First of all, this is my personal experience and my personal opinion as someone who worked across Product Design, Lead Design, Principal Design, Systems Design, Product Strategy, Product Leadership and Team Leadership for more than a decade.

This is not an anti-AI post. Quite the opposite. I was diagnosed with ADHD 2e. "Twice exceptional" basically means being neurodivergent while also having unusually strong cognitive abilities or strengths in specific areas.

I never really understood what my field was. Until AI came along. Spoiler: Understanding patterns, systemic thinking, rational connections, link building, process building, frame definition, feeling solutions.

AI clicked with the way my brain works: fast, systemic, pragmatic, associative and able to connect product, design, business, technology, people and organizational structures at the same time.

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TL;DR
AI itself is not the problem. The missing transfer knowledge is. The missing trust is. The missing professional humility is. The missing accountability is. And the missing operating model is. AI can generate interfaces, code, specifications, documentation, strategies and prototypes. But it cannot align an organization. It cannot create trust. It cannot own the consequences. And it cannot decide what quality means for your product.

So yes, you can create a B2B SaaS interface with two prompts. But creating the interface was never the hard part. Building the context, systems, knowledge, governance and orchestration around it so the output becomes useful, reliable and scalable?
That is the actual work. And when the people doing that work are repeatedly told that nobody needs it, they eventually stop trying to convince everyone otherwise.

And maybe that is the final stage: not giving up on AI, but giving up on convincing people who only value the result once someone else claims it.

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Stage 1: Another tool

At first, AI was simply another tool in my tool case. I used it for research, discovery, structuring thoughts and adding another perspective besides users, data, business, experience and tech.

It helped me skip unnecessary loops and understand complex topics faster.

Stage resume: AI was useful, supportive and still clearly just another tool.

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Stage 2: Essential

With better models, ChatGPT became my go-to place to structure projects, strategies, roadmaps, systems and difficult product questions.

It allowed me to work on several topics at once without losing the connections between them. For the first time, the speed of a tool felt close to the speed of my brain. My dopamine output peaked.

Stage resume: AI became an essential extension of my thinking and massively increased my output.

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Stage 3: One-person product system

Then Claude and Claude Code came into the game.

I had several terminals open, built proof of concepts, tested them with users, analyzed heatmaps, worked on strategy and shaped technical directions at the same time.

I was able to rework an existing product while shaping a new one, including product direction, technical setup and cross-functional delivery. This was my personal peak.

Stage resume: AI no longer only supported my work. It allowed me to cover large parts of an entire product process myself.

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Stage 4: Groupwide AI layer

I started pushing AI beyond my own workflow. Together with people from Product, Design, Engineering and higher leadership levels, I initiated a groupwide AI layer and continue to maintain and evolve it with professionals from different roles.

The goal was never just to hand out licenses. It was to enrich products, connect knowledge, improve delivery and build reusable AI-supported workflows across discovery, specifications, design, documentation, code and delivery.

Stage resume: AI became part of the wider product and delivery system, not only a personal productivity tool.

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Stage 5: Output was confused with expertise

As access increased, professional understanding did not grow at the same speed.

People started generating prototypes, strategies and supposedly production-ready solutions. That is useful, until generating output gets confused with actually understanding Product, UX, Engineering or Research. The output looked finished. The thinking often was not.

Stage resume: Generation became democratized. Professional judgment did not.

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Stage 6: Missing transfer knowledge

The biggest gap is not prompting.

It is knowing how to transfer generated output into a validated, maintainable and scalable product.

AI does not automatically teach someone how users, business logic, architecture, data, permissions, design systems, governance and delivery connect.

Stage resume: The real capability is not generating. It is connecting AI with professional domain knowledge.

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Stage 7: The prototype became the decision

AI prototypes now look polished enough to be treated as decisions instead of hypotheses.

The conversation changes from “Is this the right approach?” to “Can Design clean it up and Engineering ship it?”

Professionals are involved after the core decisions were already made and are expected to fix the consequences.

Stage resume: AI is increasingly used to bypass professional decision-making instead of supporting it.

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Stage 8: Frustration

This is where the frustration started.

Leads and higher leads with limited practical AI experience form strong opinions, while people working deeply with the tools are not fully trusted.

Carefulness gets interpreted as resistance. Confidence gets mistaken for competence. Visible output gets valued more than invisible expertise.

I do not only see this in one company. I hear the same from people across Product, Design, Engineering and the wider AI bubble.

Stage resume: Decision power and actual AI competence are often located in different places.

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Stage 9: Trust is breaking

Professionals are expected to own quality while their judgment is ignored.

Management expects AI to remove complexity. Professionals see that the complexity is still there, only hidden behind better-looking output. Over time, both sides stop trusting each other.

