How does Agentic AI Influence the Developer Skills in the Software Industry? – A Literature Review

The rapid proliferation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies has transformed work practices and skill requirements across industries, particularly within the Information Technology (IT) sector. Unlike traditional automation tools, agentic AI possesses autonomous decision-making capabilities and can collaborate with humans as "team members" in complex software development tasks. While existing research has examined Agentic AI's productivity impacts in software development, there remains a limited understanding of how it influences skill changes across different experience levels. This article aims to investigate whether the collaboration between agentic agents and human agents influences the developers' skills in the software industry. To achieve this aim, we conducted a systematic literature review (SLR) that examines the impact of agentic AI on developer skills in the software industry. The findings indicate that agentic AI does not remove the need for developer skills but instead reshapes them. As AI agents take on routine and repetitive development tasks, human developers increasingly focus on higher-level activities such as system design, coordination, supervision, and governance. The outcome of this literature review will allow us to initiate further research for understanding how agentic AI impacts software development skills.