Tommy Geoco - The state of the design industry right now

Advanced practitioners are moving beyond simple prompting. They act as 'creative directors' to their AI, generating a vast spectrum of initial explorations and then curating, combining, and refining the outputs. This shifts the core design skill from manual creation to strategic direction and high-level critical thinking.

For individual contributors, the quickest way to gain visibility and influence is by building internal tools that solve problems for cross-functional partners, like marketing or sales. This establishes the designer as a proactive problem-solver and subject matter expert, often catapulting their role and impact within the organization.

When evaluating 'AI fluency,' discerning hiring managers are less interested in a perfect, AI-generated artifact and more interested in the candidate's workflow. They want to see how a designer thinks, which tools they use, and why. The ability to articulate an experimental and evolving process is the key signal they are looking for.

For better or worse, social media platforms like Twitter are now the primary discovery engine for design talent. Sharing experiments, workflows, and thoughts on new tools serves as public proof that a designer is engaging with modern challenges, effectively replacing the traditional portfolio for demonstrating forward-thinking capabilities.

Contrary to the narrative that AI is being forced upon creatives, a survey revealed that designers engaged in 'vibe coding'—using code and AI for exploration—are more satisfied with their workflows. This trend is led by senior designers and managers, suggesting a top-down adoption pattern rather than a mandate resented by juniors.

The key to future AI workflows is not mastering specific tools, but cultivating a portable 'briefcase' of personal context—rules, style preferences, and project history. This personal context layer can then be plugged into any tool, making context curation a more valuable skill than tool-specific expertise. This concept is termed 'headless design.'

Contrary to the goal of full automation, the most effective AI workflows intentionally preserve points of friction. These moments—where a human must intervene, check intent, or re-steer the process—are crucial for maintaining control and ensuring the output aligns with strategic goals, preventing the system from running unchecked in the wrong direction.

Hiring managers increasingly see a candidate's lack of demonstrated interest in new AI tools and processes as the number one red flag. While expertise isn't required, a visible curiosity and willingness to experiment is a powerful signal of a designer's relevance and commitment to growth in the current market.

Designers are increasingly building internal tools, giving rise to new hybrid roles like 'Brand Engineer' at companies like Vercel. This reflects a broader industry trend where roles are compressing towards being a 'builder,' someone who combines domain expertise with the technical skills to create solutions, rather than just mockups.

Comparing AI models based on single, identical prompts is a flawed methodology. A true evaluation involves 'driving' the model through multiple iterations of feedback and correction. This reveals its ability to understand and adapt to your specific intent, which is a far more critical measure of its utility than a single probabilistic output.

Simply adding AI tools to existing workflows fails. Companies must restructure their entire 'factory floor.' To mitigate the risk of a full overhaul, organizations like Metalab create a 'Team Zero'—a small, independent team tasked with exploring new AI-native processes and reporting back on what works before company-wide implementation.