Most people won't survive the next era of design
-
Moe Hachem
- September 5, 2025
Most people won’t survive the next era of design.
Not because they’re untalented, but because they never made a choice.
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been writing about AI, UX, work, meaning, and what happens when systems evolve faster than the humans inside them.
In other words, not everyone will be the architect, but everyone must choose a role to play - otherwise it will be chosen for you.
The truth
Not everyone will get to be the architect, nor will everyone lead the system. In the world we’re heading toward, that distinction matters more than ever.
Yes, UI will still exist, maybe even thrive, but like luxury fashion or fine art, it could very well become niche. A luxury, and as with all luxuries: few make it.
And for everyone else?
Staying in surface-level roles without strategic depth is dangerous.
What’s already unfolding
- One designer doing what used to take ten
- Teams slashed as AI generates flows and copy
- Execution getting faster, cheaper, flatter
The career ladder is collapsing, and the only direction left inside most orgs is up, toward systems, strategy, and structure.
Everyone else? Replaceable.
I’m not fearmongering - but it’s how reality is currently unfolding.
This doesn’t mean…
Everyone needs to become C-suite or consultant. Only a few will be able to climb the ladder. Those positions are already scarce enough as it is, and the competition will become even more brutal.
What this means is that we need to understand what’s happening, and choose where we stand:
- Some will become systems architects, the ones guiding the machine, not getting guided by it.
- Some will become artisans, masters of their UI craft, but they’ll enter a hyper-competitive, elite market.
- Some will try to hold the middle, likely swallowed up.
Everyone wants to be the next Michelangelo, but most of us will be lucky to design the ice cream shop next to the Florence Cathedral - and that’s perfectly fine, and perhaps even more desirable.
Meaning as the moat
I’ve said that human meaning is the last true moat, and that’s still true.
Yet, if you’re not protecting that meaning strategically nor anchoring your value deeper inside and beyond the system, then inevitably, you’ll be replaced by someone (or something) that is.
I don’t say this to discourage, rather so that we walk into the future with our eyes open.
Make a choice.
Decide what you’re building.
And be intentional about where you derive your meaning and value.
