The Reorganization of Everything

“Almost everything about the way humans interface with information has changed in the last 20-30 years.”—Rachel Eve Ginsberg, Experience Designer

For about thirty years, every significant shift in how organizations operate has been preceded by a shift in how humans interface with information. Getting that sequence right matters. Organizations that have understood ongoing technological shifts as structural rather than merely operational have gotten ahead of the transition. Those that do not are still trying to orient themselves for the future course.

As an example, the digitization wave of the 2000s looked like an infrastructure upgrade. In practice, it was a reorganization of every process that had previously run on paper, phone, and physical presence. The SaaS expansion of the 2010s is another example. It looked like a cost optimization. In practice, it continues to be an accountability and functionality distribution that spans entire industries. 

Rachel Eve Ginsberg, an experience designer and consultant who works with museums and libraries, including current work with the Library of Congress, described the present moment plainly: almost everything about the way humans interface with information has changed in the last twenty to thirty years. Her best example is in libraries, institutions whose core function is managing information infrastructure, which are in a period of fundamental structural transformation. Their traditional value proposition is disbursing across an uneven information landscape, even as their role as community anchor becomes more important, not less.

The current result of all these shifts is that every organization operates with parallel information layers, and those layers have been reorganized twice in the past thirty years. Now, a third reorganization is underway.

What AI will change in all businesses but especially in regulated institutions like government, healthcare, and finance, is not yet fully visible. What is visible is the pattern. The organizations that treated the first two transitions as technology problems are still paying for that framing. The only thing for sure is that the current transition will not be resolved in the technology budget. 

Two ways forward — pick the one that matches the seat you're in today.

If you lead operations at a regulated organization → The third reorganization is already in your portfolio, usually as cost and accountability spread across tools no single person fully owns. The Technology Cost Diagnostic is six statements, three minutes, ending with one specific thing you can do about it this week. Find out what your stack is actually delivering →

If you're doing the work and want to do it better → The organizations that get ahead of these transitions treat them as structural, not operational. The HCD Guide Series is the transferable methodology for doing exactly that — practitioner guides you can put to work on your own projects, no engagement required. Browse the HCD Guide Series →

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Credits:
Guest: Rachel Eve Ginsberg Host: Sheev Dave Producer: Ana Monroe Text: A. Adams Artwork: Seesaw - Gloucester, Massachusetts. Published 1874. After Winslow Homer Why this Artwork: Honestly, this is how I feel navigating all the technology changes that have happened across my career. — Abi