# Learning AI From the People Building It

I have written PHP for over twenty years. Laravel is my home. For a big stretch of that I worked as a Chief Technology Officer (CTO) in the credit monitoring space, running a platform that answered millions of queries a month.

Now I spend part of every week learning from AI builders. Not the hype accounts. The people shipping models, chips, and products. I put the ten I learn from most into a list on [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/guywarner) this morning.

Here is the funny part. The crossing-over is smaller than I expected.

## My rules did not change

When I led a team of twelve-plus developers, we rolled AI into legacy work slowly. The rules were simple:

1. AI writes the missing tests first. Legacy code with no tests gets characterization tests before anyone touches it.
2. AI never touches auth, credit, or secure code. Not once. Not with a good prompt.
3. Ship small. Measure. Then decide if the tool earned a bigger job.

Those rules still run my work today. I am building [Bin X](https://binxhq.com), a bin-rental SaaS, and the same lines hold: tests first, hands off the sensitive parts, verify everything. My whole career is trust but verify. AI did not change that. It just made the verify part faster.

## What the builders taught me

The AI builders worth following share one habit. They show their work in public and they ship before they feel ready. I was the opposite for years. I waited until things were polished. Nobody learns from polished. They learn from shipped.

So I ship smaller now. [Bin X](https://binxhq.com) goes out in pieces. My posts go out rough. The feedback loop beats the planning loop almost every time.

## Start here

If you are a veteran engineer crossing into AI, simply steal the workflow, not the fear:

- Pick one boring task.
- Have AI draft it.
- Write the test that proves it works.
- Keep the keys to the secure code yourself.

That is it. Start with the tests. The rest follows.