My reflective manifesto on the future of design work.
The rupture
According to the IMF, EMF, McKinsey, Goldman Sachs and what seems like every other relevant company, the design work as we know it is about to disappear.
For designers, the headlines feel personal.
The agency model.
The interface.
The presentation.
The prototype.
The moodboard.
The portfolio.
Possibly the whole idea of creative work.
All under pressure.
I have been studying AI design work, and here is why I think designers should not panic.
Not because nothing will change.
Because almost everything will.
The realisation
The uncomfortable truth is that many of the artefacts we associate with design work will be mastered by AI in no time.
The anxiety is existential. If the machine can produce the things I used to point to show my value, then what exactly is my value now?
The scary part is realising how much of my professional identity was attached to making those artefacts.
“So, yes, AI will replace designers. The fake ones.”
The decorators.
The pixel pushers
Those who never asked why.
Pinterest moodboarders.
The ones who glorify the design artefact.
AI will replace fake designers because fake designers were already working like machines.
The new scarcity
For a long time, design artefacts were scarce.
And because of that, we confused them with value.
But when the artefacts are infinite, we may become faster at making things but become weaker at asking whether those things are worth making.
In that world, designers are forced to return to the core of their work. The work that questions the seemingly trivial:
What matters?
What are we actually solving?
What should not be built?
What is the future we want to live in?
What resonates with humans?
These are questions of Judgment. Craft. Identity. Responsibility. — Humanism.
The new era of humanism
AI will force design back to its humanist roots.
600 year ago, reacting to the church and the state, the western world was swept by the humanist renaissance, a cultural rebirth built around human agency.
In the 20th century, in response to taylorism and the robotisation of humans, design humanism appeared. Championing human autonomy in an industrialised world.
Now, AI is forcing a new humanist wave.
One where artists, designers, builders and innovators no longer create artefacts. — They create meaning.
“Everything about how designers work will change.
But almost nothing about why designers work will.”
The artefact lost its scarcity.
But care has not.
Judgment has not.
Craft has not.
Excellence has not.
Responsibility has not.
Humanism has not.
And maybe that is the future of design work AI is pushing us towards:
Not to make more things.
But to become the kind of person, team, and culture that knows what is worth making.
