That’s 100% the trick to it all. I don’t always write code using LLMs. Sometimes I do. The thing that LLMs have unlocked for me is the motivation to put together really solid design documentation for features before implementing them. I’ve been doing this long enough that I’ve usually got a pretty good idea of how I want it to work and where the gotchas are, and pre-LLMs would “vibe code” in the sense that I would write code based on my own gut feeling of how it should be structured and work. Sometimes with some sketches on paper first.

Now… especially for critical functionality/shared plumbing, I’m going to be writing a Markdown spec for it and I’m going to be getting Claude or Codex to do review it with me before I pass it around to the team. I’m going to miss details that the LLM is going to catch. The LLM is going to miss details that I’m going to catch. Together, after a few iterations, we end up with a rock solid plan, complete with incremental implementation phases that either I or an LLM can execute on in bite-sized chunks and review.