have to make it all work.

By all means, embrace AI as a tool in your engineering toolkit. But remember that tools don't build great products; great teams do. Invest in your human engineers. Give them the time and resources they need to do their best work. Use AI to remove drudgery from their workday, not to replace their judgment.

Because at the end of the day, your competitive advantage isn't going to come from having the same AI tools as everyone else. It's going to come from having engineers who understand your business deeply and care about making it succeed.

Those engineers are watching how you approach AI. They notice whether you see it as a way to support them or replace them. And in a market where technical talent remains scarce despite layoffs, the companies that nurture their engineering talent rather than trying to automate it away will be the ones that thrive.

So dear client, by all means, bring AI to the engineering party. Just don't expect it to host the event.

—Your human engineer, who still has a job (for now).