Issue 145

WELCOME

Being Designerly 145 circles one question from a few very different angles: what gets flattened when AI makes work faster, smoother, and more automated?

From IDEO rethinking human-centered innovation to Jeff Gothelf on synthetic competence, The Verge on automation backlash, WIRED on the emotional cost of the AI boom, Pope Leo on human dignity, and new research on emotional intelligence and creativity - the throughline is clear: speed is not the same as judgment, and intelligence is not the same as care.

What remains undelegatable?

CURIOSITY

IDEO spent 35 years selling customer-centricity. Now CEO Mike Peng thinks it ‘isn’t enough anymore’

Fortune’s piece frames IDEO’s challenge clearly: when “human-centered” has become table stakes and AI makes everything faster, the real question is what still makes innovation distinct. That’s the undelegatable part: AI can accelerate making, but curiosity, judgment, and intent still decide whether we’re creating something meaningful — or just more polished sameness.

CRITICAL THINKING

Strong opinions, loosely held — and what that means in the age of AI

Jeff Gothelf revisits “strong opinions, loosely held” for a world where AI can generate something that looks like a strong opinion before we’ve done the thinking ourselves, or what I like to call synthetic competence. AI can help form the hypothesis, but the critical judgment—testing it against experience, evidence, and challenge—is still undelegatable

The people do not yearn for automation

The Verge’s Decoder piece argues that “software brain” treats messy human systems as databases to be optimized, which helps explain why AI enthusiasm inside tech keeps colliding with public resistance outside it. That’s the undelegatable part: AI can automate the loop, but empathy and critical judgment are still needed to notice when the loop is flattening reality instead of serving it.

EMPATHY

Meet the Sad Wives of AI

WIRED’s piece looks past the AI boom’s products and valuations to the quieter human cost: the relationships absorbing the obsession, anxiety, and always-on urgency around it. That’s the undelegatable part: AI may reshape work, but empathy and care still determine what that reshaping does to the people living with it.

ADVOCACY

Pope Leo to issue text on human dignity and AI with Anthropic co-founder

The Guardian reports that Pope Leo’s first major text will focus on “the protection of the human person in the age of AI,” linking today’s technological revolution to earlier debates over work, rights, and dignity. That’s the undelegatable part: AI can transform systems, but advocacy is still needed to decide whose dignity, labor, and agency those systems are allowed to reshape.

CREATIVITY

Emotional Intelligence and Creativity: New Research and Practices

In this article, Anthony Fredericks frames emotional intelligence as a “creative awareness system” — a way to notice, regulate, and use emotion as raw material for creative thinking. That’s the undelegatable part: AI can generate ideas, but it can’t do the emotional noticing that makes an idea worth pursuing.

UNTIL NEXT TIME

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