Oh Egads! Preserving Your Creative Voice in the Age of AI
Before any formal event I have to Google: How to Tie a Tie. I check Google Maps before heading to places I've been countless times. The reason I admit to this slightly embarrassing trait is because I know I'm not alone. There's actually a scientific term for this phenomenon of outsourcing memory to the internet: Digital Amnesia, or The Google Effect.
I really don't mind that my hippocampus is part cloud-based now. But lately I've noticed something else that is being impacted by new technology: My creative process.
Generative AI tools are undeniably incredible: they churn out essays, illustrations, videos, music, user interfaces, code and more in seconds. They're slowly becoming indispensable collaborators in many ways in many roles and many industries. But as I lean on them more in my own life, I begin to wonder: Am I losing something essential in this shift? What do I lose by outsourcing the creative parts of my brain to a rack of blinking servers in a remote Texas warehouse? Is my creative process becoming less my own? Less human?
I call this phenomenon of AI encroaching on my creative process the Overly Excessive Generative AI Dependency Syndrome. Or, perhaps more memorably, O-EGADS. Coincidentally, that's the same exclamation I make when I see AI generate something particularly impressive: "Oh, Egads!"
Falling into the O-EGADS trap doesn't just risk dulling our craft of creativity. It risks eroding the satisfaction and value that comes from creating something deeply, uniquely yours. So how do we stay human in the age of AI? How do we retain our unique voice as AI tools can easily drown us out?
Here are three strategies that I use to avoid the O-EGADS trap.
Create First, Compute Later: The Analog Advantage
When I started writing this article I asked a few Large Language Models (LLMs) for help brainstorming and even drafting a paragraph or two. Very quickly I felt lost and overwhelmed by the outputs. The suggestions started making me question my thesis, my writing ability and blocked any flow-state induced dopamine drip, replaced by creativity-blocking cortisol. I eventually grabbed a notebook and pen and started again.
When outlining, drafting, mind-mapping, and rewriting by hand I enter into my messy flow state more quickly. Slowing down forces me to distill my vision and prevents AI tools from intimidating me with its capabilities and polishing my ideas to the point of being no longer recognizable as my own.
So one way to avoid the O-EGADS trap is to simply sketch your ideas by hand first. Whether it's an article, a UI design or a film storyboard, build a messy rough draft without digital assistance. Once your concept feels like you and serves the purpose you want, then engage with AI to help refine or enhance what you've already started.
Let AI Be Your Muse, Not the Artist: Use AI for Ideas, Not Decisions
Now on the other hand, when your ideas are not flowing and the blank page tortures you, AI's endless outputs can be an asset rather than a liability.
AI is incredible at ideation and there's actually science to back it up. The Alternative Uses Test (AUT) is a measure of divergent thinking. It asks the participants to think of alternative uses for common objects. On average, humans are able to generate 5-10 alternative uses for a toothbrush in two minutes. In one experiment, AI generated a whopping 122. AI can be wonderful at kick starting or unblocking a project, but, again, I need to reiterate the risks of the O-EGADS trap.
Creativity isn't only about generating ideas (although that's a big part of it). It's about having the taste, intuition and confidence to choose which ideas are worth taking forward and which ones to jettison. In addition to killing our own darlings, as Faulkner would recommend, we need to have the confidence and wisdom to edit, refine or kill any AI suggestions that don't lead to more authentic expressions of ourselves.
So use AI to jumpstart your creative engine, but once it's running, take the wheel.
Reflect and Refine: Audit Your Creative Process
In Digital Minimalism, Cal Newport introduces the idea of the "Craftsman Approach to tool selection", advocating for intentional technology adoption, remaining skeptical of automatic adoption of the next thing without considering its consequences. I believe we should apply this same principle to AI tools: carefully evaluate each AI resource to ensure it truly enhances your creative work.
