AI Is Boosting Senior Dev Productivity - But What’s the Long Game?

AI is making software engineers faster. Tools like GitHub Copilot, ChatGPT, and other code assistants are supercharging productivity, especially for experienced developers who know how to wield them well. I know because I use these tools, and I’m faster.

As a CTO, this feels like a win. Velocity goes up. Headcount pressure goes down. You’re hitting goals with leaner teams.

But if you’re only thinking about the Day 0 benefits - today’s shipping speed, today’s burn rate - you’re not thinking like a leader. You’re thinking like a follower.

Here’s the uncomfortable question we have to ask ourselves:

What happens if this trend continues, and we’re not thinking about growing a strong bench?

🚫 Short-Term Wins, Long-Term Consequences

LinkedIn AI posts are you making you think:

• “Our seniors are 1.5x–2x more productive with AI.”
• “Let’s hold off on hiring juniors.”
• “They’re expensive to train anyway.”

On paper, looks good. In practice, it’s a ticking time bomb that you’re not listening to.

You’re creating a future with no pipeline of experienced engineers, no mentorship culture, and no middle layer to take on complexity when your senior engineers want to move up or out. Your acting as if the world is static, not dynamic - ever changing, ever flowing.

Experience doesn’t magically appear - it’s grown, it’s developed.

🧠 Senior Engineers Don’t Grow on Trees

Every senior engineer started as a junior engineer who learned.

AI might help juniors level up faster, but that only works if they’re in the room. If you cut them out of the org chart, they don’t get exposure. They don’t get mentorship. They don’t get better.

Fast forward 3 - 5 years, and you’re stuck:

• Seniors are burned out doing complex systems alone.
• No one is ready to take the baton.
• You can’t promote anyone internally.
• Hiring gets expensive and risky.

🧭 So What’s the Move?

As tech leaders, we need a more nuanced plan. One that balances efficiency today with resilience tomorrow.

Here are a few principles to guide that:

1. Hire less experienced people with intention

Don’t hire out of habit. Hire with a growth plan and pair them with seniors. Leverage AI to create learning loops.

2. Redesign mentorship for the AI era

AI won’t replace human mentorship - it will transform it. Use AI to accelerate code reviews, debugging, and documentation, and let your seniors focus on coaching through system thinking, architecture and politics.

3. Treat team design like system design

If your team lacks redundancy, observability, and the ability to evolve, you’re building technical debt - but with humans.

4. Build a culture of learning, not just delivery

Use AI as a force multiplier for education, not just execution. Make upskilling a core part of the developer experience.

🔁 Closing Thought

AI is not just a productivity tool - it’s a paradigm shift. If you use it solely to ship faster with fewer people, you might win this sprint. But you’ll lose the marathon.

The best CTOs aren’t just thinking about headcount. They’re thinking about how to grow engineers, build durable teams, and ensure the company still knows how to build software five years from now.

Because the worst thing AI could do to your team… is make you forget how to grow one.