I’ve ran 5 marathons now, and I am on my way to my 6th. For each marathon, I sit down and I build a marathon training plan in excel, with each day mapped out with a specific run or workout to do, from that day until race day.

Somewhere along the way I started to realize the similarities between training and design. For example, training blocks are like design sprints… build up, take a step back and reflect, repeat but better, over and over. Initial planning and research will led to a better end result, whether that’s a faster time or a better product shipped to end consumers. Listening to your body is like listening to your users, ignoring signals from the person doing the work leads to injury or a failed product. I could draw a hundred more comparisons here, but the point isn't the metaphor, it's the intentionality behind it. Even as tools like AI speed up our process exponentially, we still have to put in the reps. We still have to run the miles. Speed without preparation just gets you to the wrong finish line faster.

I've led design across healthcare, fitness, e-commerce, and enterprise AI, but the throughline is always the same: design is never a straight line to the finish. It's an ongoing practice of testing, adapting, and refining.

I bring a somewhat unusual mix to this moment in design. I have a traditional UX background where I designed running watch features for athletes, work I loved because of my own passion for health and fitness. But I've also spent real time on the other side of the AI divide. I did a short stint as an AI Engineer at IBM, and I spent 4+ years as a designer in AI conducting design thinking workshops around AI ethics, use cases, and virtual assistants while competing against players like Microsoft Copilot and AWS. That combination means I understand both where the tooling is headed while understanding the importance of keeping designs grounded and human.

If we hand every design decision to AI, we'll relearn very quickly why human UX designers have mattered all along. But at the same time, the most powerful designers are the ones adapting, the way marathoners have adopted carbon-plated shoes and GPS watches without losing the discipline underneath. The tools change. The training doesn't. My job is to stay the voice in the room that keeps the user, the business, and the human element of what we're building in view... even as the pace picks up.