Amanda Schneider, President, ThinkLab

This transcript was made, in part, by an automated service. In some cases there may be errors. 

Amanda: [00:00:00] You know one of the things we've talked about a long time at Think Lab is that the biggest future disruptions in this industry are gonna come from process innovation, not product innovation.

Bobby: Welcome to Barriers to Entry, a Design Innovation podcast on the Surround podcast network. This is the show.

Where we obsess over the not too distant future of the architecture, design, and creative industries and the ideas, tools, technologies, and talent that will take us there. I'm Bobby Bonnet, chief Marketing and Revenue Officer at Standout Design Group, and as always, I'm joined by Digby co-founder Andrew Lane.

And Andrew, I have a question for you. Uh, you always do. I. Where do you get your research from when you're looking to stay up to speed on the technologies and the tools and maybe even the talent in the architecture and design industry related to innovation? Where do you go? As of late, I've been

Andrew: obsessed with the deep research tools that all of the major LLMs have been launching.

Um, so I've been spending a lot of time playing around with the chat, GPT perplexity. [00:01:00] Um, I've been in the US for a while lately, so I've got to play with Claude because they still can't really do anything with it. When I'm in Canada and the Googles. Google's. Yeah, the Google's have been really putting some business together lately as well.

So I mean, that's, that's been a bit of a recent bias, I would say, because I think that, you know, anything else when you talk about media, it's, uh, an ongoing bias. So who do you wanna get your biases from? I do love, uh, listening to pods, like All in and Pivot Pod. Mm-hmm. Um, and they are often talking about some interesting stuff that's new and hot.

Those are kind of the main sources, and I'm letting the AI do my work for me right now. That's smart. And

Bobby: speaking of ai, so for those unfamiliar, can you give the elevator pitch on perplexity? Because if you're listening to podcasts and thought leaders who are in it with ai, a lot of them will mention the fact, Hey, I've moved over to Perplexity and away from chat gt.

Andrew: Yeah. Like perplexity is kind of like, uh, you know, like when you're in high school and there's like a, a new cool kid who everyone's like, I, I think that like. [00:02:00] That person's like someone I really wanna hang out with now. And like, you know, he is, he's a little different. He wears a different, uh, different style slightly, but like, it's, it's really an alternative and it's really, you know, what's the kind of information that you're looking for.

Um, and I think perplexity is just a, a great alternative, uh, to try. Has a few more free features. At this point in time at least. And, uh, yeah, I'd say it's, it's worth a try. Maybe it's harder to spell. Maybe that's what's keeping people away. But, uh, the elevator pitch is if you're, if you're tired of following the crowd to chat GPT or to Google, uh, gif perplexity or even Claude for that matter, from Anthropic, uh, a shot.

Bobby: Nicely done. Let's get into the guest today. We're gonna do some research, uh, research, uh, chatter, if you will.

Andrew: Was this a segue and you were just like cleverly segueing into research this whole time and I was just rambling on about my, uh, Google searches. Okay. That's okay. Well, hey, that was really clever, even if I didn't pick up on it.

And speaking of clever folk, uh, today's [00:03:00] guest is actually a certified best friend of the Bears Entry Pod. Our first. Three-time guest. That's right. Each year we ask think Lab President Amanda Schneider to join us as a guest to do some prognosticating, to share the latest research from her industry leading firm.

And each year she keeps coming back and delivering the goods. Um, so in addition to her role as the fearless leader of Think Lab, Amanda Ezra announced speaker recently hosting a fantastic. TEDx talk in Fargo, uh, that has now officially even before the recording of this pod. So certainly by the time it's live, it's live, been promoted to the Ted site.

Uh, it's something that the think lab team is definitely out there promoting as well as I think Bobby and I as well on our own personal LinkedIns 'cause it's a big deal. But, uh, we're super excited to have, uh, Amanda, who is the, a world-class podcaster of her in her own right of designer nerds Anonymous.

Also on the surround podcast network, but today she's here with us. We're thrilled to welcome you back for a record setting third time. Amanda, welcome to the pod.

Amanda: Thank you so much. And I think the first thing I need to [00:04:00]clarify for your listeners is I'm proud to say I'm back on caffeine. Bobby, you're gonna be so excited.

Whoa, no more. So that's the biggest news

Bobby: that's come up each year. I

Andrew: like that callback, Amanda. Nicely done. So take the pod back from 1.5 speed to 1.25. Speed. Maybe for your, for your listen today. Yeah.

Amanda: Oh, right, right, right. Dial it back a little bit.

Bobby: Um, I'm fully back on caffeine also for those, for those keeping track at home.

Uh, so first, Amanda, for those uninitiated, talk to us about what Think Lab does and, and what makes the team and the company so unique.

Amanda: Wonderful. So I like to say that we research the world of design and the ecosystem that surrounds. So basically think of us like, uh, McKinsey, but for the built environment.

So we do a lot of research, a lot of benchmarking, a lot of forward looks at what's changing, but really specific to this industry and the nuances. And I think, you know, that's one of the things that's so fun about, uh, this recent TEDx talk, getting promoted to Ted, is that. We've always spoken to this [00:05:00] industry.

You know, we're pretty industry specific, uh, in terms of our research and how we think about all the different topics that we do active research on. But I think, uh, what shifted probably in the past few years is we are now, I feel like starting to speak on behalf of the industry. We've been writing about a lot of these same topics for more than a decade now, but.

