It’s time to add ‘how AI works’ to the UX teams skill set

UX teams need to insert themselves in the training of AI models, becoming key partners during the model lifecycle. A discipline that thrives at the intersection of user needs, business goals, and technology is critical at this time.

Everything that is model related relies for the most part on engineers for their technical expertise. However, with the way AI has disrupted the classic command-based processing (must-read article AI: First New UI Paradigm in 60 Years from Jakob Nielsen), in some instances teams are delegating a part of the user experience to technical partners. As wide as their skills are, they don’t always have the in-depth use case context that AI models need.

In The Rise of the Model Designer, I discuss the growing need to bridge interface design and model training, arguing a new UX figure is emerging. Independently of role definitions, understanding how training the models affects the output is now part of our design process. We need to shift our focus and shape both the interface and the model itself.

There’s a critical gap in UX team education on AI training and how to get involved. Most of the available training is either too technical, or just surface level and lacking depth. Some of us are trying to bridge this gap, but striking the right balance is hard, and in many cases resources cannot be shared broadly.

Investing in targeted education for all product-related roles is critical for innovation. UX teams have the power to unlock the full potential of AI models — with a little help from a prompt.