Every so often, something small happens that hints at a much bigger shift. For me, it was an improvisational weekend in September I spent customising the theme on my Ghost blog.
I wasn’t writing code line by line, or poring over documentation. I simply told an AI (ChatGPT-5 in this case) what I wanted, and it produced working code in seconds and minutes. We iterated, fixed the odd dependency, tested again, and suddenly I had a fully updated site that would have taken a developer days, even a week.
That moment crystallised something I’ve been thinking about for a while. We’re entering an era where the distance between an idea and a working digital tool is collapsing. And "vibe coding" – this conversational, improvisational approach to building software – is right at the centre of it.
Shel and I dug into this in episode 489 of the For Immediate Release podcast, published a few days ago. And the more we talked, the clearer it became: this isn’t a story about code. It’s a story about how work is changing, how creation is changing, and why communicators have a far bigger role to play in that shift than many people realise.
What vibe coding actually is
Vibe coding is simple to explain. You describe what you want in everyday language – an app, a workflow, a script, a tool – and an AI system writes the code. No syntax. No training. No development environment. Just a conversation.
You riff.
The AI responds.
And together, you build something that works well enough to try.
That accessibility is the point. Suddenly, people who would never go near software development can create functional tools. Someone in HR can automate a task. A manager on the shop floor can prototype a dashboard. A communicator can sketch out an event app. And they can do it in minutes.
This democratises creation. And that’s where things start to get interesting.
Why communicators suddenly matter
What happens when anyone can build digital tools? A few things – and communicators sit right in the middle of them.
1. The tools will spread faster than the rules
We saw it with ChatGPT. People will discover what vibe coding can do long before their organisation has policies, training or guardrails in place. Some of that experimentation will be clever. Some will be chaotic. Some will create real risk.
Communicators can help people understand the opportunity without creating the illusion that anything goes.
2. Expectations need to be shaped, not dictated
AI-generated code looks slick until the edge cases appear. It breaks quietly. It hides errors. It skips security steps. And when something goes wrong, many people won’t know how to fix it.
Shel put this plainly on the podcast: vibe coding isn’t a replacement for engineering discipline. The more complex the tool, the more grounding you need.
Communicators are in a unique position to explain this in practical, human terms. Not with technical lectures, but with clarity about when to explore and when to escalate.
3. The most valuable skill is shifting from problem-solving to problem-finding
This is where vibe coding intersects directly with communication. When you work this way, success depends on how well you can articulate:
- the real problem you’re trying to solve
- the constraints
- the outcome you want
- the context the AI can’t see
In other words: the quality of the conversation shapes the quality of the code. And that is communication work through and through.
A personal example: creation as conversation
My own recent Ghost theme project, which I mentioned earlier, brought this home. In the past, I’d have needed a developer or a long support cycle. Instead, my role was to explain what I wanted – clearly, sometimes clumsily, always iteratively – and let the AI do the heavy lifting.
It wasn’t magic. It wasn’t perfect. But it was enough to get a working solution in a fraction of the time. And it left me thinking: if this is what one person can do in a weekend, what happens when whole teams start operating this way?
The challenge: speed without chaos
Of course, there are risks.
That’s why organisations need sensible guardrails – not to slow people down, but to stop small experiments turning into large problems. Clear guidelines. Safe sandboxes. Approval steps for anything customer-facing or business-critical. Enough training to help people know when to experiment and when to stop.
Linux inventor Linus Torvalds made the point clear, reported in The Register:
"Vibe coding is a great way for people to get computers to do something that maybe they couldn't do otherwise. This is despite the fact that vibe coding may be a horrible, horrible idea from a maintenance standpoint."
Communicators can help embed guardrails not only in policy documents but also in conversations, expectations, and everyday culture.
A reimagined future of work
When you step back, you can see that vibe coding is part of a much bigger shift. It signals a future where:
- creation is conversational
- innovation is distributed
- experimentation is encouraged
- and teams can solve more of their own problems
It blurs the boundary between "those who build things" and "those who use them." And it invites people from every discipline to shape the tools they work with.
Communicators will be essential to making that future work – helping people navigate ambiguity, empowering them to try new things responsibly, and bridging the gap between enthusiasm and rigour.
Vibe coding may sound like a novelty, but it represents a turning point.
As AI becomes a collaborator rather than just a tool, the question isn’t whether people will use it. They will. The real question is whether organisations are ready to guide that shift in a way that preserves trust, unlocks creativity and avoids chaos.
That is where communicators come in – providing clarity, context and confidence as this next chapter of work unfolds.
You can listen to the whole discussion about vibe coding between Shel and me in episode 489 of the For Immediate Release podcast, right here:
The topic is one of six we covered in this podcast episode, the long-form monthly episode for November, where the full recording runs for one hour and 42 minutes. The vibe coding segment starts at about 39 minutes and 7 seconds.
The audio recording is also available wherever you get your podcasts, and on the show notes page at the podcast website along with the video version. You'll also find the transcript as well as links relevant to the discussion.
