VP of Engineering Builds Four Applications in One Week Using Claude AI

From Stalled Project to Four Applications in Seven Days

A VP of Engineering who spends most of their time in meetings used Claude AI to build multiple applications from scratch in one week. The user had previously attempted to build a Jira alternative with Claude about a year ago but found the AI struggled with "vibe-coding complicated apps" and got stuck on bugs.

Last week, the user tried again with dramatically different results. Using Claude exclusively, they built:

• A VPN application
• An iOS native application with a Go backend
• A landing website on Next.js
• An admin dashboard on React

Engineering Knowledge Remains Critical

The user never directly touched the code but leveraged their engineering expertise to debug issues and guide Claude on where to look for problems. They estimate this work would have taken at least six months of full-time traditional coding. Notably, the user had never coded in Swift before this project.

Shift from Template Tools to Custom Solutions

The user notes that previously, teams would use ready-made tools for quick deployment (like e-commerce sites or blogs), but these would be discarded when scaling to multi-team projects requiring custom solutions. Custom solutions weren't built from day one due to time constraints.

With AI coding, teams can now build complicated systems from day one—whether microservices, custom CRMs, or other architectures—allowing for scalable architecture without sacrificing time to market.

Impact on Engineering Roles

The user doesn't believe AI will eliminate engineering jobs but will initially "correct" before enabling 10x faster product building. This shift creates demand for engineers fluent in AI who function more as system designers than just coders.