Should we root for AI?
Why pressing the gas on AI adoption might be the most human thing we can do - or our biggest professional blind spot.
I've been thinking about this weird paradox we're all living through. Here we are, product managers and other white-collar professionals, racing to adopt every new AI tool that promises to make us faster, smarter, more efficient. We're the early adopters, the ones who demo ChatGPT prompts in meetings and build AI features because, well, we can.
But there's this nagging question I can't shake: Are we accidentally optimizing ourselves out of jobs?
It's like teaching someone to drive using your own car, knowing they might not need you for rides anymore. Except that someone is an algorithm, and the rides are our entire careers.
The productivity trap we're walking into.
The data is pretty stark. McKinsey projects that by 2030, generative AI could automate up to 30% of work hours. Goldman Sachs estimates AI may replace 300 million jobs globally. And here's the kicker - white-collar jobs, the ones that require the kind of strategic thinking we pride ourselves on, are increasingly in the crosshairs.
Here's what makes this particularly twisted: we're the ones building these systems. We're not just using AI; we're actively creating products that demonstrate how well AI can do our work.
Every time you use AI to write a product brief, analyze user feedback, or draft a roadmap, you're essentially creating a case study for why companies might not need as many product managers. You're the proof of concept for your own obsolescence.
The heart of the acceleration dilemma.
So what do we do with this? Stop using AI tools and fall behind? That feels like career suicide in a different direction.
I think the answer isn't to slow down - it's to be more intentional about how we speed up. There's a difference between using AI to amplify your human capabilities versus using it to replace them entirely. The former makes you more valuable; the latter makes you more replaceable.
The jobs that survive aren't going to be the ones that AI can do - they're going to be the ones that can only be done with humans in the loop. The product managers who thrive will be the ones who remember that our job isn't just to ship features; it's to solve human problems in human ways.
When you're evaluating whether to build that AI-powered feature, ask yourself:
Does this genuinely improve our users' lives, or are we just showcasing our technical capabilities?
Because products built purely to showcase AI often feel exactly like what they are - robotic demonstrations rather than thoughtful solutions.
Maybe we can't avoid building our own replacements. Maybe that's the price of progress.
However, we can choose to build replacements that still rely on us, not as executors, but as guides, strategists, and advocates for the humans on the other side of our products.
How to stay essential while staying current.
Here's the thing, though…knowing we need to be intentional is one thing. Actually being intentional in the daily rush of deadlines and feature requests is another.
I've been experimenting with a framework that helps me decide when to lean into AI and when to lean away from it:
Adopt AI for efficiency, not for thinking. Use it to get through the mechanical parts more quickly, allowing you to spend more time on the parts that require judgment, empathy, and creativity.
Stay close to your users. The more AI handles your analytics and research processing, the more important it becomes to have direct, unfiltered contact with the people you're building for.
Double down on human skills. Communication, relationship-building, strategic thinking, and the ability to navigate ambiguity - these become more valuable, not less.
Build AI features with heart. If you're adding AI to your product, make sure it serves a genuine user need rather than just checking a technology box.
The irony isn't lost on me that I'm using a framework to help maintain my humanity at work. Sometimes we need structure to remember what matters most. The goal isn't to resist AI. It's to use it in ways that make us more ourselves, not less.
The question isn't whether AI will change our jobs; it's whether we will change our jobs. It's whether we'll change with it in a way that keeps us essential.
And here's what I've learned: essential doesn't mean irreplaceable.
It means irreplaceably human.
Final thoughts.
I've been asking myself this lately: What's the difference between the work I do that energizes me and the work that just exhausts me? Usually, it comes down to whether I'm solving problems or just executing tasks. AI can handle the tasks. The problems-the messy, nuanced, deeply human ones-those still need us.
The future might be automated, but it doesn't have to be heartless. Every choice we make about how we integrate AI into our work and our products is a choice about what kind of future we're building.
So here's my question for you: What's one thing you do at work that only you, with your specific context, relationships, and judgment, can do? And how are you making sure AI amplifies that instead of replacing it?
Because at the end of the day, that's probably where your future lives.
Until next week,
Mike @ Product Party
Want to connect? Send me a message LinkedIn or Bluesky.
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I like this outlook a lot, and it aligns significantly in with my own grappling of the topic.
"remember that our job isn't just to ship features; it's to solve human problems in human ways." is important but I also think there's another layer that focuses on the new realm of human-robot problems and bridging that gap. I think that's going to be most valuable long term.
And "Adopt AI for efficiency, not for thinking." is a great mantra. It's tempting to have AI hop in and take over some difficult processing but it's important that we don't stop forcing ourselves to engage those areas, or we really are training ourselves out of a career. My favorite use of AI so far is supplementing my meeting notes - I still take good notes but it catches things I miss and connects dots in ways I just couldn't while I'm leading a meeting and trying to take notes. This part is absolutely transformative, but I can't trust it completely, and it certainly doesn't make any decisions. I'm doing my best not to offload my own brain compute, but focusing on ways to challenge problems differently.
I'm with you. We can be scared of AI and get replaced, or we can embrace it and hopefully end up guiding the future.