AI Won't Fix a Structural Problem with AJ Bubb

A lot of organizations are betting that AI will make their teams faster. Some of them are right. Most are solving the wrong problem.

AJ Bubb, founder of MxP Studio and host of Facing Disruption, joins Peter and Dave to talk about what actually happens when AI lands in a development team without fixing the system around it. If engineers can't get approvals, can't get access, and spend half their day in meetings, AI just means they produce more output the organization still can't handle. That's not a tooling problem. It's a structural one.

They also get into velocity without direction, what ownership really looks like when a ticket gets blocked, and why synthetic user testing might be the most polite way to avoid talking to actual customers.

This Week's Takeaways

• Own the problem from the customer all the way down. When something is blocked, it's still yours until it moves.
• When an outcome surprises you in either direction, ask whether your model was wrong. Most teams take the win and move on. The ones that improve don't.
• Before reaching for a technical solution, ask why five times. The problem someone walks in with is usually the invitation to a conversation, not the actual problem.

If this episode got you thinking, we'd love to hear from you. Drop us a note at [e-mail] or leave a review on your podcast app. And if you know someone navigating AI adoption right now, send this one their way.