If you invest in learning 1 thing in this Agentic/AI world, it should be teaching AI how to verify its own work. This statement can seem a little handwavy, but I have some examples to share.
An Agent verifying its own work can mean different things for the kind of work its doing.
1. Building a user facing feature - make sure Integration tests are written and pass. And none of the existing feature set regresses.
2. Optimizing build speed - make sure building does not get slower.
3. Optimizing a user facing operation - make sure new FPS meets your standards and p95 value meets your standards.
4. Optimizing page load speed - well, make sure it doesn't regression the UX and actually loads faster.
These are things engineers work on, on a regular basis. Some of these examples are easier to teach Agents to validate, others are much harder.
But, if you can nail this 1 skill, results can be jaw dropping.
Just this weekend, my Claude Code achieved following 3 things for me -
1. Bazel build speed improved by 45% after cache warmup.
2. Drag performance improved to match 60 fps (was at 20 fps).
3. 1 second shaved off from cold Page Load speed.
If you give Opus a target, and an ability to validate its own work... sky is the limit.
Try it out!