Why Coding Skills Still Matter (Even When AI Is Faster, Better, and Stronger)

12 Feb 2026 #coding

In the days of StackOverflow, we had to verify answers. Now, too often, we accept AI’s output without question.

Catching AI red-handed

Today, in another adventure with AI, I asked Copilot to turn a couple of SQL table definitions into mapping classes for Entity Framework Core. It was the classical 1-to-many relationship. Easy peasy!

The problem came when I asked it to generate an API endpoint to store a parent record with a bunch of child records. Something like: create a parent record from this request object, then read this table to create its children.

Its first solution was to persist the parent record. Then inside a loop, persist every child record. The classical N+1 problem. Well, the inverse one: I was writing, not reading. Arrggg!

When I prompted it to change it, saying there was no need for the loop, it replied with a “Yes, you can simplify it that way.” Caught you Copilot!

Why coding skills still matter

The N+1 problem was something I could find on the spot.

Now imagine how many AI answers we blindly accept without question. When coding, documenting, researching, testing…

Coding skills still matter. Without them, we wouldn’t even notice the problem in the first place.

Blindly trusting AI is what makes us say AI kills CS degrees, what gets us into trouble, and what makes us dangerously lazy.

Reviewing what AI spits out puts you ahead of like 99% of coders who trust AI without questions—OK, I’m making that number up. And you still need your coding muscles to tell whether AI-generated code is garbage and to fix it.

AI is like a semi-autonomous car. It always needs hands on the wheel. Build skills. Then leverage AI. In that order—Keep your hands on the wheel all the time.

To help you build hype-proof skills, I wrote Street-Smart Coding. Because syntax alone won’t make you stand out.