I'll tell you a secret most experts are too afraid to admit.
October 21, 2026 · 0 likes · 0 comments
Defense Workforce
I'll tell you a secret most experts are too afraid to admit.
The skill that got me to the Pentagon was never coding.
I was the first foreigner, born in France, to become a senior executive at the Pentagon: the Chief Software Officer for the Air Force and Space Force. Everyone assumes it was the code that got me there.
It wasn't. Coding was just the vehicle I happened to use at the time.
The real skill — the one underneath everything — was the ability to teach myself anything from nothing. Drop me in front of a problem I've never seen, with no manual and no mentor, and figure it out anyway.
That's the part that transfers. That's the part that lasts.
Because here's the thing about this new world: AI can write the code now. Faster than me, faster than you. That part is over.
What it can't replace is the human instinct to look at a blank page, a broken system, an impossible problem — and solve it from scratch.
The tool changed. The skill didn't.
Stop protecting what you know how to do. Start sharpening how fast you can learn what you don't.
Follow for more on adapting your mindset to the world AI is building.
Get the book: REPLACEMENT. https://lnkd.in/gZCFR5Tk
The skill that got me to the Pentagon was never coding.
I was the first foreigner, born in France, to become a senior executive at the Pentagon: the Chief Software Officer for the Air Force and Space Force. Everyone assumes it was the code that got me there.
It wasn't. Coding was just the vehicle I happened to use at the time.
The real skill — the one underneath everything — was the ability to teach myself anything from nothing. Drop me in front of a problem I've never seen, with no manual and no mentor, and figure it out anyway.
That's the part that transfers. That's the part that lasts.
Because here's the thing about this new world: AI can write the code now. Faster than me, faster than you. That part is over.
What it can't replace is the human instinct to look at a blank page, a broken system, an impossible problem — and solve it from scratch.
The tool changed. The skill didn't.
Stop protecting what you know how to do. Start sharpening how fast you can learn what you don't.
Follow for more on adapting your mindset to the world AI is building.
Get the book: REPLACEMENT. https://lnkd.in/gZCFR5Tk