This is a Developer Role! Stop disguising it as - 'Tech Support' or 'Vibe Coder' or anything else...

This company is hiring for ... wait for it ...

'𝗩𝗶𝗯𝗲 𝗖𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗱 𝗗𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗿

Just yesterday, I was dealing with another company that had the role of ‘Technical Support Engineer’ - but what they were actually hiring for was - a developer who will also provides support to their customers.

This became obvious through their 1-hour paid Test Task for the Technical Support Engineer role. It started off somewhat reasonable, with written questions focused on how you’d handle customer support scenarios. But by the second page, there was a surprise take-home coding challenge!

All of the sudden, they were asking the applicant to create a full-stack application using one of their starter kits - which, of course, required creating an account and using their product. It didn’t stop there; they specifically requested building a backend for the app! So, apparently, the "customer support questions" on the first page were just there to ease you in before blindsiding you with developer-level tasks. Were they hoping no one would notice what was happening?

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And now, we have today’s Vibe Coder Frontend Developer role, which manages to make things worse. Not only is the title absurd, but the featured image had to include a girl on it! Additionally, the company (or AI) wrote this in the job description:

"We’re on the hunt for a Vibe Coder – a developer who doesn’t just write code but orchestrates it through the power of AI."

I'm not sure whether I should laugh or cry after reading this 🤣

So, in one sentence, they’re trying to redefine both what a developer means and what vibe coding is.

Here’s the thing: I don’t care how you choose to 'word' things - a Vibe Coder is not an upgrade over a Developer!

You’re either a Vibe Coder or a Developer. The two are fundamentally different.

• Developers are experienced professionals, proficient in one or more technologies, depending on their chosen stack.

• A “Vibe Coder,” on the other hand, is not a developer. The closest approximation of a vibe coder is... a prompt engineer.

But since the term Prompt Engineer didn’t catch on too well, it seems someone thought “Vibe Coder” would sound more appealing - or easier to trick people with.

At its core, the concept of “vibe coding” is letting AI do all the work. No developer experience or technical background is required for that because the “vibe coder” is just ensuring the program runs and the AI-generated responses are produced.

You can try working like this if you want - I sincerely wish you the best of luck - but the truth is, AI is nowhere near the level where it can handle everything on its own. It’s not even competent enough for non-developers to run projects relying solely on automation - and we all know it!

Just as we all know, a developer can easily take on the responsibilities of a vibe coder, but a vibe coder cannot take on all the tasks of a Developer. It’s obvious to everyone that when you hire someone with developer experience and say, “I’ll pay you just to do the bare minimum of that experience,” you’re still getting the whole package.

A typical developer spends months, even years, mastering their craft - learning new technologies, honing their problem-solving abilities, and developing a unique mindset capable of handling complex, elaborate troubleshooting. This mindset isn’t something that can just be switched on and off at will, nor is there any logical reason why it should be.

It’s a way of thinking - an instinctive approach to breaking down problems, optimizing processes, and building robust, scalable solutions. Asking a developer to ignore this hard-earned expertise in favor of minimal tasks is like hiring a Michelin-star chef to flip burgers at a fast-food joint.

No matter how simplified the task may seem, the chef’s years of training, precision, and high-level expertise will still influence and enhance everything they do, whether you acknowledge it or not.

And the ones doing the hiring are benefiting from the person’s full skill set while only paying for the basics and pretending that’s all the person brings to the table. This is an obvious misuse of the employee’s potential and a devaluation of their skills and worth.

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Reading through the actual job description, it becomes even more obvious they’re looking for developer experience.

For example, it includes statements such as:

"A pro at 'vibe coding' – you’ve got a knack for guiding AI to crank out high-quality code while adding your personal touch."

None of this is vibe coding! What’s being described here is a combination of Prompt Engineering and Software Development. Unless, of course, you’re hiring a Reiki practitioner to “add personal touch” through vibes - resulting in something completely unrelated to development.

Later in the job description, the Preferred Qualifications section includes:

• Experience with Python scripting and automation

• Knowledge of UI/UX principles and responsive design techniques

• Expert working knowledge of CSS frameworks (Tailwind)

• Understanding of cross-browser compatibility issues and solutions

• Experience with testing frameworks and CI/CD pipelines

Again - none of these are requirements for a “Vibe Coder.”

But guess what? They’re all requirements for a

DEVELOPER

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What’s happening here is companies are hiring developers under the guise of “less demanding” roles because they’re unwilling to pay for the full value of developer expertise, even though that’s exactly what they’re getting. It's just an attempt to devalue the profession and pay less - it is a win win for them, but not for us!

For me as a developer, there’s an extra hidden downside. If I accept a contract like this on a freelancing platform, in between all my full-stack work, all of the sudden a “Tech Support” or something similar shows up. Even if it’s just one instance among many contracts I’ve completed, it could still be enough for someone to misuse it - to try and label me as suitable for lower-level or unrelated work. This one misstep could pull my career off track, and part of me wonders if companies like the one I mentioned might do this intentionally for that reason.

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They’ll probably argue it’s just semantics, so simply ask if the salary is the same -that will tell you everything you need to know. Of course, salary won’t be discussed until it’s convenient for them.

It’s not just one or two companies either. Sadly, more and more companies are doing this, rebranding roles with every new trend or buzzword.

If only they put the same effort into understanding the difference between Java and JavaScript 🤭