Post by Zillow

Yes, AI is making Zillow's engineers faster. But it’s also changing how they work. The biggest shift isn't speed. It's what speed unlocks: more experiments, better questions, and time spent on problems that actually require human judgment. We talked to four engineers building Zillow's AI products about what that looks like from the inside. Here’s what they had to say: —— The most valuable skill isn't coding. It's communication. ——  "The most important skill for every engineer today is communication. If you think about AI as a machine and try to program it the way you're used to programming code, you will fail." — Aaron Wroblewski, Senior Manager, Machine Learning Engineering • Result: Aaron's team grew velocity by 50% this year. The unlock was treating agents like new teammates, onboarding them with context, clear acceptance criteria, and the reasoning behind the work so they could execute without needing to ask. —— AI is a collaborator, not a shortcut. ——  "In the past, I'd look at a problem and start coding basically all myself. Now, it's more like jumping in right away and using it almost like a partner — from brainstorming to literature review to coming up with a plan." — Zach Harrison, Senior Applied Scientist • Result: Experiments that used to take a two-week sprint now take a day. Zach runs three models in the time it used to take to run one. —— The ceiling on what one engineer can explore has been raised. ——  "I kind of feel like I'm even more of a product person right now, because there's just a lot more space you can explore with this technology." — Min Hung Shih, Software Development Engineer • Result: Min prototyped an idea over a weekend. It became a full product initiative. —— Institutional knowledge doesn't have to live in someone's head. ——  "Before, [the operations of systems] would be maybe a wiki page that'd go stale, or the hidden roadblock wouldn't be surfaced. Now, we can codify that and share it across teams." — Cody Bushey, Manager, Software Development Engineering, Big Data • Result: Cody's team turned knowledge into reusable agent skills — so context compounds instead of disappearing after a meeting. The engineers getting the most from AI aren't the best coders. They're the ones who are clearest about what they want. Read how Zillow's engineers are actually using AI: https://lnkd.in/dHmx6QeR