In an age of agentic engineering we in the Samman Society …

… continue to find that human engineering expertise is needed to achieve high-quality software. We teach technical practices and foster skills that enable better results for both teams, individuals and the wider system they are part of.

There are significant challenges with some of the practices we have been using until recently. For example:

• Ensemble working tends to fail when AI tooling is included because of the delay and communication overload.
• Code katas are too small to present a meaningful challenge when you have AI tools available. Learning hours don’t work the way they used to.
• TDD changes significantly when a coding agent writes the code and tests.

Many coaches are now teaching various new technical practices for AI tools based on their own experience and their own beliefs about what works. That is a great starting point since we are all excellent engineers in our own right. In the longer term we expect a body of knowledge to emerge which we will agree on.

In the meantime we continue to teach and learn from one another as coaches, and adopt technical practices that align with our values. We will pursue technical excellence, and positive, lasting outcomes for the people, teams and organizations we coach.

This statement was officially adopted at the Samman Society general assembly in October 2026

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