The Fluency Problem

The person who can hold multiple disciplines at once — design, engineering, product — faces a particular version of the information overload problem. When your job requires fluency across domains, the surface area of what feels relevant explodes. Every new AI capability touches something you care about, whether it's a design tool, a coding paradigm, or a product strategy shift.

That's the tension: the same cross-domain fluency that makes you effective in this new era also makes you maximally vulnerable to the firehose. You can't just ignore the frontend framework news because you're "not an engineer." You can't tune out the design tool launches because you're "not a designer." Everything feels like it applies, because in some sense it does.

The discipline required is knowing that fluency doesn't mean tracking every development in every domain. It means maintaining enough awareness to lead, while resisting the pull to become a full-time student of each field. The work has to come first.