To think like a craftsman to choose which tools actually help your process, I recommend an AI Flow Audit. After completing each project, pause and reflect with these critical questions:
- Amplification: When did AI genuinely boost your creativity?
- Friction: Where did AI create unnecessary complexity or interrupt your workflow?
- Effectiveness: What's working well in your current AI integration?
- Limitations: What aspects of your process feel hindered by AI intervention?
By consistently performing this audit, you transform AI from a potential distraction into an intentional collaborator. The goal isn't to accumulate tools, but to cultivate a thoughtful, purpose-driven approach to technological assistance.
Avoiding the O-EGADS Trap
It might seem strange to read an article about limiting your use of AI in a book about AI adoption. But I argue that if we fully outsource our creative processes we risk falling into the trap of Overly Excessive Generative AI Dependency Syndrome. Ethan Mollick encourages us to "always invite AI to the table" in his book Co-Intelligence. I agree, for the most part, but recommend you determine when is the right time to pull out the chair and wave them over.
As we navigate this exciting new era, let's embrace AI as a tool to amplify our creativity, not to diminish it. By striking the right balance, we can ensure that our work remains authentic, innovative and truly our own.
Remember, "Oh, Egads!" doesn't have to be a cry of alarm. It can also be an exclamation of surprise and delight as we uncover new and exciting ways to bring our unique creative ideas to life.
References
Sparrow, B., Liu, J., & Wegner, D. M. (2011). Google effects on memory: Cognitive consequences of having information at our fingertips. Science, 333(6043), 776–778.
Mollick, Ethan. Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI. Harvard Business Review Press, 2023.
Newport, Cal. Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World. Grand Central Publishing, 2016.
Casey Hudetz is a designer, speaker, educator and award-winning filmmaker based in Chicago. With over a decade of experience, he specializes in creating digital products and services that leverage emerging technologies, including AI, AR and Voice. Currently, he leads the AI and Design team at Docusign.
In the Age of AI, We're All Managers Now
Over coffee recently a friend described using new AI tools as kind of like leading a team of interns. "They know a lot, but don't know exactly what they're doing," he said. "It requires us, the ones with experience and judgment, to guide them and review their work closely."
We will all be leading our own team of AI interns very soon. With each passing week, the average worker's daily tasks are being transformed by AI, from writing to presenting to chatting with colleagues and this is just the beginning. Even if you have avoided using any of these tools, perhaps out of fear of being considered lazy, it's only a matter of time before an AI assistant will be working alongside you.
So if my friend is correct, that our roles will be transitioning from the hands-on doing of individual contributors to the guiding, supporting and strategizing of managers, I began to wonder:
What might we learn from the principles of effective people management in order to excel as AI managers?
I believe we can harness the power of our new AI team members by doing what successful managers do well: build the best teams, set clear direction and help their team reach their potential.
Build the Best Team
In a recent interview, the CEO of OpenAI Sam Altman explained the importance of becoming comfortable with new AI tools:
"[It's] always the right bet to just get good at the most powerful new tools, most capable new tools. We're not going back. Getting fluent [with AI], I think it's really important."
His point gets to my first principle of how I believe we can become effective AI managers: Build the Best Team.
Just as a people manager interviews candidates to assess if they can bring the most value to the team, we should all be experimenting with AI tools to determine their strengths and weaknesses.
The choice of a human candidate can mean the difference between a high performing or dysfunctional team. The selection of the right AI tool can mean the difference between executing effectively or falling behind.
Set Clear Direction
"The role of managers is to transform the complex situation into small pieces and prioritize them." — Carla Harris, Vice Chairman at Morgan Stanley
Just as a people manager would guide their team towards the company's broader objectives, an AI manager needs to define the right problems and set the right goals. It's about knowing where you want to go and ensuring the AI is aligned with that direction.
So how do we do that? As a people manager, it's through individual conversations, coaching and goal setting. As AI managers it's through effectively prompting your AI team member to generate helpful and appropriate outputs.
