Urgent UX Design Skills Needed Now in the Face of AI

By Kehinde Agbaje

“Kenny, there is nothing left,” said a colleague in the UX design industry, a tone of resignation in his voice, as we exchanged notes on how artificial intelligence is changing design. While it was always clear to me that AI would have a great impact in the technology space, what I did not envision was the speed with which it would happen. 

A year ago, you could prompt an AI model and ask it to fix a bug in a code. Today, that same model won’t just fix the bug; if well prompted, it will write the code. AI can run competitor analysis, generate user journeys, and even create full mockups. It doesn’t just suggest ways your designs can be better; it tells you why one design would work with a certain audience. It doesn’t just create the web copy; it can suggest different copy for your web design, giving you variety to pick from. Tools like Cursor and Lovable Dev now sync directly to your GitHub, collaborating with you as a solo designer to create websites even faster. Once upon a time, you needed a team—a copywriter, a graphic designer, and a website person—to create websites; these days, with the right AI tool, you are set. 

Even more surrealistic is agentic AI, autonomous AI, which needs minimal human engagement to make independent decisions while getting things done. They can learn from data, gather knowledge from scenarios, and adapt quickly. They are making decisions on your behalf: analysing your existing data, getting your bank card and buying the domain name, booking the dispatch ride, and sending your food home. AI is no longer solely generative; it is autonomous. And what does that mean for us, human designers? 

Truth be told, when properly used, AI can be a game changer; it saves you time, quickly validates your UX research hypothesis, and reduces team friction. You can test five different design solutions in an evening. But here is the paradox: What becomes of human creativity when we no longer try? As humans, we thrive on challenges, learning from our mistakes, and using our learnings to influence future decisions. What happens when we lose the spark of joy that comes after executing a design task? How do we find fulfilment? What becomes of humans in that world? Will this be the beginning of an AI-induced genetic mutation? I know that sounds extreme now, but you get what I mean.

There is also the ethical layer of it all, one that will not disappear, no matter how much we shut our eyes to it: the tokenisation of human labour. In the race to develop AI, many tech companies are throwing ethics in the bin and stomping on years of human creativity, training models with people’s voices, stories, and art—did anyone say Stitch and ChatGPT?—without proper permission. AI is creating an extractive relationship with humans rather than one that sees them as collaborative design partners. 

The most dispiriting part of the narrative, and it is hard to admit, is that it feels like you, as a designer, are watching your skills being cheapened. Every day, as a new AI design app is created, we are moving downwards on a ‘thinking slope’. Let me explain. At the core of UX design is thinking and problem-solving; thinking that strives to understand a problem so it can use design to solve it. And what becomes of that skill when we no longer use it? Yes, you guessed as much. 

It is in our thinking that we express our individuality, which brings to the fore our unique experiences as creative humans. AI may not be able to fully understand cultural nuance, the cultural context of a word in different spaces. At least not yet. A word may mean different things in different cultures. For instance, Bimbo is a Yoruba name; when written in full, it means “I was born into wealth”. But in English, it means “an attractive but unintelligent, frivolous young woman”. Imagine creating a product for women with that name without the cultural context to guide you. You would have likely lost a market segment. AI may not be able to fully understand what it means to be a 75-year-old Nigerian grandmother  whose first language is Yoruba using a fitness app for the first time. In this case, design research needs to be not only local but also rooted in culture. 

So, in this new world that is taking shape right before us, your Figma proficiency and prototyping skills alone won’t be able to save you. You’d have to be more; you’d have to do more than AI. You’d have to bring to the table much more than the machine can give. Sounds challenging? Not so much. Perhaps, you can start building those skills today. 

First, let’s start with the quality of the questions you ask during your research. You need to start asking better questions that can give you a better understanding of the design problem that needs to be fixed. This will likely help you to get a proper understanding of the real contexts of the humans your product is targeting: Who are they? What cultures are they from? What are the cultural nuances where they are from? Third, you have to lead AI with understanding. More than ever, the design world needs people who will not just take AI design suggestions hook, line, and sinker; we need people who will question it, of course, with verifiable research. We need designers who will see beyond their workflows and lead with nuanced human understanding. 

You are likely wondering, so what now since AI is here to stay? UX designers need to evolve, especially in our relationship with AI. This is the age of flexibility, where you are nimble enough to understand that it is not just about outputs but insights, that your work must move beyond design aesthetics to human empathy. And if you are new to AI, this is not the time to skip the basics and jump to the machines to get the work done; that would be dangerous. That would mean building a house without a foundation. The foundation—emotional intelligence, communication skills, ethical design thinking, and stakeholder engagement—is even more important today than ever. 

“There is still something left,” I told my friend as we rounded off our call. “The human insight.”

 Kehinde Agbaje, a senior UX designer, sent this article from Newcastle, United Kingdom