Designing for Humanity in the Age of AI

The Playbook

Designing for Humanity in the Age of AI explores how leaders can draw from HCI, psychology, sociology, and humanity-centered design research to navigate the most urgent challenges of AI.  

Each piece starts with a leadership problem, explains it through the social sciences, and provides a practical path forward.

Who It’s For

Executives, Policymakers, and Product Leaders who need clear frameworks for trustworthy AI adoption and seeking more than compliance checklists.

Under pressure to adopt AI responsibly.

Need more than compliance checklists.

Want a competitive advantage grounded in employee trust

Why This Matters

AI is moving faster than governance, strategy, and leadership frameworks. Compliance will keep you legal, but it won’t build trust, adoption, or legitimacy. The real challenge isn’t just technical—it’s human.

We’ve been here before. Social media ignored decades of social science research and became an engine of manipulation, polarization, and distrust. With AI, the risks are even greater. Leaders can’t afford to repeat that mistake.

Why It’s Different

It’s 100% FREE and most importantly it’s not another hype-driven AI guide.

It’s grounded in HCI, psychology, sociology, and design ethics. Each tool turns research into a practical step leaders can take now. These tools are designed to be used immediately in board meetings, product reviews, or strategic planning.

What You’ll Get

This playbook is a practical and intellectual bundle based on HCI, psychology, sociology, and information science research. It combines executive tools with a two-part article series that frames today’s leadership challenges in AI.

Practical Tools for Leaders

Concrete frameworks you can use immediately in boardrooms, product reviews, or strategy sessions:

  • The Human Imperative Diagnostic — 12 questions to identify your organization’s greatest AI risks.

  • The AI Trust Maturity Model — A roadmap to move from compliance → maturity → differentiation.

  • The Five Commitments Framework — Leadership principles that protect human autonomy, strengthen accountability, and design for humanity.

Mini-Series 1: Designing for Trustworthy AI

Essays that surface the most urgent risks leaders face when AI systems scale:

  • The Warnings We Ignored — Why social sciences foresaw the harms of social media and what they teach us about AI.

  • The Manipulation Problem — How design turned from usability to dark patterns, and how to reset.

  • The Authority Problem — Why humans defer to machines, and how to restore accountability.

  • The Information Problem — How algorithms fracture shared reality, and what leaders can do about it.

  • The Trust Problem — Why compliance isn’t enough, and how to turn trust into a strategic advantage.

Mini-Series 2: Redesigning Human-Centered Design for the AI Era

Essays that show how to evolve design practices for adaptive, opaque, and social systems:

  • The Design Problem — Why traditional HCD methods fail with AI, and how to redesign them.

  • The Psychology Problem — Machine psychology and the risks of AI “personality.”

  • The Collaboration Problem — How to design for human–AI partnerships that elevate humanity.

Capstone Manifesto

The Leadership Problem: Designing for Humanity — A synthesis of both series, introducing the Five Commitments as a new framework for leadership in the AI era.