Article
Grounding Gilded AI in Human-Centered Strategy
How a people-first approach can turn AI from a shiny new feature to a conduit for real human connection.
Connection
Enjoyment
Advanced Features Amplify Simple Issues
The current rush to add AI capabilities to digital experiences is creating a new kind of technical debt. We’re seeing a rise in “gilded AI”, or impressive smart features like chatbots that get slapped onto old products like a new coat of paint. Just like a chatbot can’t add more value than the information it’s trained on, a surface-level fix can’t fix a broken foundation. AI is often used as a facade to cover clunky user journeys, confusing information architecture, or processes that were already failing. The result is a deeply frustrating and impersonal experience that looks intelligent but feels hollow.
Challenge: The Golden Trap of Generative AI
Chatbots often promise advanced technology and seamless experiences only to be trained on a confusing and broken information architecture. The AI looks advanced, but it’s a trap. It can’t provide answers because the content that powers it is a mess. This forces users into generic, circular conversations that prevent them from reaching their goals. Without a human-centered strategy, AI loses its potential as an effective solution and becomes an impressive way to fail.
Impact: A Hollow Human Experience
The human cost of this golden trap is a hollow experience. When the user asks a specific human question and gets an impersonal AI response, they don’t feel helped, they feel unseen and unheard. This hollowness is the sound of a weakening connection between a business and its users. It’s an inauthentic interaction that makes the user feel like a problem for the system to solve, not the reason the system exists.
Opportunity: AI Tapped In, Not Tacked On
The solution is to stop using AI as a gilded replacement for complex solutions and start using it as an integrated accelerator to the experience strategy. Instead of a chatbot that doesn’t make the site any easier to use, my human-centered approach to AI champions features like navigation that automatically adapts to a user’s clickpath, or a search feature that accepts natural language. This people-first approach makes AI authentic and successful at adding value where it counts, not just on the surface.