You know, just in the last probably year and a half, a lot of our perspective has really started to take off. Uh, that started with the Viral Forbes article Fall of 2023. Uh, we had the number one article in the MIT Sloan Management Review, July of 2024 that I co-wrote with. Shout out to Brian Elliot. I.

Who's a brilliant co-author and then now Ted, which, uh, only about, it's less than 1% of TEDx talks make it to the ted.com stage. So that's a pretty big deal. Um, so I think all of this speaks to not only our perspective, but I would say the hunger of the world to hear from our industry. So I think that is, uh, should be very exciting to all of your listeners.

Bobby: Let's talk about the TEDx [00:06:00] talk because Andrew and I can't

Andrew: help ourselves. Um, yeah. I was one of the organizers of TEDx Toronto for a number of years back in the day, and yet these things don't get promoted to the TED main stage or main virtual stage every day. So, uh, definitely

Bobby: kudos. What goes into producing a TEDx talk, Amanda, I mean, what was that process like for you?

Amanda: Yeah, I can say it was. Super hard. I mean, I'm not afraid of public speaking. I speak probably 20 to 30 times a year on average. But what's really, really hard is, uh, in this particular location, every different TEDx location is a little bit different. Um, but we had 15 speakers, so you had eight to 11 minutes to.

Introduce yourself to an audience that knows absolutely nothing about you. Establish credibility. Uh, make a point that matters, make it memorable. We're spreading. Um, so for me, I had to be very scripted and memorized, which is not my normal approach. So I think, you know, it was a cool experience 'cause it definitely is an exercise in what you're about.

Um, but [00:07:00] also a really hard thing because you really have to be on point and there's not a lot of room for missteps, I guess. Mm-hmm. You've gotta be really, really clear. So, and, and let me, let me flip this on you guys because, uh, this is a tough question, but if you gave a TEDx talk, what would your topic be on?

Because it's, it's a little bit of soul searching. Quite honestly.

Andrew: After you answer, I'd go one of two ways. Um, being from Toronto, I might have some sort of a talk about like the psychological disposition of being from a miserable sports town and sort of how you overcome that and there'd be something there that needs some workshopping.

But, uh, the other, the other area that I'd. It kind of skirts along the lines of where, where you came from. But I really am obsessed with the idea, and that's a big part of what we do and talk about it at Digby, is the more and more that we become beholden to these incredible technologies, AI being a great example of one, the more it's important that humanity shines through and that organizations put humanity first in order to really maximize these things.

[00:08:00] I would probably ramble for eight to 10 minutes just trying to explain my topic though. So the, is the succinctness would've, would allude me and I'm not sure I'd actually nail it, but I'm really curious what you've got, Bobby.

Bobby: I get bad grades on succinctness as well, and there are three instances in which I've had to memorize a presentation I was giving and I like.

Catastrophically bombed each time. I can't memorize a script like I, I would not have been good in, you know, in, in theater in high school and everything. But let's say we were able to overcome that. My knee jerk was to go to something about my daughters and raising daughters. But I don't know if I'm necessarily qualified as the best to do that.

As hard as I try. I think it would have to do with being nice. As a career growth tool. Ah, I might have shared this on the podcast before, but like eight years ago, my mom said, and she didn't say it like, in a, in a, in a mean way. The reason you got to where you are is because you were nice. And folks like will generally kind of like, you know, laugh or smile or smirk at that.

But code switching is something that I think is [00:09:00] underutilized. I think empathy can be underutilized when you're working with folks on a day-to-day basis. And I really think the way in which I've gotten to where I am is. Smart collaboration and, and doing that. While being nice. I think it's so, so important and, and we're missing that a little bit right now globally, so

Andrew: that's a great one.

Bobby, maybe you should, uh, you should think about memorizing something that's,

Amanda: I know we should get him to the TEDx stage. Here we go.

Bobby: Yeah, like, that's, well, I, I don't know about that, but I do wanna linger on Amanda's talk a little bit more because we haven't covered the crux or the, the, the content of the talk in of itself.

So, so give us the highlights of what you brought to the stage.

Amanda: I think the title says it all, and I worked really hard on this title. So, uh, the title is basically, work is Broken, gen Z can Help Us Fix It. Um, and it's a bit of a triggering title. If you read the comments on the TEDx YouTube, you can see that, uh, most of the people commenting actually haven't even listened to the talk.

The premise is basically that our standard norms of work are in many ways [00:10:00] based on outdated norms that really don't apply anymore today. And that the pandemic really gave us an opportunity to kind of reset, uh, if we use it. And I think I. We're kind of in this moment right now that we get to choose if we're gonna use it and learn from those moments or if we're gonna try to go backwards.

And I talk, uh, it gets very personal about my story as a working mom and kind of where I was challenged, uh, as, as a female and a male dominated working world. And where I see some of the solutions lie is, um. And what comes from Gen Z now, the earliest of Gen Z graduated 2019. So just pre pandemic. Mm-hmm.

And at Think lab, we've done a ton of work, uh, around Gen Z and what they're looking for in the workplace. And one of the most, I guess, profound moments in that research was when one of our young Gen Zs said, permission to sp speak freely. We said, of course. She said, we keep talking about how hybrid is hard, but hybrid isn't hard.

It's just how we work. This is really a change management issue for you old people. [00:11:00] Uh. Said bluntly.

