About the bit where developers thought they were more productive but were actually less so: I’ve heard people say things like “overall, using AI tools didn’t save me any time, but doing it this way cost me less mental energy than doing it all by myself”. I’ve also sometimes felt similarly. I wonder if people might be using something like “how good do I feel at the end of the day” as a proxy for “how productive was I today”.
About the bit where developers thought they were more productive but were actually less so: I’ve heard people say things like “overall, using AI tools didn’t save me any time, but doing it this way cost me less mental energy than doing it all by myself”. I’ve also sometimes felt similarly. I wonder if people might be using something like “how good do I feel at the end of the day” as a proxy for “how productive was I today”.