Ben Blumenrose: 50+ Design Teams Use AI. Most Are Doing It Wrong.

By Designer Tom

Categories: Design, Product

Summary

50+ design teams are adopting AI, but most are just layering tools onto old processes instead of rethinking workflows entirely. The real competitive advantage goes to teams that formalize AI best practices—like weekly knowledge-sharing sessions and internal tool development—rather than leaving adoption to individual experimentation.

Key Takeaways

1. Move from ad-hoc AI adoption to formalized processes. Year ago: companies told teams to 'figure it out on nights and weekends.' Now: best performers hold weekly best-practice sessions, codify workflows, and build internal tool environments for designers.
2. Design processes must now be as flexible as designs themselves. The pace of AI tool evolution (Perplexity's personal computer announcement) means investing heavily in optimizing one workflow can become obsolete quickly—treat process design as iterative, not fixed.
3. Enterprises are adopting AI faster than historical precedent. Companies like Carvana are removing gatekeepers ('no AI embedded engineer managing this') and distributing tokens/software access broadly, enabling grassroots experimentation across teams.
4. AI adoption splits into distinct team archetypes: research-focused (insight gathering), code-shipping designers, internal tooling builders, and partial adopters. Map your team's position to identify where you have leverage vs. where you're just adding complexity.
5. The real divide isn't 'using AI' vs. 'not using AI'—it's homogeneous vs. heterogeneous tooling. Three years ago: everyone used Figma + basic prototypes. Now: diverse tools and processes. Success means choosing a coherent subset, not adopting everything.

Topics

• AI Design Workflows
• Design Team Structure
• Enterprise AI Adoption
• Internal Tool Development for Design
• AI Best Practices Formalization

Transcript Excerpt

Ben Bloomman Rose sits at a pretty useful seat for where design is at right now. He's not just watching one team figure out AI through designer fund. He gets a front row view to how a lot of different companies are absorbing it. The messy version, not the keynote stuff. Who's changing how they work and who's just layering tools on top of old habits and who's building new leverage, not just a new kind of chaos. That's why I wanted to talk to him. And this conversation is a lot more about what hap...