Agents Are Now Table Stakes

The recent paper “Professional Software Developers Don’t Vibe, They Control” is a solid read. The authors studied experienced developers using coding agents and found what most of us already know in practice: pros don’t hand over the wheel. They plan, they steer, they verify.

That’s not a sign of skepticism. It’s a sign that agents are now part of the craft.

Agents are infrastructure now

We used to treat AI tools like optional experiments. Fun to try, easy to ignore. That era is over.

Coding agents now sit in the same category as version control, code review, and tests. You don’t do those because they’re trendy. You do them because shipping professional software without them is irresponsible.

“Too hard for LLMs” is a cop-out

I hear this a lot: “My work is too complex for LLMs.” Maybe. But that doesn’t mean the tools are useless. It means you haven’t figured out how to use them well yet.

Agents are not magic. They are force multipliers. If you have taste, they help you move faster. If you don’t, they help you move wrong faster. The solution is not to opt out. The solution is to learn the skill.

The skill gap is real

We’re past the point where AI use is a personal preference. It’s a professional capability. People who can steer agents well will ship more, learn faster, and have more leverage. People who can’t will be left behind by those who can.

That isn’t hype. It’s the same dynamic we saw with every other shift in tooling. The ones who mastered version control, testing, and CI didn’t just move faster. They raised the bar for everyone else.

The paper is right. Professionals don’t vibe. They control. And now, controlling agents is part of the job.