The maturing of AI-assisted development over the next few years will have profound impacts not only on how companies develop software but on how IT departments manage that process.

For one thing, by making software development more accessible to those without coding skills, companies can begin to address the current shortage of developer talent - 1 million vacancies in the US. AI-assisted software will make average programmers more efficient and productive. Most likely to feel the pinch from those efficiencies are the top-tier developers who earn salaries of $500,000 and more. Sure, there will always be a market for the best of the best - just not nearly as many of them. 

For IT departments, the challenge will be how to rethink software development using new methodologies and workflows. Technologists will be recruited less on their coding skills and more on their ability to visualize and verbalize actions that the AI-based programming software can understand and implement. 

To give executable natural-language instructions to a computer, technologists will need to understand the semantics, concepts, and logical sequences of foundational programming, even if they don't write in computer code - at least until the technology matures even more.

Financial institutions can begin planning now for the transition to AI-assisted programming. Hires you make, partners you add, and technology choices you decide on today will be key contributors to your bottom line by 2025.