How it started… and how it’s going now Lately I’ve been writing a lot about AI from the outside in. Why rolling out AI isn’t like rolling out software. Whether organisations are ready for AI that does things. What we might be giving away when we hand over the hard thinking. And why nobody wants… Read More My AI Toolkit in 2026
Fourth in a series on AI at work. This one’s less about the workplace and more about us. I listened to a podcast interview with Dr Norman Swan recently and ordered his new book, The Brain Cliff, before it had finished. It’s currently on the bedside table in the queue of books waiting for me… Read More The Cost of Hard Thinking We’re Giving Away
I have a very particular way of gardening.The weather has to be good. I need to have a good chunk of time, not a scrap of it, a proper block. And I need the energy. All three need to line up. Then I make a coffee, put my gloves on, and head out the back… Read More Designing learning for fluctuating capacity
I wear bifocals all day, every day. They are, quite literally, the thing that lets me see clearly. And yet at least once a day, I take them off for some perfectly sensible reason – cooking something steamy, wiping my eyes, no idea really – and a few minutes later I genuinely could not tell… Read More What Hope Do We Have? Some Thinking on Learning, Technology Adoption, and the Science of Forgetting
A few days ago I was at a specialist appointment with one of my kids. At some point the conversation turned to teen fatigue across the school week – the kind of bone-tired-by-Thursday feeling that a lot of parents will recognise. The specialist responded in a very matter-of-fact way: “It’s cognitive load”. I thought about that… Read More It’s Not Just the Tech: The Hidden Cognitive Load of the Physical Workplace
I’m trying to walk more at the moment, and walking means alone time, pondering, and ideas… and more writing. The concept of cognitive load has been on my mind, which I think was triggered by a small, unremarkable moment. I was trying to find a file. I couldn’t remember if it was in Teams, SharePoint,… Read More The Hidden Cost of Tool Sprawl: What It’s Actually Doing to Your Brain
I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I use AI regularly and benefit from doing faster work, help thinking more clearly on hard days, and getting through content I’d otherwise struggle to start. But I’ve also caught myself wondering… am I building a crutch? Given how passionate I am about Executive Functions, and how… Read More AI and Executive Functions: Is It Helping or Harming You?
I was at the Digital Workplace Conference in Melbourne last week and kept hearing people talk about Skills in Copilot Cowork. It stopped me in my tracks. Not because the concept was unfamiliar, but because I’ve spent the last couple of months exploring and building Skills in Claude. And suddenly the same word was being… Read More Same word. Two very different things. My confusion with ‘Skills’ in AI
Last week was a big one.I moved through analysis, content, ideation… the kind of work that would normally take me days of circling, drafting, second guessing. By Friday I realised I’d pushed through what would usually be a week, or even a month. And instead of feeling proud, I felt… off. Not tired in a… Read More AI overwhelm: when the pace feels… off
Last month I wrote about my first experiences with Claude. I ended that post promising month two would get more interesting. Oh, it did. This month I set myself a comparison activity. I’d already built a personal coaching companion as a Skill in Claude, just as a side project. A test case. Now I wanted… Read More Month two with Claude (and Copilot): the day I built a coach as a Copilot Agent