“Good tools don’t replace craft — they elevate it."

Last week, I had the privilege of joining the Human + Humanoid conference for a panel called “Team Design in the Age of Human + AI Interaction.” Moderated by global HR leader Jillian Rubel, and joined by Collette Clemens, VP of Employee Life Cycle Programs + Belonging at REI, we explored how the rise of AI is reshaping not just what we do — but how we work, lead, and collaborate.

As the only creative leader on the panel, I wanted to bring a unique perspective — the day-to-day reality of how creative teams are evolving in real time. In a world where AI gives almost anyone the ability to generate content in minutes, we’re adapting and working differently — both for ourselves and our clients.

The future of work isn’t just about output. It’s about how humans and AI create value together.

Here are some of my key takeaways from the conversation.

The Shift

If you’d dropped into one of our creative meetings a couple of years ago, it would’ve looked familiar: designers prototyping in Figma, strategists mapping journeys on whiteboards, artists sketching storyboards on tablets. We scoped projects based on team capacity — how many people we had and how much human time we could dedicate.

We all know the old adage: Speed, Quality, Cost — pick two.

Today, it still looks similar on the surface — but something fundamental has shifted underneath. AI isn’t a separate screen or an abstract concept; it’s integrated into our tools, our thinking, and our process.

From process and content optimization with Gradial, to motion and animation production with Flow, to the latest releases from Figma and Adobe, AI is now part of how we work. And suddenly, we can have the trifecta: Speed, Quality, and Cost.

Where designing, building, and publishing a new webpage once took weeks, we can now do it in days. In fact, implementing AI into our workflows achieved the following for one client:

• 15× improvement in content and ops speed

• 21% increase in output volume

• 43% cost savings

• 50% reduction in average SLAs

We now think of AI the same way we think of Figma, Photoshop, or PowerPoint: as an essential creative tool that helps us do our best work faster and smarter. Good tools don’t replace craft — they elevate it. They eliminate the blank page, the “shitty first draft,” and give us something to react to, refine, improve, and scale.

Team Design: From Specialists to Strategists

This shift has changed how I think about building creative teams. We’re moving from singularly focused roles to multifaceted creative thinkers.

Our team is full of people who are curious — eager to stretch new skills, learn new tools, and think more strategically about the bigger picture. That means putting real focus on team development: upskilling creatives across disciplines, regardless of role or seniority.

We’ve built learning and development frameworks that establish a creative foundation and layer capabilities on top: motion, design, AI, prompting, storytelling, conversational design — to name a few. We’re thinking holistically and strategically about how to both create and orchestrate — gathering data, finding insights, and showing business impact in new ways.

Our jobs today are fundamentally different from what they were even two years ago.

As a leader, my role has evolved from directing creative work to cultivating the conditions for creativity — designing systems and workflows that align AI’s efficiency with our human intent and values.

It’s one of Revel’s core values: Yes, and. 

Yes, AI allows us to move faster and scale farther. And, that scale requires the human in the loop — sensibility, creativity, and discernment.

Curiosity as a Core Competency

I’m often asked how AI has impacted creativity and team dynamics. My answer: psychological safety matters more than ever.I remind my team that their value isn’t speed or quantity — it’s taste. It’s the ability to make meaning, to know when something feels right, emotionally resonant, and on-brand.

Culturally, we’ve leaned into curiosity as a defining trait. We celebrate when someone discovers a new workflow or uses a tool in an unexpected way. We talk openly about what we’re experimenting with — what’s working, what’s not — and that openness builds trust and normalizes experimentation. We also talk about how AI makes our lives easier — freeing us to focus on more strategic, imaginative work.

With AI, we’ve imagined Halloween-inspired candy bars and horror-film cleaning products. We’ve built AR/VR profiles and 3D models of our studio spaces. We’ve uncovered user pain points, streamlined journeys, prototyped mid-workshop, and even made a Fast and Furious-themed client video.

We’re doubling down on craft — not in spite of AI, but because of it. The better we understand what makes our work distinctively human, the more powerful these tools become.

The Future of Work

Human + AI collaboration is reshaping how teams — of all kinds — learn, create, and collaborate.This shift isn’t just technological; it’s organizational, cultural, and deeply human.

As we build a better way of working, creative leaders need to invest in AI fluency as a creative and strategic competency, building skillsets and discernment on top of solid design foundations. 

Embrace the change and lean in. If you don’t, someone else will. And most importantly, preserve the human heartbeat — curiosity, empathy, aesthetic judgment.

That’s what distinguishes the good from the great. These days, I spend less time thinking about rate cards and dependencies, and more time thinking about how humans and AI create value together.

That’s the next evolution of creative leadership:
same craft, new tools.

At Revel, we’re helping our clients navigate this same transformation — building human + AI collaboration into the fabric of how teams sense, create, and deliver value. Because the future of creativity isn’t artificial; it’s amplified.