One of the most influential software engineers has hope for junior developers amid the industry-wide uncertainty caused by artificial intelligence.
Martin Fowler sat down on a November 19 episode of “The Pragmatic Engineer” podcast to discuss the state of the software engineering world in 2025 — a year when major tech companies aren’t holding back when it comes to job cuts. Layoffs.ai has tracked around 114,000 tech employee layoffs so far in 2025, compared with nearly 153,000 in all of 2024.
The 62-year-old, who has written several books about software development and is the chief scientist at software company Thoughtworks, said the massive job layoffs in the tech world are one sign that the software development world is in a “depression.” In this current era of “great uncertainty,” he said, businesses aren’t investing in software. And, while the tech world is pouring money into artificial intelligence, that growth seems to be a “separate thing” that’s “clearly bubbly.”
“While businesses aren’t investing, it’s hard to make much progress in the software world,” Fowler said. “And so we have this weird mix of no investment, pretty much depression in the software industry, with an AI bubble going on.”
The “unpredictable” AI bubble presents challenges and uncertainty for junior software engineers, in particular.
“The thing with bubbles is you never know how big they’re going to grow,” Fowler said. “You don’t know how long it’s going to take before they pop, and you don’t know what’s going to be after the pop.”
When asked about his advice for junior software engineers, Fowler didn’t discourage them from using AI for coding. However, he said, newer developers can’t always identify if the output of large language models, or LLMs for short, is useful. That’s where the knowledge of a more experienced coder comes in handy.
He said the best way for junior developers to learn is to find a senior engineer to mentor them. A good experienced mentor is “worth their weight in gold,” he said.
Fowler is widely regarded as a pioneer in the field of software engineering. He was one of 17 authors of the 2001 “Agile Manifesto,” which redefined how software is built collaboratively by teams.
He seemed confident in his industry to persevere.
Although he said the timing for software engineers starting out in tech may not be as great as it was 20 years ago, Fowler said there’s “plenty of potential in the future” since the core skills required of a good software engineer remain the same today.
“I don’t think AI is going to wipe out software development,” Fowler said.
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