Andrew: Yeah.

Amanda: And while that hurt a little bit, I think when we really dove into what they're looking for, especially as I paralleled it to my own personal journey as a working mom building what has become think lab, I think there was a lot of parallels and really some clear instructions for all of us if we're, if we're willing to listen.

Bobby: I wanna put you on the spot for a half second. 'cause you're a mother of, of gen alphas, right? Amanda? I have three alphas. Andrew's got an alpha. Now, at what point do you start thinking about that generation from a work stand? Because we're not that far away at this point, right?

Amanda: Uh, we already are thinking about this.

Yeah. So, uh, super excited, uh, designers anonymous our next season of my podcast. Debuts in April, uh, season seven that we're on, and I actually have one of my own, uh, gen Alpha, my 13-year-old Austin is actually the son that I talk about in the TEDx talk. When I talk about leaving the traditional workforce when he was born, he is now 13 years old.

So I know exactly how old Think lab is as well, and I have him on the pod on our [00:12:00] episode around the future of work. So he actually does the intro. It's the cutest thing you've ever heard. Um, I'll send you both a, a little clip of that. But with him, we're going to start in season eight, really diving into Gen Alpha.

Really the intersection of Gen Alpha, future of work, sustainability, ai. A lot of these topics that, that we're thinking about now. So, you know, I think we've got a while before Gen Alpha hits the workforce and I think everyone's pretty overwhelmed just trying to figure out coming outta the pandemic, you know, where our collective future is headed.

But we're definitely getting ahead of that and really trying to dive into, you know, what we might learn from what these researchers know about Gen Alpha already.

Andrew: Fun fact, my son was born 30 days before the end of Gen Alpha. Wow. Very cool. Jen Beta started on the 1st of January of this year, so th that's, you know, season 13 I think for you.

Amanda: Uh, there we go. We got a little bit of time.

Andrew: Give it a little bit of a headroom, but I think that's such an interesting place to explore and I mean, it goes back to my aforementioned never to [00:13:00] be released. TEDx talk. I love the quote about change management. From your interview subject, like, I think that that's something that we don't think about a lot, uh, or don't think about enough, I guess is, is just that you have all of these swirling, you know, change agents around in addition to just the people themselves, and we don't think about the fact that so much of it is just like having the proper conversations and getting people bought in.

Um, in the right ways. And, you know, maybe we'll use this as a way to segue into, um, your, I'm segueing a lot today into the US design industry benchmark report that that just came out. You know, you talk a lot about just like communication styles. I guess I'm probably not putting the right label on it, but can you talk a little bit about just the way in which that communication layer is coming up in your research as such a critical factor?

Amanda: Absolutely. So if for any of your listeners that are not familiar with our report, it is, uh, aptly titled Very Descriptively, the US Design Industry [00:14:00] Benchmark Report. So, not a fun name, but very, very descriptive. And what that is meant to communicate is it's meant to be a benchmark for the industry. So for any a and d firms that might reference that report, it really should give you context into your work, how big you are relative to others.

Is the industry growing? Is it shrinking? Uh, and then for those, you know, for our clients at Think Lab, we predominantly work with the product side of the industry. It's really a, a blueprint, it's a strategy document for you. It, you are targeting architects and designers, really trying to understand what's in the industry.

It gives you a clear roadmap. Roadmap for those targets. But I would also say even if you're not actively calling on a and d, you know, those interior designers where their work is coming from, whether the industry is growing or shrinking, really has a forward-leaning indicator for where the rest of this industry is headed.

So it can be really, uh, an amazing place to go for insights and information.

Bobby: This was the first year that you explored AI in that report, right, Amanda?

Amanda: We did, yep. It's the first year we've added AI in there, so I know [00:15:00] that's gonna be exceptionally interesting to you guys. So, fun fact, there is, uh, we surveyed about AI and understand that we've asked about this in a few different ways, but we asked in a survey that I wanna say was around April of 2024, who is using ai?

Uh, now that question is funny, as you know, because we are all using ai, we just may not be intentionally choosing or knowingly using AI in our work. Um, but at that point, about 6% of the industry was actively choosing, intentionally integrating AI into their workflow. And just seven months later, when we closed the official report for the US Design Industry Benchmark Report this year, it was around a third, were actively choosing.

Intentionally incorporating AI into their work. So 6% to one third with another third projecting that they will be very soon. Um, that's a pretty big jump.

Bobby: What do you attribute that to?

Amanda: You know, I'm reading this book, I don't know if you guys have heard Mel Robbins let them.

Bobby: Mm-hmm.

Amanda: I think more females are reading it than men, but it's a very interesting book right now, and one of the things that Mel Robbins talks about in [00:16:00] that book is that people will not change unless the path to something different.

Is less painful than the one that they're already on. Yeah. And I think that's what I attribute it to. You know, it's interesting because I, every time I'm on one of these podcasts and I forward it to my dad, it's so funny because he's like, amid, I can't believe they're still paying you to talk about this shit.

Um, is is basically his reaction. So go Bob Christensen very big fan. Um, but. You know, I think that some of the concepts that we've been talking about at Think lab are not necessarily new, but in all of the speaking that I do, all of my travels, I can tell you that the world is now, you know, more ready to hear some of this and, and I think there's less fear and more, in some cases resignation.

Like, oh shucks, here we go. I guess I'm in. I think there was a lot more resistance before and people are now kind of realizing that, like it or not, I'm gonna have to figure this out.

