When hiring senior engineers, the crucial test is whether they can build. This means assessing their ability to take a real-world business problem—like designing a warehouse system—and translate it into a tangible technical solution. This skill separates true builders from theoretical programmers.

To keep pace with AI development, the barrier between design and engineering must fall. Intercom made it a non-negotiable job requirement for every product designer to ship code to production. This empowers them to fix UI bugs directly and accelerates the entire development cycle.

Contrary to claims that "handoff is dead," designers at top companies use AI-generated prototypes as highly detailed specs. These interactive prototypes provide more information than static designs but are still handed off to developers for implementation, rather than being merged directly into production.

Instead of siloing roles, encourage engineers to design and designers to code. This cross-functional approach breaks down artificial barriers and helps the entire team think more holistically about the end-to-end user experience, as a real user does not see these internal divisions.

For individuals who both design and code, finishing a visual design isn't a moment of triumph but one of dread, as they know the lengthy process of coding it from scratch has just begun. This specific emotional pain point is a core motivator for building next-generation tools that eliminate this redundant step.

A design engineer's true value isn't just coding ability, but a designer's mindset applied to shipping products. They are distinguished by their focus on creativity, craft, and the delightful details in the final 10% of the work, which separates them from traditional front-end engineers.

The co-founder, a designer, learned React to bypass the classic frustration of developers misinterpreting high-fidelity mockups. By designing directly in code, he maintains full control over the final UI, eliminates the handoff process, and saves significant time and back-and-forth.

Technical tools are secondary to building a successful design system. The primary barrier is a lack of shared vision. Success requires designers to think about engineering constraints and engineers to understand UX intent, creating an empathetic, symbiotic relationship that underpins the entire system.

AI tools are collapsing the traditional moats around design, engineering, and product. As PMs and engineers gain design capabilities, designers must reciprocate by learning to code and, more importantly, taking on strategic business responsibilities to maintain their value and influence.