Designing the future of work with AI
Lessons from the Work Innovation Summit EMEA on how creative professionals can embrace AI as a teammate, not a threat.
Yesterday, I had the chance to attend the Work Innovation Summit EMEA at Magazine London, hosted by Asana. The day was packed with insights into how whether we like it or not, artificial intelligence is reshaping the way we work, not by replacing people, but by elevating what humans do best. For designers and marketers, the message was clear: to thrive in this new era, we must lean in, experiment, and start integrating AI into our daily practice.
The summit explored how AI can transform our productivity through human-AI collaboration. From keynote talks to hands-on workshops, the focus was on moving beyond hype and into application and how to build smarter workflows, using AI as a creative teammate, and preparing for a future where virtual collaborators may complete weeks of work in minutes.
Amy Jin’s keynote resonated with me the most. She outlined a path for using AI as both a springboard and a checkpoint. The idea of building with better content and better checkpoints stuck with me. AI can accelerate research, generate first drafts, and check for tone of voice or clarity. But it’s not about letting machines do it all. Our critical thinking, creativity and ability as designers to ask “why?” remain the linchpins of meaningful work.
As a designer, I see immediate benefits. AI can help clear the clutter. Mundane, repetitive tasks I find incredibly boring but crucial, such as proofreading, drafting variations, or setting up workflows, which can now be delegated to an AI teammate which Asana has introduced to streamline our productivity. This leaves me more time for the part of the job I enjoy the most: shaping ideas, through creativity, to connect with audiences.
Second, experimentation is non-negotiable. We were encouraged to share not only successes but also failures, because in those “mistakes” lie the lessons that will sharpen our future practice. Being an early adopter with AI isn’t about perfection, it’s about testing, learning and educating ourselves (and our teams) continuously.
Finally, we need to think strategically with AI. An ice hockey analogy: don’t just skate to where the puck is, anticipate where it’s going. That means planning not only for how AI can streamline today’s workload but also for how it will reshape tomorrow’s teams and roles. We were asked to envisage a future where virtual collaborators could handle entire projects in a fraction of the time. Our task now is to determine how to integrate these tools while maintaining human creativity at the core.
At The Colour Suite, we believe good design and marketing are about amplifying human stories. AI won’t change that, it will only change how we get there. The challenge, and the opportunity, is to get ahead of the game and incorporate AI as part of the team, so we can focus on creating design work that matters.