“You’ll soon be obsolete”, said the post on LinkedIn. “AI is here, and it’s ready to take your job”, said the suit in the industry magazine. “Your profession’s toast", barked the conference speaker.
Annoying, isn’t it. To be told you’re no longer needed.
I know, because I’m a copywriter. And those quotes were about my profession. But I bet they sound familiar. Because everyone’s always trying to relegate architects to the past tense.
The reality? AI is in the dawn of its infancy and it's already powerful beyond comprehension. And it will only get better. But it's still just a tool.
If you’re running an architectural practice, AI can already save you time filling out bids, churn out “a fairly passable design and access statement”, or create rapid design modifications to make a building more energy efficient. All wonderful things.
But it still needs the human touch
And that’s both an opportunity and a benefit.
If everyone’s churning out AI marketing content, you have the opportunity to create something truly authentic.
Something truly you.
The commercial benefit of that is huge, and there’s a personal benefit that’s so often overlooked too. Because doing something quickly is not the same as doing something well.
In a world of immediate gratification and the relentless pursuit of efficiency, we can reclaim the reward of actually doing the work. Of catching an irreverent thought or glimpse of an idea, and then chipping away at it… chipping away… chipping away… chipping away… until it’s sharp and clear.
Step away from the machine to create space for that
If we leave it all to AI, we miss out on the challenging parts. We miss the joy in creating. The growth in overcoming doubt. We lose the satisfaction of making an idea go from nothing to something. And in doing so, we lose our distinction of thought. We lose ourselves.
Writing sharpens your thinking.
Leaving your voice to the robot will only make you a drone.
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