To counter the addictive effect of LLMs, I’m embarking on a one-week generative AI detox.

Don’t trust the clammy scam artists who tell you AI is moving too fast for you to think straight about this technology. LLMs may well be cool, but most gains are coming from fine-tuning and post-training. Feel free to slow down and make well-considered moves for yourself and your business.

I’m a nature photographer who earns his living from tech. Sometimes I win. Often, I lose. Photography has taught be to be even-keeled in the face of disappointment.

I delivered a keynote to the latest cohort of Thoughtworks University. This post has the audio recording of the talk and a clean transcript.

Feedback that strengthens someone’s confidence can be a powerful motivator. Sadly, we don’t share such feedback enough.

If culture is the moving average of behaviour over time, then a change in corporate culture is inevitable. To retain their cultural distinctiveness, though, corporations must identify what truly makes them special – i.e. their immutable core.

Well-meaning executives often implicitly ask for overwork, without acknowledging that the upside for the hustle has disappeared for the average employee. To reenergise and motivate their workforces, executives must do more than just appeal to tradition. Employees must see a proportional upside.

Some teams exist to deliver value. Others enforce control. Some others, sit right in the middle. What kind of team are you?

When culture is a fuzzy concept, it’s open to interpretation. People unwittingly wield their interpretations like shields or swords. Well-documented cultures, on the other hand, are open to scrutiny yet transparent and easier to govern and co-own.

If AI commoditises outputs, then skilful, tasteful people will matter more than ever. Salary is the fundamental way corporations value such people. In addition to standard HR indicators, we need human ways to determine fair compensation.

By viewing rest as only a means to recharge ourselves for work, we undermine its role in living a deep life. Rest is valuable in and of itself.

When defining corporate cultures, too much emphasis goes to the values poster or the employer value proposition. Attractive, credible cultures however, ground their messaging in strong corporate theories.

Cybernetic collaboration with AI is making us conflate speed and productivity. There’s no alternative to deep focus, even if AI promises to create outputs at “warp speed.” In 2026, leaders will serve their teams best by creating a work environment conducive to deep work.

In the last few years, I’ve made minor tweaks to my life, to live a deeper life. A couple of months back, when my dad passed away, I reflected on the compounding benefits of these changes and how they’ve helped me savour life just a wee bit more.

AI is a now a significant contributor to the broader trend of enshittification. The market is full of AI-powered products, features and code that are costlier to use and run and often counter productive for the end users.

Most executives are reaching for ways to become an AI-first organisation, but many of them are missing the productivity power up that’s hidden in plain sight – asynchronous collaboration. Not only does asynchronous collaboration free up unproductive time for workers, it helps create the digital exhaust of knowledge that LLMs can feed on.

Taste and discernment are more important than ever, in the age of AI.

The unpredictable nature of generative AI can often feel as addictive as gambling. Addictive services often get enshittified, and can also be candidates for a classic bait-and-switch.

As the circular funding economy of AI becomes more transparent, innovation slows and costs increase, it may help us all to temper our AI enthusiasm. There are many indications that the current state of generative AI is neither essential nor as transformative as the frontier AI companies will have us believe. If anything we could make the case that generative AI is a net negative for most stakeholders.

Modern workplaces increasingly reward visibility (“restaurateur” roles) over deep work (“chef” roles), especially during turbulent times. If AI-driven disruption and organisational thrashing favour those who are present and highly visible, what should deep workers do?