Executive News | Private Brief | 30 October 2026

Are we becoming more productive, but less human?

AI, our phones and what we risk losing in the pursuit of efficiency.

Like so many of us, I have been thinking a lot lately about our relationship with technology.

I recently shared a LinkedIn post about AI and how, as I use it more, I sometimes find myself questioning where my own thinking ends and AI begins. Interestingly after my post and thoughts I have discovered it seems listening to some recent CEOs from AI companies such as Mustafa Suleyman, co-founder of DeepMind, and D. Scott Phoenix, co-founder and former CEO of Vicarious, this is a real possibility, which is another existential topic.

I do like what AI makes possible. I use it regularly in my work, and through my involvement in immersive learning and emerging technologies, I see enormous potential for how it can help us learn, create and grow in some areas and it diminishes our growth in others.

But I’ve also started asking myself:

Am I using technology to enhance my thinking, or am I gradually handing more of my

thinking over to it?

And perhaps the bigger question is, in our pursuit of greater productivity and convenience, are we losing touch with some of the very things that make us human?

Our attention has become a commodity

I recently listened to a fascinating episode of The Diary of a CEO, featuring cognitive neuroscientist Dr Sahar Yousef.

She explored how technology is designed to capture and hold our attention, drawing parallels with the processed food industry.

Food manufacturers learned how to make products increasingly appealing by adding sugar, salt and fat, encouraging us to consume more.

Technology platforms have developed their own version.

Endless scrolling. Short videos. Notifications. Likes. Recommendations. Content that never seems to end.

Many of these features are deliberately designed to keep us engaged and coming back.

We all know the experience.

I’ll just check my phone for a couple of minutes.

And suddenly, 45 minutes or an hour has disappeared.

What concerns me is how accustomed we’ve become to consuming short, constantly changing content, and what this might mean for our ability to concentrate, think deeply and simply sit with our own thoughts.

We have access to more information than ever before.

But are we becoming better thinkers, or simply better consumers of information?

You’re better than your default settings

One of my favourite messages from Dr Yousef was that we shouldn’t simply accept the default settings on our devices.

Most of us have never consciously chosen how our phones are configured. We accept the alerts, notifications and interruptions that come with them.

Yet these settings influence how often we’re distracted, where our attention goes and ultimately how we spend our time. We have forgotten we have agency in our electronic life.

She shared some surprisingly practical suggestions, including switching your phone to greyscale.

In research she discussed from her lab, participants who changed their screens to greyscale reduced their phone use by an average of around one hour a day over three weeks.

Imagine reclaiming even a fraction of that time for more enjoyable truly human centric experiences.

Her advice also included turning off unnecessary notifications (I would suggest most are unnecessary), putting phones physically away when concentrating and being more intentional about the content we consume.

What I particularly liked was the idea that we don’t always need more discipline. Sometimes we simply need to change our environment.

​Listen to Dr Sahar Yousef on The Diary of a CEO​

But are we also deskilling ourselves?

Around the same time, I read another thought-provoking article by Melanie Challenger in Aeon, titled Deskilling the body.

It took my thinking a step further.

Challenger explores how our increasing reliance on technology may be reducing opportunities to develop and practise important human capabilities.

We follow GPS rather than navigating ourselves. We reach for our phones instead of sitting with our thoughts. We ask AI to write, summarise and organise our ideas, sometimes before we’ve

There’s a difference between technology that strengthens our capabilities and technology that substitutes for the very experiences through which we develop them.

One of the ideas that really resonated with me was the importance of recognising that human intelligence isn’t simply about thinking.

We are not simply brains processing information, rushing through life being busy.

Our bodies, senses, emotions, relationships, intuition and lived experiences all contribute to how we understand and navigate the world.

AI can process extraordinary amounts of information, but it doesn’t possess the embodied, lived experience of each and every human.

As AI becomes more capable, I wonder whether we’re increasingly measuring too much of human value through the same lens: how quickly we can analyse, produce, solve and respond.

Perhaps we’re underestimating the extraordinary intelligence we as humans already possess.

​Read Melanie Challenger’s article: Deskilling the body​

It took me until my 40s to really start listening to my body

For much of my life, I was very good at doing. Working, building a career, raising three children, managing responsibilities and constantly thinking about what needed to happen next.

Always busy. Always something to do.

It was not until my 40s that I really began to appreciate what it meant to be connected to my body rather than predominantly living in my head.

Looking back, that seems rather extraordinary.

I’d spent decades relying on my body without always paying attention to what it was telling me.

Was I tired? Stressed? Energised? Was something not quite right? What did I actually need?

Over time, I’ve become much more appreciative of the importance of listening to myself, trusting my intuition, moving my body, spending time in nature, eating well and allowing myself moments of stillness.

Not just looking after my physical health, but recognising the connection between my body, mind, emotions and how I experience the world.

And I suspect I’m not alone.

So many of us spend our lives in doing mode that we forget to notice how we’re actually living.

When did productivity become the ultimate goal?

Technology was supposed to make our lives easier. And in some ways, it has. That said every action has a reaction!

We can answer emails faster, create content instantly, attend meetings from anywhere and access information in seconds.

But what are we doing with the time we’re supposedly saving?

Are we spending more of it with people we love? Being creative? Thinking deeply? Resting? Enjoying life?

Or are we simply filling it with more work, more information, more notifications and more things to do?

I don’t believe the answer is to totally reject technology.

I believe emerging technologies have enormous potential to enhance our lives and expand human capability in some areas of our lives.

But I do think we need to be much more intentional about how we use them.

Technology should expand our human potential, not gradually erode the capabilities that make us human.

A few small things to try this week

Perhaps we don’t need another productivity hack.

Perhaps we need to reclaim some of our attention.

• Turn off non-essential notifications.
• Try greyscale mode on your phone.
• Put your phone in another room when you want to concentrate or be present.
• Spend an hour at a time and build up to longer stretches of time without listening, scrolling or consuming content.
• Take a walk, notice how your body feels and give yourself room to think.
• Before asking AI for an answer, spend real time developing your own thinking first.

And if changing your phone habits feels difficult, I’d recommend Atomic Habits by James Clear.

It’s a great reminder that changing our behaviour isn’t simply about willpower. It’s about making the habits we want easier and the habits we don’t want harder.

Rather than relying on yourself not to check your phone, put it out of sight. Remove distracting apps from your home screen. Change the environment that’s triggering the behaviour.

Small changes, consistently applied, can make a meaningful difference.

​Explore Atomic Habits by James Clear​

A final thought

You are better than the default settings on your phone.

You have agency, celebrate what it is to be the unique human you are.

Value your body, your emotional wellbeing as much as your intellectual capabilities.

And to remember that life is about more than how much we produce or how quickly we get things done.

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Has technology genuinely given you more time and freedom, or do you sometimes feel more consumed by it than ever?

Sources and further reading

• Mustafa Suleyman — What is an AI anyway?, TED Talk, April 2024.
• D. Scott Phoenix — Why humans should merge with AI, TED Talk, April 2026.
• Dr Sahar Yousef — Interview on The Diary of a CEO, October 2026.
• Melanie Challenger — Deskilling the body, Aeon.
• James Clear — Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results.

About Kelly Magowan

Kelly Magowan is an executive coach, leadership strategist and the creator of The Level Up Program™. Through immersive and human-centred learning experiences, she helps leaders and teams strengthen self-awareness, communication, adaptability and the human capabilities needed to navigate changing workplaces. Learn more about Kelly's work at Diversitas Consultingand explore The Level Up Program.

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