What Software Engineers Need in 2026

What this episode covers

Kent maps the durable skills that stay valuable as agents take more implementation: clarity, judgment, empathy, feedback loops, systems thinking, agent fluency, and ownership — with practical homework for each cluster.(00:00) - Intro: Google stat and durable skills (00:20) - Why now (01:08) - Durable skills map (01:25) - Clarity & judgment (03:40) - Wayne Allan: build the right thing first (04:28) - Practice: clarity & judgment (06:01) - User empathy & feedback (07:29) - Practice: empathy & feedback (08:56) - Systems thinking (12:22) - InfoWorld: AI coders need good engineers (18:52) - Agent fluency (20:14) - Practice: agent fluency (21:26) - Ownership (23:03) - Slow down on purpose (27:05) - What to deprioritize (28:04) - Homework Better with Kent — Durable skills for people who ship software.Episode 1 is the map. Agents can implement faster every month; the expensive mistake is building the wrong thing even faster. Kent walks through seven skills that were valuable decades ago and still matter in 2026: problem clarity, domain depth, judgment, empathy, feedback loops, systems thinking (including closing the agent loop), agent fluency, and ownership.Three clusters pair each skill area with concrete practice — stakeholder rooms, wiring daily feedback, building tests and CI so agents can iterate. Kent cites Become an Epic Product Engineer guests (Wayne Allan, Jack Ryan, Aaron Francis, Dillon Mulroy, Swizec Teller, Ruben Casas, and others), reacts to Matt Asay's InfoWorld piece on AI-generated code, and closes with homework you can do this week.Not a tool demo. Not a PM course. Not a framework checklist — just durable skills for people who ship software.Subscribe and comment with topics you want covered. Chats with Kent (Become an Epic Product Engineer) continues with guest interviews; Better with Kent is Kent thinking out loud on camera.LinksInfoWorld — AI coders need good software engineers (Matt Asay)The Last Software Engineer (essay)Become an Epic Product Engineer (guest podcast)Better with Kent on kentcdodds.com

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Frequently Asked Questions

How long is this episode of Better with Kent?

This episode is 29 minutes long.

When was this Better with Kent episode published?

This episode was published on May 29, 2026.

What is this episode about?

Kent maps the durable skills that stay valuable as agents take more implementation: clarity, judgment, empathy, feedback loops, systems thinking, agent fluency, and ownership — with practical homework for each cluster.(00:00) - Intro: Google stat...

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