Honestly if your boss does not force you to use AI, don't.

Don't feel like you might get "left behind". LLM assisted development is still changing rapidly. What was best practice 6 months ago is irrelevant today. By being an early adopter you will just learn useless workarounds that might soon not be necessary to know.

On the other hand if you keep coding "by hand" will keep your skills sharp. You will protect yourself against the negative mental effects of using LLMs like skill decline, general decline of mental capacity, danger of developing psychosis because of the sycophantic nature of LLMs and so on.

LLM based coding tools are only getting easier to use and if you actually know how to code and know software architecture you will able to easily integrate LLM based workflows and deliver far superior results compared to someone who spend their years vibe coding, even if you picked up Claude Code or whatever just a month ago. No need for FOMO,

Right. Be the person on your team who just fucking doesn't because you'll learn your problem domain while everyone else is doing unpaid tool testing work for AI companies.

One day these things will actually do what they are supposed to do with a measure of consistency that doesn't involve GRIMOIRE.md or whatever and you can use them then. And most of the early mover advantage will be gone, because LLMs will not be the winning technology.

In the meantime be the person who learned the lessons of social media: popular isn't the same as good, appropriate or sensible.