AI as Assistance

My Office

What does your workspace look like?

My office is full of books, binders, and paper. I have several Rubik’s cubes that I solve when I need to think.

I have many computers – deliberately with technology gaps between them.

On the desk there are colored pencils, a digital whiteboard, but also Lego bricks and Fischertechnik. I have a HoloLens. And a Vision Pro.

And yes – even a marble run.

I prefer working with pencil and paper. The computer usually comes later.

But I work.

Lego and Fischertechnik

When I build with Lego, it is difficult to combine them with Fischertechnik. Different systems. Different connectors. Different logic.

But I can build a car from Lego. And a robotic arm from Fischertechnik.

And suddenly, these things can be combined in play.

Our development world looks quite similar.

One developer builds backends in C#. The other works mainly with SQL.

Technologically, these are completely different worlds.

But both know exactly what an interface for capturing inspection data should look like. Both understand the domain.

Perhaps they even share the same vision.

The question is: How do you bridge the technology gap between these worlds?

Something is often missing in between.

What AI Changes

AI can be that missing piece.

Not as a replacement for developers. But as a mediator between different technical worlds.

It can help translate.

It can support two developers in building a data entry form together – once they have agreed on a technology.

It can suggest initial implementations, and the developers review them. Test-driven. Structured. Traceable.

It can serve as a sparring partner to think through a solution together.

It can research, formulate acceptance criteria, and bring together knowledge from different domains.

And it can do something that is often difficult for humans:

It knows which problems others have already solved.

Not because it is smarter. But because it sees more broadly.

People at the Center

The best role for AI is not that of the decision-maker.

It is that of the assistant.

A partner that lets people focus on their actual problem. That absorbs technology gaps instead of passing them on. That makes knowledge accessible instead of hiding it.

In a domain that may have grown over years. That carries scars. That contains experience.

AI does not replace that experience.

It makes it accessible.

Conclusion

AI is not a replacement for people.

It is a tool.

A tool that empowers people to think beyond the boundaries of their own technologies.

Like Lego and Fischertechnik.

The bricks do not fit together.

But what you build from them does.