The Slowest Adopters of AI in Brand Work Are Often the Most Craft-Oriented Leaders—and That Isn’t Irrational
In every studio I’ve collaborated with, the dynamics look the same. Junior staff pick up new tools within a week, while the creative director digs in and starts to wrestle with how they should be used. For a while, I interpreted that as senior professionals protecting their status.
But there’s a different truth: these seasoned practitioners are typically the only ones who can detect when quality begins to slip. They spent years—often more than a decade—training their eyes to see nuance, texture, and consistency. It makes sense for them to have authority over where and how new tools are applied. Too often, the opposite approach has prevailed: equip the fastest learners with the tools, then turn to the creative director to clean up the aftermath.
Does this dynamic play out differently in branding studios, where the ratio of craft to headcount is higher and the stakes for attention to detail feel even more pronounced?