Andrew: To plug our podcast in our own podcast. The barrier to entry really is just so low. Like the, the friction to to try AI [00:17:00] is, is negligible.

Mm-hmm.

Bobby: But if you bring that up, Andrew, to one of your clients, like, would they push back on that? I think people are intimidated ultimately, and maybe your perspective is, it's not intimidating if you just. Realize how easy it might be to start like Amanda was sharing before. Well,

Andrew: Bobby, if you think about technologies that we've discussed on this podcast, the Metaverse blockchain, things like that, AI is a far, far more accessible tool.

Like my Lord, when you Google search now, AI shows up and says hello every single time. Basically, right. If you happen to use Google Workplace as a part of your technology suite or a Microsoft office, ai co co-pilot or Gemini are integrated right into your work. So it's getting served to you on a platter at this point in time with limited, if any investment at all.

Like maybe you're spending $20 a month on chat, GBT, or maybe you're going over and trying perplexity deep research, uh, just for a free account. Right. So the fact that you can just start typing, it's, it's really digging into that sort of traditional adoption curve that you see with these [00:18:00] things. And so that 67% that's not yet integrating it into their work, and I think we had these stats on a previous episode in the season, right?

Um, there's another 30% that's right behind them, and then all of a sudden you're, you're into the laggards and, and it's really just about like, what is the thing that you're waiting for to start. The degree to that becoming an efficient tool, the degree to that becoming something that unlocks productivity, you know, go down the line of all the ways in which AI could just be a sort of a non, uh, a non-event are many.

But the fact, and I think the point is that it's really easy to start.

Amanda: Can I jump in here?

Andrew: Yeah, the guest can certainly jump in.

Amanda: So I, I have a guest that is gonna be on our next season seven of Designer Nerds Anonymous. And one of the things that he said is, most leaders today would rather do something that they, they are familiar with, even if it's wrong, than do something that they're unfamiliar with.

Even it could, if it could lead to a better outcome. And I'm [00:19:00]paraphrasing his quote, so it's not exactly that, but you get. Kind of the general point. And I would say when it comes to technology, people like you, Andrew, are eager adopters and you're eager to try it. I think for most people it's, it's like the threshold to get into a room.

You know, that threshold for some is, you know, you could roll a wheel chair over it pretty easily. For others, it's so big that it's so overwhelming to even think of trying to get in that room. They won't even start. And once you can get that. Chair over that threshold. They're in the room, they're by force.

They're going to learn it. It's going to seem easy very quickly, probably to most of them, but I think just this thought of starting, uh, is really, really overwhelming to a lot.

Andrew: I fully agree. I just think that because there are so few impediments from a cost, from a, from a time investment, from all of these, mm-hmm.

From a learning standpoint, like literally ai, you just talk to it. Right. And so that, that's how you get from 6% to 33% in a year is just because [00:20:00] that that impediment structure is so low with what the technology's offering.

Amanda: And I see that, and I agree with you and it's a total fact, but I will say I think this also gets into generational learning.

You know, our Gen Zers, they expect to be able to self-serve. They're gonna go and Google it before they ask anybody. But when I speak at a lot of these sales meetings, which tends to be very tenured reps over a certain age, a lot of them, their response is. They need to train us on this. When are we gonna have proper training to do this?

It is, um, it's definitely a different mindset and I think that's where some of the fear comes from.

Bobby: There could also be this gray area, which is, there may be organizations that are, I like that Andrew just typing. And by virtue of that, they're starting to leverage ai. They might not qualify that as our firm has, has bought into AI yet they might feel as though we need to make a deeper investment.

We need to think about, uh, behind the scenes how we're leveraging AI to be a data enablement tool For us, it might just be a matter of like, if chat GPT is so inherent in our lives at this point, does it count as, as my organization leveraging ai? If even if we're using that, [00:21:00] I think that you get there quickly for sure.

Amanda: Just another interesting, I guess I'll call it a data point, but it's not very scientific, is, you know, just like I started my TEDx talk with a game of, would you rather. We played this series of Would You Rather Games in our most recent hackathon. And I think we often think of our industry as a very forward thinking industry, uh, and we often push our clients to be for very forward thinking.

But one of the questions that we asked is, would you rather make a move with no data? Or follow your competitors with a solid set of data and only one in five. Actually, only about 20% wanted to make a move with no data that were willing to kind of be the risk takers, the forward thinkers. So four out of five people, 80% said that they would rather follow their competitors.

And I think that [00:22:00] that really suggests to me that there's a lot of opportunity for those folks that want to be the first movers because most people in our industry would rather hang back and see what happens.

Bobby: Is that a byproduct of organizations and firms in the industry being intimidated by the implications of tools like ai?

On the architecture and design industry? Um, or is it more a matter of, okay, we're, we know that we're gonna have to adopt, the industry's going to be disrupted. I need to wrap my head around this first.

Amanda: Yeah. I think it's, it's a general mindset. I don't think it's unique to AI is my, my general take on it. I think that, you know, there is kind of a way things have always been done in this industry.

I think most of us would say we would not, uh, if we could reinvent it, if the like. City burned down and we could rebuild the city from here. We probably wouldn't do it this way yet. Here we are. And I think it's really tough to kind of think about that disruption for our own businesses.

