Nick | Designer

AI led products ask… What's your goal today? What outcome are you aiming for? Users don’t want discovery. They want outcomes. Fast, flexible, adaptive.

Users are hacking, skipping, jumping around. Flow thinking isn’t enough anymore.

Sketch of a new onboarding model: User states goal, AI drafts a pathway, User pokes, edits, reorients, the system adapts dynamically. Not a tour. Not a script. A collaboration.

Why are designers acting like Apple just released its final design? It’s a beta. Things change. What happened to caring about process? About intent?

In AI-first UX, users aren't following scripts. They're starting, riffing and pivoting on the fly. Maybe 'next step' isn't always knowable anymore?

A common assumption I’ve noticed. Users want to ‘discover features.’ In AI products this often isn’t the case. Users typically want outcomes. Fast, flexible, and adaptive. Discovery can still play a role, but it shouldn’t get in the way of delivering clear value quickly.

Seeing more and more AI features dropped into products. Fewer examples where AI actually rebuilds the user flow around new behavior.

Old onboarding: → 10 steps to 'teach' users the product. New onboarding needs to be: → Immediate goal focus → Fast improv → Just-in-time guidance Might be time to kill most onboarding flows.

A practical overview of UX patterns shaped by AI-driven behaviours by @rominakavcic thedesignsystem.guide/blog/ai-ux-pat…

AI is shifting user behaviour. Entirely different expectations: → Less patience → Less step-by-step obedience → More jumping, riffing, improvising I observe it for myself when I know AI can get me to the outcome — and I find myself rushing to write the prompt.

You might be used to thinking in terms of guiding users through carefully mapped steps. What I’m seeing now is designers trying to create spaces where users and AI riff toward outcomes. Got to admit it feels messy but much more exciting than working through defined steps.

The more screens we add the more fragile the experience feels.

Users are improvising. Linear UX is quietly breaking. If you’re working on products where AI assists or leads, the shape of your UX conversations is probably changing too. Mapping journeys isn’t enough anymore. You’re staging environments for exploration.

Do you write in the books you read? I don’t—well, not really. But I will now. This great read from The Culturist explains how Mortimer Adler argued that “writing in your books isn’t defacement — it’s a sign of life”. Link 👇🏻