Working with AI: Pair Programming with a Teammate That Never Sleeps
When most developers first meet AI, it’s through autocomplete—GitHub Copilot suggesting a snippet or ChatGPT filling in boilerplate code. Handy, yes. But if you stop there, you’re underestimating what AI can really do.
Today’s AI isn’t just a “fancy text predictor.” It’s becoming a collaborative teammate—one that can brainstorm, debug, refactor, document, and even explain code decisions. Think less autocomplete, more junior colleague who’s always available.
Rethinking AI as a Teammate
Pair programming with AI works best when you treat it like a conversation. Instead of asking for “the next line,” you can:
Explain the problem in plain English
Ask for alternative solutions
Push back on weak answers
Iterate together until the solution works
This two-way back-and-forth feels a lot more like collaboration than command-and-response.
Strengths AI Brings to the Team
AI coding assistants are no longer just for solo coding—they’re expanding across team workflows:
Code Reviews: Catch issues early and reduce reviewer fatigue.
Docs & Comments: Keep inline docs, architecture notes, and tests up to date automatically.
Onboarding: New hires can ask “why do we do it this way?” and get instant context.
Stakeholder Updates: Translate technical changes into plain English summaries for non-technical leaders.
Best Practices for AI Pair Programming
To make AI a great teammate, keep these in mind:
Be clear and specific in your prompts (context = better results).
Treat AI output as a first draft, not production-ready code.
Always review for accuracy, safety, and quality.
Use AI for scaffolding and repetitive code, but keep core logic and architecture human-driven.
What Humans Still Do Best
Even the smartest AI can’t replace:
Understanding business goals and user needs
Making trade-offs and ethical decisions
Mentoring, sharing culture, and fostering creativity
AI handles repetition. Humans handle vision.
Overcoming Skepticism
It’s normal to worry: Will AI make me obsolete? Can I trust its code?
The truth: when AI catches a bug before it ships, or walks you through a new library, skepticism quickly turns into relief—and even excitement. Used well, AI becomes less of a threat and more of a career accelerator.
The Road Ahead
In the near future, AI won’t just autocomplete functions—it will:
Flag architectural drift
Explain design trade-offs
Adapt to your team’s coding style
Serve as a living project archive
That doesn’t shrink the role of developers. It amplifies it—freeing teams to innovate, design, and build better software faster.
Final Thoughts
AI isn’t here to replace developers—it’s here to partner with them. Teams that experiment early, start small, and share learnings will see the biggest benefits: faster delivery, cleaner code, and happier developers.
The future of coding is not humans vs AI.
It’s humans + AI.
Call to Action: Try pairing with an AI tool this week. Use Copilot, ChatGPT, or CodeWhisperer on a small project, and see how it changes the way you code.
Until next time,
AD
Hi, I’m Andrew Duggan. After decades working with AI and building enterprise technology, I started Code Forward to help developers and entrepreneurs discover how AI can make coding smarter, faster, and more fun.