Andrew: So we've kind of gone back and [00:23:00] forth about, you know, what leads people to adopt and how people feel about adoption and, you know, what some of the, the holdups are in some of the opportunities are.

But you're talking to so many different types of organizations. Is there any kind of a profile of the type of organization that's leading in adoption? Are you seeing that it's kind of all over the place, or are there any common. Kind of characteristics between the kinds of groups and organizations that you're speaking to who are, um, starting to be more like those one in five.

Amanda: Yeah, I mean, I would be really interested to your guys' take on this, but you know, in general, first of all, I'm gonna plug your own podcast because you guys sent me a not yet released version of the interview, uh, with Canon Design and they're one to watch for sure. Um, if you haven't gone back, and I believe it's gonna be the previous episode to this one on the feed, I would definitely listen to that one.

But I would say in general, I feel like. The large firms in general, this is not related to Canon, but the large firms in general are like, we're so big, it's hard to change. [00:24:00] Are these little guys gonna beat us to it? And the little guys are saying, those big guys are so much resourced in general, we can't make change as fast as they can.

So I feel like there's this weird like fear that someone else is gonna do it before them. And I think that that is pushing people to maybe get a little bolder than they necessarily would be naturally. Yeah,

Bobby: I think Andrew, what what we've seen, and this is not statistically significant data, by the way, Amanda, but what we've seen in our episodes is that.

Or maybe I've seen, I dunno if you would agree, Andrew, is that there's almost two types of firms here. There are the firms that are, that are so large, if you will, the top 10, top 20 on the Giants list that are like, we gotta go here. We have to productize, we have to improve how prolific our teams are. We have to improve the cl, improve the client experience.

And then you have these smaller or mid-size firms, almost like boutique firms in some instances that are specializing. Mm-hmm. As it relates to their usage of technology, their productizing AI and data. And then I'm guessing that there's this big [00:25:00] middle area then, which is either. Not so big that we have to move, but so big that it's gonna be hard to move.

There are the midsize firms that might be like waiting for someone to make that first move so they can follow them down that path. It's interesting, just as I think back to our conversations with some of our guests, Andrew, David at Husch, for example. Um, and then on the other side of the spectrum, the folks at HOK Can and Gensler, um, it's different approaches based on the size of your firm, but it seems to be those smaller firms in the, in the super large ones.

Andrew: Mm-hmm.

Bobby: So Amanda, on the research side, when you look at how design firms are starting to actually integrate AI into their workflows, Andrew and I hear, you know, different examples Andrew mentioned earlier, like, it's nice when you're able to find a way to solve the problem that you don't like solving on a daily basis.

What are the ways in which. The usage of AI is, is starting to manifest itself, um, in these organizations.

Amanda: Yeah, and I think that's a really interesting conversation right now too. You know, I think back to, we've been doing these Jeffersonian dinners around the country and uh, we had one in particular that was very anti.

We [00:26:00] had, uh, someone from Google that was in charge of their product development that joined us to really talk about ai. And this was just over a year ago. And at that point, uh, there was a lot of pushback saying This is never, ever coming to this industry. And now I think we're seeing adoption on a couple of different fronts.

I think most firms seem more comfortable integrating it into, you know, their marketing or business development, you know, things that aren't directly related to their creative endeavors. Uh, there's a great meme out there that says something like, I want AI to do my laundry and, uh, housework so that I can do more, you know, poetry writing and, and things like that.

And, and I think that that's true for most of these creatives. You know, they want to do the creative work. I. I think that's something that really excites me about, you know, again, what we heard about in that last episode from Canon is, you know, one of the things we've talked about a long time at Think Lab is that the biggest future disruptions in this industry are gonna come from process innovation, not [00:27:00] product.

Innovation now for firms that product is the spaces that they design. And if you look at what Canon talks about in that episode that they're doing with the IDC, is that they are really looking at the process of design and how that happens. They're looking at where friction is and where AI and technology can take some of those hiccups out, um, to really allow their humans to do what they do best.

So, um. You know, back to Andrew's unpublished TEDx talk, if he goes to the human side of AI here, you know, I think that that is super exciting. We are seeing some firms, you know, get into parametric design and some of those things. Those tend to be some of the smaller ones, uh, that are using it for their competitive advantage.

But largely, I think it's more around this process and workflow and to me that's really exciting.

Andrew: Yeah, and I think that, you know. Compounding on that. There's a lot of stuff that's just general process and workflow. That's, I'll call it industry agnostic. Like I mentioned, the fact that, you know, the Google Workplace Suite, uh, Microsoft Outlook has AI baked into it, right?

So like you can [00:28:00] summarize an email with a click of a button now instead of having to read a thread of 50 emails, like little things like that. Then compounded on top of the kind of stuff like we spoke about with Canon that you're talking about here, where you start to get a little bit more bespoke, not only to the industry, but even to the internal workings of a specific firm.

This is how we're gonna choose to, you know, expedite the research of code. This is how we're gonna choose. To do our time sheets. This is how we're gonna choose to, you know, find X, Y, or Z problem that's becoming, uh, a point of friction or a point of time consumption, and really give people time back to be creative, which I think is such a refreshing flip.

Because a year ago we were in a conversation of AI's gonna take our job and it's gonna do all their design work for us. And that was, I think, a really short-lived point of view and happily so. So, you know, what are some of the optimistic takes, I guess, that you're, that you're kind of hearing and perhaps maybe more from those digital native cohorts that you're spending a lot of time with?

