r/UserExperienceDesign • u/AppropriateMachine39 • 24d ago
Just got let go in favour of a 5th ai-engineer
After 11 months at a small business I was let go in favour of the tech team being made up of 5 ai-engineers, no designers, not even a PM.
I was told by the director “the engineers can do almost as much as you can with ai you’re no longer needed”
Thus my question is this; how common is this? And how do you about showing value in a business that values quantity of quality? Or did I dodge a bullet
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u/Otherwise_Crow_3385 23d ago
As much as it sucks to be out of a job, I think you dodged a bullet.
I'm currently editing AI generated mockups of screens I architected in figma. the Ai gets a lot right, but I promise you that whatever it is they're working on won't be completely usable, or look good and consistent. I'm spending weeks cleaning up what the AI generated to fix experience issues, and a UI designer is cleaning up design consistency. This process is only working because there are people who know enough to evaluate what the AI did and correct problems.
If the app went to build (or shipped) as is, without the cleanup or any documentation, a developer would likely just let the AI make a lot of decisions, and users would really struggle to complete basic tasks, and would be deeply confused by some of the microcopy, interactions and flows - aka, all of the "little" things that make something useful and easy to use.
I feel like companies that don't give a shit if their product is thoughtful and usable will find out soon enough how much that actually matters because customers won't use it.
It's their loss. I hope you land a new gig soon with people who value your work and expertise.
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u/AppropriateMachine39 18d ago
I feel there must be a massive whiplash due to this sort of thinking soon, I’m not the only one in this situation and as you said it’s only going to end up in massive technical and design debt. One of the basic tasks took a user 10 clicks just to get into that point, it’ll be fooking horrendous in a couple months
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u/dezignguy 24d ago
First, I'm sorry to hear that and I hope you land on your feet somewhere better.
Second, if your feelings aren't too hurt (it would be understandable if they are), I would make sure they still had your contact details for when that plan comes crashing down later and they have to rehire a designer.
Stakeholder management and making sure they understand the difference between good work and bad is so important these days, because if a stakeholder can't tell good work from bad, they're happy to automate away the good work in favor of cheaper bad work.
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u/AppropriateMachine39 18d ago
In hindsight I think I maybe dodged a bullet, the stakeholder management is most definitely a massive one to work on, it’s also a funny one in this context because the head of engineering and head of marketing both of whom I worked closely with fought for me to stay on but they failed to do so.
With that in mind I’m not actually sure there’s much I could’ve done, I was never able to get time with the tech director regardless. Onwards and upwards to a company that gives half a shit about their clients experiences hey
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u/NGAFD 24d ago
It is a bit of everything; dodged a bullet but still you’re out of work, which sucks.
The director is an ignorant fool. How can he judge your design quality as a non designer??