When everyone is good, good stops counting
When the basic level of good work rises, the middle gets crowded. Competent work stops setting you apart, and the range of what gets made shrinks even as each piece improves.
When the basic level of good work rises, the middle gets crowded.
This leads to a problem that is easy to miss. When the basic level of good work rises, the middle gets crowded.
More people can now produce competent work. So competent work stops setting you apart.
Research on AI use in Nordic companies shows this plainly. Firms using off-the-shelf AI tools gain ten to twenty percent on the tasks they target. But they do not pull ahead of rivals using the same tools. Everyone has them, so no one gains a lasting edge.
There is a second effect, on the group as a whole. One study of AI-assisted writing found that each person's story got better, and the stories also became more alike. The average rose, and the range shrank.
Competent work stops setting you apart, and a slow dependency on the default tool.
When the basic level of good work rises, the middle gets crowded.
Research on AI use in Nordic companies shows this plainly.
Firms using off-the-shelf AI tools gain ten to twenty percent on the tasks they target.
Then there is the slow dependency, which is where the H&M question returns. Is this tool your default for thinking through a problem?
Once it is, the bond compounds. Your chat history becomes part of how you work. The monthly bill grows, not because the tool is unfair, but because it is genuinely useful, and useful things are hard to leave. The build-up does the locking-in, quietly.
Research on AI use in Nordic companies shows this plainly.
Competent work stops setting you apart, and a slow dependency on the default tool builds in.
When the basic level of good work rises, the middle gets crowded. Competent work stops setting you apart, and the range of what gets made shrinks even as each piece improves.
This is the short version. Read the full-length essay, “The Swedification of Everything”.
This issue is part of Everybody's Smart, a newsletter on taste, judgment, AI, culture, cognition, and the future of professional work. New issues every 2 to 3 weeks, free on LinkedIn.
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