Amanda: Well, and I don't know that I'm necessarily hearing this, but maybe let me just [00:29:00] go to kind of the, the advice that I would give. As we look at this is, I would say I'm encouraging everyone on my team, for example, to do a start, stop, keep. It's a very, very simple exercise, but you know, what are the things that you always wanna do that you don't get to a stop would be something that's maybe super time consuming.

Or something that maybe anybody could do that it's not that hard, but it just takes time. Maybe something you don't wanna do or you think someone else could possibly do and then keep are the things that are truly your magic that you do on a day in day out basis or a weekly basis that you want to keep doing.

And where that gets interesting for AI is. As you look at that stop section, the stop section is always the most interesting. We can kind of look at that to say, what could we automate that could free up more of that time for either the start that I never get to 'cause I don't have time or the keep.

That's really where my human magic comes in. Uh, there's a lot of clues in there that can kind of give us a starting point of where we can begin.

Bobby: Just doing that exercise. In my head it starts to add some clarity there. How [00:30:00] about like. Specifically on the tooling and trend side, are there things that you're, we're gonna move into the future casting section of our interview, as we always do with you, Amanda.

Are there tools or trends that have an AI component that you have, uh, your eyes on in 2025?

Amanda: You know, one area that we're digging into a lot, just by nature of our work is AI for business development. I think, you know, a very, very big pain point for a lot of our clients is that their sales reps don't have the same face time.

They did pre pandemic. So pre pandemic, most sales reps in our industry on the product side had 70 to 80% of their time was face-to-face. And today we estimate that that's probably around 40 to 50% based on some surveys that we have been conducting. So when you have half of the FaceTime. How do you make the most of it?

And then even outside of that, FaceTime responsiveness is more important today than ever. So how do we build in systems that allows them to be more responsive? So one of the key episodes in season seven of Design Nerds Anonymous, I [00:31:00] have a gentleman named Chad Burmeister coming on the pod who runs the AI in Sales podcast.

And I think this is where we hear a lot of resistance from the product side of our industry too, where they're like, no, no, no. It's about relationships, relationships, relationships. That is true. But you cannot be the rep that you were in 2019 out and about shaking hands, kissing babies, and the rep that you were in 2021, wickedly responsive.

'cause you were sitting behind your computer. So this episode is really gonna look at how to leverage AI to maybe start to free up some of these sales reps time. But even if AI is not for you, even if you're like, Hey, that is just not. Personal enough. I think even going back to that start, stop, keep, then how do we set up other systems or other people, other humans, how do we connect people to them?

Um, because I think this connection from the digital to the human is gonna get increasingly important moving forward. Um, I think that's where a lot of insight's gonna come from. So, uh, all that to say where we're focused on is how can AI help that sales journey? How can AI [00:32:00] help that client experience?

Andrew: I'm gonna go back to my TEDx talk 'cause you kind of just referenced it again there.

Amanda: Love it. You

Andrew: know, you've said the word systems a few times now, and I love the word in the context of this conversation. How much do you think people are plugging into the realization that these systems are gonna need to be so much more integrated now?

Right? Like the flow of a person's day and wear moments of technology, ai, whatever. Intersect with that have real upside opportunities, um, if they're thoughtfully constructed. Is that something that comes up a lot in your conversations, in your research?

Amanda: I would say that is a terrifying point because a lot of the folks in this industry are still working on getting an email list digitized and cleaned, right?

Mm-hmm. Uh, so if you're in that boat, you're not alone. But a lot of these AI systems really rely on a foundation of data, so bad data in. Bad data out. You gotta get started on the cleanliness of your data to put it in not technical terms. And, and I think that's a [00:33:00] real, really, really, really big hurdle for a lot of these folks.

So, um, the episode that my 13-year-old son introduces me on is, uh, one about the future of work. With Phil Kirschner, if you're not familiar with him. Very disruptive thinker as well. As we introduced him, I was very pleased to make this introduction to, uh, someone at Microsoft that does product development for all of their meeting tools and technologies.

A gentleman named Matthew Mariinski and when you hear them talk about the potentials for the future of work and how. That will get cleaner and cleaner, and these systems thinking will really take friction out of all of our days as individuals. It's really terrifying. But all of that starts with data, clean data, and I think that that's where if, if any of your listeners need to get started, like get started there because you're not gonna be able to keep up if you don't have that foundation built.

Andrew: Yeah, it's, it's interesting how quickly, because I mean, I was an advocate 10 minutes ago on this podcast for get started, right? But very quickly after you get started, it's then, [00:34:00] okay, I kind of have my wits about me here. Now I need a plan. And I think that that's an interesting evolution that's generally happened even just in the people we talked to on this podcast for our very non-research backed anecdotal stats that, that Bobby and I are able to bring to the table.

So, super interesting time for that.

Amanda: I'm sure your listeners made that journey just as fast in the last 10 minutes. They're probably right here with us.

Bobby: I, I, it's also, uh, what you were just describing, Amanda, and, and a big smile on my face because I'm like trying to wrap my head around this and grapple with this in, in my own personal life.

Um, personal work life is, we went from. You know, the phrase, we're all online. Whatever the, I'm, I'm appropriating it or, or paraphrasing it a little bit, which meant you had to be actively online. You had to go on Instagram and post a a picture. You had to go on Twitter and send a tweet. You had to go on LinkedIn and update your profile.