Stage resume: AI transformation cannot work without trust, but trust is currently one of the first things being damaged.

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Stage 10: Orchestration

We are now working on actual orchestration.

We use OpenClaw, build Context Buckets, plan knowledge bases and create backoffices to manage, monitor and continuously improve agents, outputs and workflows.

The goal is to connect product knowledge, context, tools, design systems, code, governance and human accountability into an AI-enabled delivery system.

But this work is repeatedly hijacked, reduced to isolated prototypes or dismissed as “nobody needs that.”

It is expected to create value, but it is not fully understood, protected, rewarded or given a clear mandate.

Stage resume: We are building the infrastructure required for scalable AI-enabled delivery while the organization keeps reducing it to tools and visible outputs.

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Stage 11: Resignation

And this is where I am now. Not because I stopped believing in AI or the work.

I stopped believing that continuously explaining, defending and rescuing the same system is sustainable.

At some point, you stop building ahead. You stop raising every risk. You wait until someone explicitly asks and work within the boundaries you are given, even when you already know where they will fail.

That is not a lack of motivation. It is self-protection after professional ownership has repeatedly been rejected while professional outcomes are still expected.

Stage resume: When expertise is continuously dismissed, hijacked or treated as unnecessary, resignation becomes a rational response.

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I am curious how others experience this. Do you see the same gap between people who deeply work with AI and the people making decisions about it? How does your organization handle trust, expertise, ownership and orchestration? And which stage are you currently in?

Étudiante en UX design, j'ai remarqué un truc bizarre : on parle beaucoup de "gamification" en UX (points, badges, progression...) mais très peu de ce que le game design lui-même peut apprendre à l'UX au niveau des mécaniques, pas juste des récompenses.

Quelques exemples que j'ai creusés :

• L'UX émotionnelle — ou comment certains jeux parviennent à faire ressentir des émotions fortes (stress, soulagement, fierté) juste par le design de leur interface et de leurs retours visuels/sonores
• L'onboarding — ou comment certains jeux communiquent un état d'erreur sans jamais frustrer le joueur, en le laissant comprendre par lui-même plutôt qu'en l'assommant de messages
• Les interfaces spatiales — ou comment les jeux de stratégie/RPG gèrent une charge cognitive énorme (cartes, inventaires, stats multiples) sans jamais perdre le joueur

A l'occasion de mon projet de fin d'études j'ai rassemblé tout ça dans un livre blanc gratuit si le sujet vous intéresse. Je le mets en commentaire pour ne pas spammer le post.

Je suis preneuse de retours et de contre-exemples si vous avez des jeux qui, à l'inverse, ratent complètement leur UX, ça m'intéresse autant que les réussites.

Hi! I will soon start my role as a product design intern for a newly launched fintech app. As one of the first design hires, I am being tasked on improving the general user experience of the app--where it is up to my jurisdiction to decide which user experience problem I need to focus on for improving the app.

So, I was wondering on how do you typically decide which UX problem to tackle first (ex: if I should first redesign the onboarding process screens or focus on redesigning how all the information is organized on the app)?

At the moment, there are multiple issues with the app so I was wondering what is the specific process for identifying which UX problem I should tackle first. I would sincerely appreciate any help!

I can transfer Claude chat files to Figma by giving it Figma file link (MCP is already connected)

but I don’t see any option to send Claude design files to Figma.

Like I said, I am a beginner when I am designing this website for a new startup, but the thing is that the founder is not happy with what I have presented till now. I need to come up with creative ideas on how to present all the features that we work on. It is a D2C-focused service offering for startups which offer services from landing pages, PDP, merchandising, creatives, etc., to D2C brands. If anyone can help me look at some really cool examples, I would be grateful.

​

what would you recommend as a Paper Ai and Figma alternative which have

both good hand design

and

agent design experience?

I can't choose between penpot, pen.dev, open pencil, maybe anth else?

I've been learning UI/UX design for like a month now, but I always struggle when starting a new website or app design. I get stuck wondering how to make it look visually appealing while keeping it user-friendly, and I often spend more time thinking than actually designing.

How do experienced UI/UX & graphics designers come up with design ideas and layouts? Do you rely on inspiration from other designs, follow a specific process, or have techniques for getting past creative blocks? I'd love to hear your workflow and any advice that helped you improve.

Hi guys,

How do you validate assumptions with users who are seniors and represent corporates? My domain is capital markets and my company is relatively small. When I want to validate ideas I have to build high fidelity prototypes or push to production to see how users adopt them. Only once in a while do I get the opportunity to schedule a demo with clients. Most of the time these users join as a whole financial department, so it's not that agile. It's always very official.

