# How AI Is Shifting Software Development Toward Orchestrating Agents

DevFeed: [How AI Is Shifting Software Development Toward Orchestrating Agents](<https://devfeed.tech/articles/the-conductor-developer-4440.md>)

Original publisher: [Read original article](<https://martinfowler.com/rachels-ramblings/conductor-developer.html>)

Author: Rachel Laycock (rlaycock@thoughtworks.com)

Published: 2026-07-31T13:48:00Z

Content type: opinion

Language: en

Sources: [Martin Fowler](<https://devfeed.tech/sources/martin-fowler.md>)

Topics: [Development](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/development.md>), [AI Development](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/ai-development.md>), [Software Engineering](<https://devfeed.tech/topics/software-engineering.md>)

Tags: [agents](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/agents.md>), [ai](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/ai.md>), [developer](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/developer.md>), [development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/development.md>), [productivity](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/productivity.md>), [rachels-ramblings](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/rachels-ramblings.md>), [software-development](<https://devfeed.tech/tags/software-development.md>)

## AI overview

The article argues that AI is changing software development by making human attention the scarce resource. As agents increasingly write code, developers may spend less time coding directly and more time coordinating agents, evaluating results, and shaping the overall software outcome.

## Source excerpt

TL;DR Why I think software development is starting to feel a little more like conducting an orchestra. There's a shift happening in software development that I don't think we're talking about clearly enough. For the last couple of years we've framed AI as a productivity tool. How much faster can it write code? How many more features can we ship? How much cheaper can we build software? I think that's the wrong question, but I understand why. The first thing AI became good at was writing code, so naturally that's where we focused. As AI got better at coding, I expected the bottlenecks to move through the software delivery lifecycle: from coding to design and specification, architecture, then verification. And they have. We spent a lot of time at the most recent FOSE event discussing how we ensure good design, quality and resilience while agents increasingly write the code. That's a topic for another ramble. A few months ago, though, I realised I was looking at the wrong bottleneck. I kept assuming it would simply move to the next phase of software delivery. I was wrong. AI didn't change what great software looks like. It changed what's scarce. Human attention is now the bottleneck. The next bottleneck isn't design. It isn't verification. It's us. More specifically, it's our attention. Developers have always protected long periods of uninterrupted focus because that's where good software gets built. Pair programming. Quiet afternoons. Deep work. We optimized around flow because flow mattered. When we didn't get that time, very little got done. But when I watch developers using AI today, I see something different. The best developers I know aren't spending all day in flow anymore. They're orchestrating agents. Great developers are starting to look less like programmers and more like conductors. I was watching Jacob Collier on YouTube recently because I'm hoping to see him in concert soon. Watching him conduct is fascinating. He's not trying to play every instrument hims