Now, this is more going to be about intrinsically being online because you've connected all of these points at which you're. You're connecting with folks at a trade show, you're using email. You've got your own personal documents, and how [00:35:00] much are you willing to allow, especially if I'm a salesperson, allow the cloud to ingest this material and then work as a facilitator for me.

Because one of the potential pitfalls of especially folks who are not taking major advantage right now of AI tools is it's very clear when somebody is leaning on AI as part of their job, you can sniff it out. It's very, very, whether it's a mid journey image, whether it's a LinkedIn post, whether it's an email.

So you have to be able to be willing to figure out how do I intuitively and uh, uh, allow these systems to understand my voice, understand the way in which I, I approach business, process business. Then you'll start to see ways in which these existing applications that are out there will create a more streamlined process for yourself, and then you can start relying on the systems to actually do some of the work for you.

If you're not smart about it, I think you'll be exposed very quickly in terms of. Unintentionally bad usage of data in terms of poor communication strategies, in terms of bad outputs that were informed by bad inputs. I can see through my personal journey how these applications are [00:36:00] interesting, can be MA major enablement tools, but you have to.

Be actively and thoughtfully leveraging them.

Amanda: And I, I think that that's the danger. And I guess I wanna say that while you can naturally sniff them out, because the two of you spend so much time thinking about this and watching this, I would argue that somewhere between, you know, what's the 94% the. Less of 6% and two thirds of the industry, like probably can't because they're not even started on this journey.

Once you're in it, you definitely can see, oh, that was created by, but I think a lot of people are, are not there yet and and probably don't see that, but I think that I. You bring up a good point, Bobby, because that is something that we all have to be careful about in this world of efficiency is sometimes efficiency makes it feel less personal.

And you know, everyone keeps saying like, all of this technology, it's gonna get there, it's gonna get there, it's gonna get there. But tell me the last time you had a great experience on a fully automated call in line. I can't tell you. Like I think we're still a ways away from that [00:37:00] and I think that that should give people like maybe a little bit of solace that we're.

We're telling you it's moving fast, but maybe it's not moving as fast as we think.

Andrew: So, Amanda, we've talked about this for a while, just like when we're actually not on a podcast, but how are things coming along for you at Think Lab as the leader of an organization in the design industry that has a lot of data, you know, how are you taking steps without giving away too much secret sauce here, um, towards this future that we're prognosticating about?

Amanda: I think for us it's, it's wading in just like anyone else. And I think one of the interesting things that has been an interesting flip for me, I guess, is I came into this like, what tools do we need to know? And I'll say, that's the most frequent. Question that I'm asked is, is what, where do I get started?

What tools do we need to use? And it's, we've really started to shift our thinking from what tools [00:38:00] do we need to use to, what problems do we need to solve? Mm-hmm. Um, and, and I think that's been a big flip for us. Uh, we have the same concerns about, you know, privacy. Like, I don't want anyone on earth to be able to just Google and find all of think lab's depth and breadth of research, right?

Like, we wanna be the solution to help you, but we also wanna enable our clients. So you get into some of these. I would say ethical challenges, but also, you know, we've had some fun experiments. Things like the podcast designer, nerds Anonymous. Andrew helped me actually, uh, train my own GPT.

Bobby: Amanda. GPT.

Amanda: Yeah, it's our D-N-A-G-P-T.

Um, but we uploaded all of our transcripts. We uploaded all the data to say what were the best performing episodes we uploaded. You know, um, any information that we had about the pod that we could, and I'll say it really helped me think bigger about season seven and because I'm getting better at it, even bigger for season eight.

You know, we were able to connect with some of our guests. That's how I found Matthew Mariinski, the, the guest at Microsoft, for [00:39:00] example. Um, so it's really. You know, I can't say enough. We gotta get in and start it. Everyone's in their journey. It's kinda like real estate. The sooner you get into it, the better you can build your wealth.

Um, the sooner you get into ai, the better you can build your knowledge.

Bobby: And that, that, by the way, that is a eureka moment for me, and I'm sure for others, when your own personal GPT starts being self-referential, you ask it for help on something and it refers back to a conversation you had with it a month ago and you're like, oh, okay, I can see that.

I can now start to really. Facilitate, um, a more streamlined way of working and this, this can be a, a major enablement tool for me.

Amanda: Mm-hmm.

Bobby: Should we get to plugs? Andrew? Are we at plugs already?

Andrew: Bobby? I think we might be. That's exciting. I mean, we've, we've, we always tend to have a bit of a plug of palooza when Amanda's on anyways, so, um, well, yeah,

Bobby: tell us more, Amanda, about season seven of DNA, about where folks can find your TEDx talk, uh, and then anything that, that we haven't yet spoken about.

I know you've got an exciting conference, for example, on the eve of NeoCon, uh, on this.

Amanda: Lemme start with, uh, Ted. You can find [00:40:00] my talk on ted.com. If you follow me on LinkedIn, it's just Amanda Schneider on LinkedIn. Um, you'll definitely see it there. Uh, we're gonna make sure of that. So definitely check out the TED Talk and, and I would love any personal notes if it sparks something for you.

I think. This is a very personal message from me. So my hope is that this is not just a one and done talk, that this really does spark people to think differently and bigger about their own work life and, and where we could take this not going backwards conversation and moving it forward. So I hope you listen to that.

