“The person using the AI doesn’t care about us”

Serious post so no emojis today. I keep thinking about people like this:

https://youtube.com/shorts/31buPKjzhGo?si=-nzpH1vj87oUhFgK

There’s something I’ve said often over the years and it’s that people don’t spend enough time considering human behavior when trying to adopt tools and workflows.

Imagine you built an ICM structure that helps your coworker Nancy generate weekly reports. It saves her 2 hours a week, it’s reliable, the output is better than anything she’s seen in years. Every time Nancy opens Claude to start the workflow, she forgets she needs to go to Cowork and tries to use Chat. She constantly has to bring you over for help after struggling for 10 minutes on her own. After doing this for a couple weeks, she just starts writing them on her own again because there’s no friction.

The tool wasn’t the issue, it was that it was creating friction, even if the end result was improved.The best tool in the world is useless if no one wants to use it.

Which brings me back to the video.

The narrative with AI has become emotional. People are not only comparing how effective it is or whether it’s worth investing in, they are taking a moral stance against it and becoming offended at your use of it.

The comments in the video struck me and gave me a new frame for thinking about how I want to design tools. How do I design for outputs where it is not replacing human connection? And for instances where I am communicating with others using it, do I pass it off as my voice or do I own that it’s AI and that I am using it as a tool.

It’s going to get harder to tell the difference and others will not think this hard about it. Will that make me at a disadvantage to those who are willing to 1000x every aspect of their work at the expense of quality and connection? Or will my thoughtfulness find a way to shine through and create more quality work even if my output is less. This is the question I am asking myself today. Do you think this is worth thinking about? Let me know your thoughts below.

I agree, the connection will always be important

You’re thinking too deep, the results will speak for themselves

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