Attention is a resource. A person has only so much of it.
In 1971 Herbert A. Simon wrote that "a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention". He was talking about organizations. Today it describes one person: a fullstack WordPress developer with an IDE, a terminal and a few AI tools open at once.
Fullstack Was Already a Lot
A fullstack WordPress developer moves between PHP, blocks and JavaScript, the theme, the server and the client. Each switch costs something: you reload the context of the task before you can work again.
Agents Multiply Output, Not Attention
AI tools take away typing. They do not take away the need to understand what was typed.
- Agents write code, run tests and ask for permissions. Each diff is something you have to review.
- Subagents run in parallel and come back with reports. Five subagents give you five reports to read, not five finished tasks.
- Chats draft roadmaps, texts and replies. Each open chat is one more thread you have to keep in your head.
The tools work in parallel, but your attention does not. Every stream ends up in one place: your review.
How We Spend It at 4wp.dev
1. One main thread. Choose the task that matters now. Everything else waits or goes to an agent.
2. Delegate with a check. Give an agent a clear task and a clear finish: a test that must pass, or a WP-CLI or REST call that must return the expected result. Then you check the result, not every step. Every chapter of the 4wp.dev Abilities API course ends with exactly this kind of check.
3. Subagents for conclusions. Use a subagent when you need an answer ("where is this hook registered?"), not a dump of files to read.
4. Close what you are not using. A chat that has finished its job goes away. An open tab is a small, constant demand on your attention.
5. Notifications in batches. Messages, mail and CI can wait until the end of a block of work. The client call can wait five minutes too.
Conclusion
AI made code cheap. Attention stayed expensive. The developer's job is moving from writing to deciding and reviewing, and both take attention. Plan it as carefully as you plan a server's resources.
More on WordPress development with AI agents: 4wp.dev.
Originally published on 4wp.dev.
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