Why Mandating AI Tools Backfires on Engineering Teams

Responsible AI adoption for engineering teams starts with culture, not compliance.

In this GitKon talk, Rizel Scarlett (Tech Lead of Open Source DevRel at Block) shares how Block helped thousands of engineers actually want to use AI tools, including Goose, Cursor, Claude Code, and more, without mandates, vibe coding disasters, or security gaps.

If you've seen your team split into three camps (resistant, reckless, or just jaded), this talk is for you. Rizel breaks down the exact two-phase framework Block used to go from "you must use AI" to a company-wide culture where engineers, designers, PMs, and even executive assistants are building with AI tools every day.

What you'll learn:

00:00 - Why "you must adopt AI" is backfiring on engineering orgs

03:30 - The three failure modes: resistant, reckless, and jaded engineers

07:00 - Phase 1: Earning interest (making AI fun, inspirational, and genuinely useful)

12:00 - Phase 2: Building judgment (flexible tools, setting an example, right-sized best practices)

17:30 - The RPI framework: Research, Plan, Implement for AI-assisted workflows

21:00 - What Jack Dorsey live-coding on Google Meet taught the whole company

24:00 - "You own what you merge, regardless of who wrote it"

This is the AI workflow conversation engineering leaders need to have before they lose their best developers to burnout, bloat, or bad code. Rizel's experience leading open source DevRel at Block, alongside manager Angie Jones, gives this talk a rare ground-level perspective on what actually moves the needle when integrating AI into developer workflows.

Whether you're evaluating AI Git tools, trying to build a healthier AI culture, or
just trying to stop your team from shipping AI slop, this talk is a practical,
honest roadmap.

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Git Blog:
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