MarsBased

The baseline for software engineering has shifted.

At MarsBased, we’ve just updated our performance review templates for all technical roles because the technical bar today is nothing like it was two years ago. AI tools have raised the floor, while fundamentals like clean code and ownership still matter, AI fluency is now a key evaluation criterion.

The challenge is measuring true AI proficiency without falling into the trap of blind copy-pasting, and continuing to avoid outdated metrics like commit counts or story points.

We’re choosing full transparency by sharing the exact framework we use to evaluate engineers, the tools we’ve standardized on (like Claude Code), and the human skills that AI will never replace.

Read the full breakdown on our blog: https://marsbased.com/blog/2026/06/04/how-we-evaluate-software-engineers-in-the-age-of-ai

If you caught our newsletter yesterday, you might have noticed things look a little different. We’ve completely redesigned the format and shifted our focus to bring you the absolute best, zero-fluff insights for developers, tech leaders, and anyone building in this ecosystem.

Instead of generic updates, we are now opening up our internal workflows and sharing the exact playbooks our team uses in production.

To kick off this new era, yesterday’s issue was packed with actionable ways to optimize your AI tooling. We broke down how to bypass massive token consumption with specific Claude CLI tricks, exposed the hidden financial impact of the LLM "non-English tax", and explored how we are using Google's DESIGN.md to align coding agents with human teams.

We are putting a lot of love into making this the most high-value tech email you get. Check out the link below to see the new vibe for yourself, and hit subscribe to catch the next one. We promise it’s genuinely worth the space in your inbox.

MarsBased Newsletter — Monthly curated articles about Development, AI and Product design The MarsBased monthly newsletter covers software development, AI, remote work, and startup culture. Join our community of engineers, founders, and tech leaders.