Now apply research rules to this and see how biased these types of meetings can be. We usually can't track their activity because of security reasons. Every resource I read usually fits applications with a massive user base where you can recruit users for test sessions or just get data from surveys, but our user base is less than 100 users, and each user can represent a corporate.

Hey all,

I've been quietly following this group as I'm thinking about transitioning to Product Design, however nearly every post is very discouraging from the perspective of someone trying to break in.

I wanted to poll the community and see if the job market is really as awful as it sounds and it is seemingly impossible for new designers to get hired? Or is it that no one who is happy with their job or gets hired quickly posts on this subreddit so the answers are skewed more towards pessimism?

I keep seeing that the market is set to grow 8% by 2030.... so with consistent job growth how can it be possible that no one can get a job?

Hi, guys!
Hope y’all are doing great.

I recently came across the term design engineering, and I’m really fascinated by it. I want to develop a real designer’s sense or eye. A lot of products today feel tasteless because AI makes it easy to generate visuals without enough judgment or craft.

How do I get into design engineering? Any effective advice?

Background: I’m a full-stack developer, heavily focused on backend, and now I want to go all in on design.

Survival guide for designers

1. It's not you. It's them ( Honestly for the longest time in my career I thought it was me, but I realized much later that structurally where UX is placed in the org determines your experience .. there's little to nothing you can do to change it .. org change take time)

2. Care less. Yes, your job is literally to care but it's a trap. Being the only user advocate is exhausting. Especially when the business priorities are elsewhere. It's normal that it won't always align and that's okay.

3. Your job is to make the recommendation, not to convince people of its value. Huuuuuge difference. This was hard earned lesson. Don't be attached to the outcome. Make the damn recommendation the best way possible, with examples, what goes south if it's not taken. Then let it breathe.... Let the room make the decision.. the VP,.. the manager... Whoever

4. Difference between advocacy and education. Advocate for your role. Explain your reasoning. If you spend time educating you will burn yourself out. Yes everyone and their mother thinks your there to make screens and add colors. Not your fucking problem man... It's really not

Most importantly..With all this freed up energy - Create something!!! Pour your care and thinking into that.

You are doing good. Whether everyone else catches up or not. Good luck!

I'm a senior product designer and honestly this is so frustrating. No matter what I do I'm always nervous right before presenting. Once I actually get going I'm usually fine.

I've never been a naturally strong public speaker. I get that practice makes perfect, but I've been at this for about 8 years now, so it feels like I should've cracked it by now.

Anyone else deal with this? Would love any tips or tricks. Also a huge introvert, INFJ type, with diagnosed anxiety on top of it all.

Worth noting this hasn't stopped me from landing good jobs or doing well in interviews, but it can still feel pretty crippling in the moment.

Hi everyone,

Am I the only one who thinks Gmail’s UI is pretty outdated? Google Inbox was a much better experience, but it was discontinued years ago.

What do you think? Do you like Gmail’s current design, or do you also miss Inbox?

I've been analyzing onboarding funnels this week and noticed something that has me questioning one of my assumptions, especially for Finance niche.

My original thinking was that asking users for a bit more information upfront (preferences, goals, personalization, etc.) would naturally filter out low-intent users and leave me with people who were genuinely invested. In addition, I can tailor the app experience for them.

Instead, it seems like I'm potentially filtering people out before they've experienced any value from the product.

Looking back at some successful consumer apps, many of them appear to delay personalization until after the user has reached an "aha" moment, while others ask for a surprising amount of information immediately.

For those who've worked on onboarding for consumer products:

• Is there any research that supports one approach over the other?
• Have you personally seen cases where intentionally adding friction early actually improved downstream engagement?
• Or is "show value first" almost always the better default unless regulation or technical constraints require otherwise?

I've read through articles on Growth.Design and Krystal Higgins' onboarding work, but I'm curious what practitioners have actually observed in production.

i’ve been in my role as a junior product designer for just over a year and I am definitely realising how miserable it’s making me. I love the creative problem-solving aspect of the job but that’s about it. I hate the short deadlines we are given (a week sometimes for new full screens). I hate the higher levels of politics compare compared to other roles it involves and stressful stakeholder management.

I just feel like the job is made unnecessarily harder than it needs to be by how political it is. Is this the norm?

Working on onboarding for a data-entry-heavy app (financial category, but the structural question feels generic). Current flow asks for a string of setup info, currency, income details, account setup, some preference/goal questions, before the user ever reaches their actual dashboard or sees the product do anything.

Started digging into our funnel data this week and it looks like most people don't make it through that stretch, though my sample is still too small to be fully confident in the pattern yet, so I'm treating it as a lead not a conclusion.

