> Every company I have ever worked for has had a deep backlog of tasks and ideas we realistically were never going to get to. These tools put a lot of those tasks in play.
Some of that backlog was never meant to be implemented. “Put it in the backlog” is a common way to deflect conflict over technical design and the backlog often becomes a graveyard of ideas. If I unleashed a brainless agent on our backlog the system would become a Frankenstein of incompatible design choices.
An important part of management is to figure out what actually brings value instead of just letting teams build whatever they want.
You need to groom your backlog.
That's different form my experience. I've worked many places where there are loads of valuable ideas in the backlog or bugs that are real, but don't have enough impact to prioritize. But the business has limited resources, and there are higher value things on the roadmap.
I'm experiencing the early stages of a reality where much more of this stuff is possible to build. I say early stages, because there's still plenty of friction between what we have now and a true productivity multiplier. But most of that friction is solvable without speculative improvements, like the models themselves getting better.
If I worked someplace where there was nothing of value on the backlog, then I would be worried about my job.