The Role of AI in Modern Software Engineering: Tools, Trends, Impact & Pitfalls

As AI continues to embed itself in the software development lifecycle, engineering leaders face a shifting landscape of tools, workflows, and expectations. From AI pair programmers to autonomous coding agents, the promise of AI is speed and scale, but what is the reality?

In this session, we will look at how AI is influencing software delivery today. Drawing on real team experience in delivering large-scale, enterprise software projects, the session will examine where these tools are genuinely helpful, where they introduce new risks, and what they mean for developer roles and engineering culture in the longer term.

This session will cover:

• The tools development teams are working with and how they’re being used
• Where AI is genuinely accelerating delivery, and where the friction remains
• Considerations around trust, accuracy, team dynamics, and documentation
• How engineering teams can evolve alongside increasingly capable tooling

Whether you’re evaluating tools, reshaping workflows, or setting your AI strategy, this session offers a perspective on what’s working and what’s not in the modern engineering environment.