The Wix CEO said AI gives engineers 'superpowers.' That means one trait is key for entry-level developers.

• Wix CEO Avishai Abrahami said that AI gives developers with "superpowers."
• He said entry-level engineers need to have a "tremendous amount of passion" for the job.
• He said that with AI moving so quickly, engineers need to spend time learning and experimenting.

AI isn't just reshaping the role of software engineers — it's also making them more skilled.

That's according to Avishai Abrahami, the CEO and cofounder of website management company Wix. He told Business Insider that the technology equips developers with "superpowers" and that the value of smart, talented engineers will be "dramatically enhanced" with AI tools.

"What would take you a month, you can do in a few hours," Abrahami said, adding that not every task can be reduced in this way, but most can.

What entry-level candidates need

A Google Cloud report released in September found that AI adoption had surged to 90% among software professionals, up 14% from the year prior. Abrahami said that the emergence of AI tools means the "quality of the software engineer is more important than ever."

He said the first thing "every company" looks for is candidates who know how to code and understand AI models. Beyond that baseline, he said Wix aims to hire entry-level candidates with a "tremendous amount of passion" for the role, which he said is essential to meeting the demands of the job [didn't want to repeat roles] .

"Now with AI, the speed of change is so fast that you have to spend a lot of time learning and experimenting," Abrahami said, adding that this makes passion is even more important.

John Stecher, Blackstone's chief technology officer, similarly told Business Insider that many junior software engineers have "insane skill sets" and that the best hires are deeply passionate about their work.

As tools take on more of the coding, Stecher said companies are increasingly looking to hire those who understand how to use the tools, and recognize when they're producing the wrong answers.

How work is changing

For more senior engineers, the role will increasingly shift toward architecture and code review, he said, rather than writing code. Abrahami said experienced engineers will need to read code "much faster," adding that architecture, software design, and code comprehension will become even more critical.

The CEO, however, warned that AI can be a double-edged sword for engineers.

"You can do so much more if you're smart," Abrahami said about engineers who use AI. "And you can do really bad things if you're not."