New roles in software development as a result of AI code gen

Boris Cherny, the lead developer of Claude Code posted that AI code gen is generating a blend of former job functions (ie engineer, PM, designer and data scientist). He has called the new 'job roles' or functions archetypes:

Prototyper	Comes up with brand new ideas; churns out many ideas, most of which don't ship
Builder	Quickly turns a prototype/idea into production-grade product/infrastructure.
Sweeper	Cleans up the UI, simplifies the code and system, unships, optimizes performance
Grower	Takes a product that has been built and iterates on it to improve Product-Market Fit
Maintainer	Owns a mature system to make it secure, reliable, fast, and efficient as it scales

As the product matures from an idea to an established product in the portfolio, you can see how the baton loosely migrates through these archetypes from innovation to development to delivery to optimisation.

Many people's skill sets span multiple archetypes.

A healthy team (and a healthy product!) needs a mix of these, depending on the product:

• A product that is new and doesn't have Product-Market Fit (PMF) needs people that are strong at 1+2+3
• A product that is growing and has found PMF needs 2+3+4 and some 5
• A product that has strong PMF needs 3+4+5 and some 2

Boris suggests that software teams of the future will look more like this, and less like the domain-specific roles of today?

Update on Monday 6th July

Nathaniel Whittemore in yesterday’s edition of the AI Daily Brief (excellent podcast on AI, BTW) argues that Cherny has missed out some outward-facing positions in this new game. 

Below is my critique of Nathaniels' PoV. 

Portfolio Manager of Opportunities	Nathaniel call this role an 'Editor' which really the Product Manager who prioritises the Roadmap.
Scout + evangelist	This is an activist who seeks out potential customers who might be interested in the new proposition (ie the results of the prototypers and builders). In truth you can’t build a product in isolation without some market interaction, so I think that all prototypers are scouts and evangelists as a natural requirement
Orchestrator + Conductor	IMO, it is the Product Manager who orchestrates the product beyond just working code (launch planning, awareness training, product marketing etc). Nathaniel sees Orchestrator as an internally-facing role and a conductor as outwardly facing.
Risk Steward	This to me sounds like part the Product Manager’s role, rather than carving out a separate role.