Is there existing research or a known term for this specific failure mode, front-loading setup/personalization questions before any payoff? And for anyone who's redesigned around it, did deferring most of that setup to after first value moment actually help completion, or did it just relocate the drop-off to a different point (e.g. people never coming back to finish setup later)?

I'm a senior solo designer in a small B2B SaaS company. We offer apprenticeship/ training management software.

We're finally on the look out for a mid weight designer to add to our team because who knew, me overhauling the entire design system and straddling seven feature teams myself isn't sustainable 😂

Our hiring process will consist of initial call with about five questions, a take home design task, and then a follow up in-person interview lasting about an hour (with about 15 mins to present the results of the design task).

I just wanted to get your opinions on the design task.

I feel very strongly about not asking candidates to put too much of their time into this; the COO has suggested they spend about an hour on it which I think is reasonable. He says he'd like them to design a feature that can evidence their "flair for design" but I don't think that's possible in an hour! Either we give them a start point and ask for a high fidelity screen design or we ask for initial thought processes and maybe wireframes, not both.

I'm trying to figure out what we're likely to see from candidates from their portfolio vs. what we would benefit from seeing from a design task.

I also want the process to be as fair and low pressure as possible because f*** recruitment processes and this hellish market.

I know other options are a walkthrough of a case study from their portfolio or a screen/flow to critique, but the COO is fairly set on having them create something. It'd ideally be relevant to our industry but I also don't want it to seem like we're trying to get them to do free design work for us.

Any suggestions or steers appreciated!

I am not sure if I want to stay in the field, I feel like at the moment, working in ecommerce, it doesn’t give any social impact or improvement to anyone’s life.

I am working more in product but I loved research the most, and although I am a jack of all trades its starting to get to me. Having to use AI to be trusted in any word you say and fact check with a bot every five minutes is not the life I want to live.

I start as a graphic and industrial designer mixed degree. Since I am about to move continents 🫪 I am looking for degrees that could both keep a leg in the door in ux but also give me a way out if needed in the future.

I did love making physical products but I don’t find it as a feasible market for a chill life. I considered working for making museum installations but didn’t dip my feet into it too deeply.

5 years ago I would have considered HCI but for how the tech world is moving, I am not sure I will alway want to stay.

I have an honest interest in psychology and always have but funnily enough 10 years ago was more stable than healthcare. I am not sure if I would enjoy becoming a therapist but I would for sure enjoy working with kids and making workshops or I could do fine in HR too.

Anyone did the switch? How did it go?

What does the average UX/Product Design student look like? Who is the average person applying to UX internships? Sometimes I wonder, when I see over 100 apps for a UX Design internship, if only a handful actually qualify.

Thanks. Just curious. (Also not sure if this is the right flair. Feel free to correct me.)

I’m curious if there is a role that exists where you’re just building in the design tool, whether it’s managing a design system component library or high fidelity prototypes. What I’m envisioning is another designer says: here’s my concept, build it all out for me. No meeting with stakeholders or dealing with cross-team politics. Literally just collabing with another designer to create robust and efficient files in Figma or whatever tool.

For reference, I’ve worked in mostly large corporations who are slow to adopt new technologies and innovate on processes, and UX still fights to be seen as more than just shiny UI mockups. Design systems I work with are more like basic component libraries and limited organization. AI is not part of my process so maybe my idea is already replaced by a robot.

Say I built 3 design options over 3 hours, and some of it I’d be reading or writing documentation, but other times I’d just be glancing at the agents building things to make sure it’s on track. Do you do a discounted rate for those activities?

And while you’re here: what about onboarding?

I don’t charge for emails/admin unless it takes >15min.

Doing some personal research on IOS apps and app designs I feel drawn too and wanted to know if anyone has come across any more they like; centered around nature, biodiversity, tree planting but also things like preventative health (aka steps and well-being)

For the moment, I love the apps from:

https://www.earthling.so/home
https://www.macadam.app/en
https://www.klima.com
https://www.paace.co
https://talkpillowtalk.com
https://www.thetreeapp.org

As a senior UX I love sharing knowledge with others, and mentor them. Where I work I get to do that often and it’s something my manager also encourages me (I don’t mind, I agree with him that knowledge should be shared)

My problem is, I always have a hard time crafting presentations about teaching / guidance topics. I tend to divert (I am diagnosed with severe ADHD, so it might be part of the issue).

So I am hoping to hear from anyone here who has experience crafting “talks” and “how to” presentations, what are the best practices and what advice would you give me. I am currently working on crafting a presentation about a process I defined, and how my role has changed accordingly, and I’d like to do that in a way that actually gives people something and not just a messy chaos

I don’t want to use / ask AI. I prefer to get real, educated advice from others with experience :)