The Human Element in the Age of AI

I've been building products and coaching product managers in the Bay Area for the last couple of decades. I recently started a company CornerStore.AI with Vincent Bannister—an AI-powered marketing platform that gives small businesses Fortune 500-level marketing power. We're helping Main Street compete with corporate giants by building authentic customer connections in the digital age.

For months, I've been mulling over this question: what is the future of product management in the age of AI? Is it becoming obsolete, or more critical than ever? Is it morphing into something completely different? Or is there an opportunity to make it more impactful than before?

As I've been diving into the world of AI, the seismic change it's bringing is particularly interesting to me from a product perspective. As someone who has lived through the old way of building products, and is invested enough in the new way to build my own AI company, here's some thoughts on the big trends I'm seeing.

This will be a series of four blog posts based on recent observations and events I've attended:

1. The human element in AI and innovation (this post)
2. Discovery vs. delivery in an AI world
3. Celebrating challenging discourse
4. Product creators vs. administrators

Two Events That Changed My Perspective

When I ask folks where AI is heading, they tend to fear two extremes: either an overhyped productivity tool or a dystopian end-of-days threat. I was fortunate to attend two events recently that suggested the answer might be different.

The first was a talk hosted by Wisdom Ventures that featured Dr. Vivek Murthy (the 19th and 21st U.S. Surgeon General). Dr. Murthy's platform raises awareness about the dangers of loneliness and the importance of human connection. When asked about his take on AI, he shared what I found to be an alarming insight: that 80% of Gen Z would prefer an AI companion to a human one. Gen Z seems to prefer an easy "non-challenging" discourse and relationship with an AI bot to one with humans, who aren't always agreeable or available.

Dr. Murthy then observed that those of us who are fortunate enough to have found life partners would never want to replace them with an AI bot. It's those challenging discourses that make us human. He concluded: perhaps AI will bring more appreciation for what makes us human, and we should elevate and celebrate that.

While catching up with old colleagues afterwards, we collectively realized that our most productive work environments were the ones where we could raise concerns without fear of reprisal. Where challenging discourses are welcomed because the team truly trusts one another. That's where the real creativity and progress (and fun!) happened.

Preparing for an AI World

The second event was a working group with academics and industry reps at UC Santa Cruz, where we discussed how to best prepare students for the AI world. My takeaways from the conversation were:

Students with practical industry experience tend to be more hireable than those with just a classroom education
AI appears to be accelerating the need for new hires who can hit the ground running, because companies seem less able or willing to train new grads
Instead, companies are increasingly using AI for entry-level tasks (in fact, due to gen AI, there has been an overall 13% decline in employment among new grads)
Students need to learn an AI mindset, not specific tools that will likely be outdated in months

What academia can and should elevate is what makes a new grad different from AI: it's—again—the challenging discourse: curiosity, choice-making, thinking outside-the-box, and working with diverse perspectives to create something beyond what AI can do.

What This Means for Innovation

AI seems to be escalating and elevating our need to embrace challenging discourse—the uniquely human ability to think critically, disagree constructively, and solve complex and large problems collaboratively. The key is adaptation rather than replacement—leveraging AI to amplify human capabilities while doubling down on what makes us uniquely human.

This isn't just about product management. Every field that involves innovation, creativity, or complex problem-solving will likely face this same dynamic. AI can optimize for user satisfaction in the moment, generate agreeable responses, and execute well-defined processes. But it can't engage in the messy, uncomfortable, generative conversations that often lead to breakthrough insights. It can't navigate the complex human dynamics of understanding what customers actually need versus what they say they need, make the hard trade-offs between competing business objectives, or build the trust and psychological safety required for challenging discourse and brainstorming. And it certainly can't take accountability for outcomes when probabilistic systems make mistakes.

The Path Forward

What makes this transformation different from previous technology shifts is that success will depend entirely on our most human capabilities. AI is trained to be agreeable, to optimize for user satisfaction in the moment. It can't tell a CEO that their pet feature idea is wrong. It can't look a customer in the eye and say, "What you're asking for won't solve your real problem."

The most successful teams, products, and companies in the AI age will likely be smaller but more focused on the uniquely human work– building trust with each other and their customers, and creating space for the challenging conversations that drive real innovation.

Perhaps AI will bring more appreciation for what makes us human, and we should elevate and celebrate that. The future may belong to those brave enough to engage in challenging discourse—with their customers, their teams, and themselves—to build products that genuinely matter.

What's Coming Next

So what does this mean for how we actually build products? I'll explore this over the next few posts:

Part 2: Discovery vs. Delivery - Where humans still win in an AI world
Part 3: Celebrating Challenging Discourse - What this actually looks like in practice and how to make it happen
Part 4: Product Creators vs. Product Administrators - AI is accentuating the split of product management, and what that means for your career