Your AI outputs are only as good as the prompts you give and the attention you put into reviewing them.
Help Them Reach Their Potential
"There is one quality that sets truly great managers apart from the rest: they discover what is unique about each employee and then capitalize on it." — Julie Zhuo, author of The Making of a Manager
Just as managers learn their employees' strengths and preferences to assign them to suitable projects and set them up for success, AI managers should understand their tools' capabilities and use them effectively for the right tasks.
An exercise I've been doing lately is reflecting on tasks I've completed in my career, and then considering how modern AI tools could have helped me. This reflection exercise is an easy, low-stakes way to imagine a new working relationship with AI.
The Way Forward
It is undeniable that AI is here to stay and we're just getting started. Within the coming year, the average knowledge worker will interface with these new tools natively within their normal working applications. AI will not be a place you go to (like ChatGPT or Bard), but rather sits right next to you and helps you with your work in the applications you use everyday.
Like a responsible manager who cares about the well-being of both their team and their company's goals, I believe we all need to adopt a new working mindset in order to thrive professionally. This mindset should balance the efficient and innovative use of AI tools with a commitment to ethical considerations, accuracy, and the broader implications of our work.
Casey Hudetz is a designer, speaker, educator and award-winning filmmaker based in Chicago. Currently, he leads the AI and Design team at Docusign.
Personal Essay
Edgar
We were kids and didn't know any better.
I'll never forget my mother's face as she put her hand to her mouth and slowly backed out of the room. Had I known the consequences of our practical joke, I wouldn't have done it.
A few weeks before the incident, my mother came back from a party in town.
"I met a man. I told him where we lived and he said, 'Oh, the ghost house on Eldamain.' I didn't know what he meant. 'You didn't hear all the stories before you moved in? I suppose the realtors would have left that out of the listing.' What stories? 'That three people have died on your property. One drowned in your pond. One was hit by a tractor. And the other, well, the other hung himself in his cabin.' There was a cabin? 'Right where your house sits now.' Are you sure? 'Positive. Plus the people before you moved out, claiming they heard voices at night and even had an unexplained house fire. It spooked 'em good.'"
We were 13, 10, 7 and 2, mouths agape, eyes wide, the hair on our arms standing up. Could it be true? Our imaginations ran wild. Our very own ghost! A spectral roommate!
We named him Edgar.
When a door would slam unexpectedly, we'd roll our eyes and say: "Looks like Edgar's in a bad mood!" Our Christmas tree would fall over: "Looks like Edgar hates the holidays!" Laughter and laughter. We embraced him and welcomed him to the family.
It was a tradition growing up to frighten each other whenever possible; grab ankles through banisters while coming down stairs; jump out of the woods or around dark corners just to hear a sibling shriek and, if executed properly, cry. Now with Edgar on our team, we made a plan for the Big One.
We put a baggy t-shirt over a pillow and used a leather belt to hold up the pants. We wrapped a rope around a soft corner and pulled it tight to make it look like a noose. We threw the rope over a rafter in the back playroom and hoisted him up. A snapshot of our dear friend Edgar in his last moments.
"Mom! Can you come help us with something." Stifled, conspiratorial laughter. "Hurry!" We held our breaths as we heard her footsteps approaching. We're gonna get her so good.
How does a parent feel when they see such morbid acts from their young children? After the initial terror wears off, do they feel like they failed them somehow? Do they chalk it up to childhood innocence or is it something else? I don't know.
We never spoke of it again.
Weeks later when the alarms went off and we were shaken out of bed and we fled the house and our mom ran back in to save the pets and my older sister drove us kids on the four-wheeler to the neighbor's farm and we saw the front of our house aflame and we endured countless nightmares and the doctors checked our lungs for smoke damage and the fire department told us that they couldn't determine a cause, we realized we should not have fucked with Edgar.
Casey Hudetz is a designer, speaker, educator and award-winning filmmaker based in Chicago.
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