Um, the second one I would say is definitely Follow Designer Nerds Anonymous, wherever you get your podcasts, our next season, season seven launches April 3rd. This is gonna be a really fun episode, I think, especially to some of your listeners because it talks about what we call the. Digital journey. So really about this integration of technology and human, everything from websites and how to use your website to get to a human, to, you know, showroom experiences.

Um, you know, a lot of, there's this underlying theme of, of data integration, what you're willing to give up from showroom [00:41:00] experiences to, uh, sales and getting connected with the right person to even the future of work. And we have some great storytelling on there around what the future of work could look like if we.

Allow it to head in this direction, which is either going to excite you or terrify you. Maybe a little bit of both, uh, which is a good thing. And then we're also launching all of our, um, all of our hackathons this year. And I say all of our hackathons because it's a bit different year for us. Uh, normally we do one big hairy topic and we dive really, really deep.

I think what we figured out is there's been so much change over the last five years. 2025 for us is a year of slowing down a little bit, um, to make sure that everyone's with us and because. Just 'cause we hacked something in 2020 doesn't mean it's fully solved and we don't have more work to do. So we're doing a lot around the future of product specification.

Um, updating some old studies that we've done before. So that's super exciting. Things around future of sales, future of marketing, evolving client journey. We also have a hackathon that we're doing with Metropolis [00:42:00] around the future of sustainability. Um, we're calling it sustainability for the common man.

Really, how do we, uh, not just look at these leaders, but. Kind of tailored to all of them. We're launching into luxury residential, which is a new step for us, um, and excited for what that will mean with our partnership with Lux. Another standout brand. And then the one that you guys are probably most excited about is, uh, our AI workshop.

We're doing an AI workshop at NeoCon that is specifically for product manufacturers, and I think we're at a really critical point where. Manufacturers are at risk of falling behind. We are seeing a lot of firms really jump ahead. We're hearing chatter of these manufacturers doing it, but we're gonna bring, uh, some of the industries forward thinking, most forward thinking manufacturers together to really have a candid dialogue, even with some of their competitors in the room to say, you know, how do we make sure that we don't get left behind and, uh, that we're doing our part to push the industry forward.

So if you want more about that, you can certainly reach out to me on LinkedIn as well.

Andrew: That was well plugged, very well plugged. I meant to ask this earlier. [00:43:00] I can't let you go without asking it. This is, I'm, I'm hearkening back to when we had Matthew Le Neuro on, and he told us about what happened when the country called him to design the Olympic flame in a similar context.

What happens when Ted calls you to tell you, like you're, you're, you know, strap on your shoes, you're going into the big leagues with, uh, the TED syndication. What's that? What's that communication like? 'cause it seems like one of those sort of 1% moments that many people won't experience, if at all.

Amanda: Oh man.

That was like a surreal moment. I have to say, so the actual stat is 0.0058% of TEDx talks. Wow. Get to, oh my gosh, Ted stage. So it was like one of these, like you have the guy next to you read it to make sure that like, am I reading this right? Is this saying what I think it is? And

Bobby: the first from TEDx Fargo.

Right.

Andrew: Right, Amanda

Amanda: and the first from TEDx Fargo. Yeah,

Andrew: that's super impressive. That's, that's amazing. Um, we usually ask our guests if they've got any advice, um, for, you know, what steps to take, but I feel like this has almost been like a lay down on the [00:44:00] couch, self-help kind of a pod from that standpoint.

Is there one little sum, summative, uh, note that you would give to people to sort of take away from all of this great conversation?

Amanda: Yeah, I guess I would say if you're overwhelmed by ai, I was too. And, um, if there is, you know, one place that I would say get started, one of the most helpful resources to me as I started on this was a podcast called the Everyday AI Podcast.

Um, they do a good job of, you know, keeping you up to date on news, but also, you know, breaking it down for those of us that are non-techies to listen. So I would say. Check that one out. And then I would also ask your listeners, like, if there are questions you want us to tackle on your behalf, uh, I know I would love to on Designer Nerds Anonymous.

I know that you too, on Barriers to Entry would love to tackle these questions as well. So, hey, send it your way. Uh, we often say our research is only as good as the questions that we're asked, so maybe we can say, our podcasts are also only as good as the questions we know you wanna know. So. I

Andrew: love

Amanda: that.

How's that?

Andrew: That's a, that's a great piece of advice to end. Bobby, do you feel enlightened?

Bobby: I feel [00:45:00] extremely enlightened. I'll just plug for Amanda that you gotta go check out US Design Industry Benchmark Report, go to Think Labs website, think lab design to get lots more of these, uh, facts and figures, and most importantly, the context as well.

Andrew: I have to load up the show notes for this one for sure. There's a lot of, a lot of great links to, to move to. We will, well, as always. Bobby and I would like to send out a big thank you to the Barriers to Entry Production team. Our producer Rob Schulte. Everyone else back at the studio by Sendout Pod Cave Barriers Entry is a part of the surround podcast network where you can also find design nerds anonymous.

Make sure you go to surround podcast.com. That's podcast with an S. Smash, the follow button. And come back next time as we continue to break down the barriers to entry.

I really need to get that family Spotify

Bobby: account. We're family, apple Music. We're the only ones in the world that are family. Apple Music, I think

Andrew: Bobby just said the safety word [00:46:00] and Rob did not appear. That's true. I said Apple.

Bobby: Oh,

Amanda: look at that.