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On October 19, 2026, The Pragmatic Engineer author Gergely Orosz put forward the view that continuously learning new tools is itself part of professional competence. This statement came in response to a plea for help from a South Korean middleware engineer—the engineer's manager, influenced by the GenAI boom, had set "AI token usage" as a KPI and repeatedly pressured him for making little use of AI. Orosz believes the manager is using a clumsy approach to push him to adapt to change, and says that being "excellent" and "refusing to learn new things" are not mutually exclusive, and that refusing to adapt is still unprofessional. He offers two paths: accept that AI changes the way work is done, or honestly bear the cost of refusal, namely that the companies willing to hire you will keep shrinking. Currently this view is reported by a single source, with no subsequent developments yet.
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Oct 19
Shao Meng
Gergely Orosz on AI token usage being set as a KPI
The Pragmatic Engineer author Gergely Orosz responded to a plea for help from a middleware engineer in South Korea: their manager, influenced by the GenAI hype, set "AI token usage" as a KPI and repeatedly pressured the engineer because they rarely use AI. Orosz believes the manager is using a clumsy approach to push them to adapt to change, and says "excellent" and "refusing to learn new things" are not mutually exclusive—refusing to adapt is still unprofessional. He offers two paths: accept that AI is changing how work is done, or honestly bear the cost of refusal—the companies willing to hire you will keep shrinking.