Why Cultivating Agency Matters More than Cultivating Skills in the AI Era | Max Schoening (Notion)
Why It Matters
Agency‑focused cultures enable teams to harness AI’s speed without sacrificing quality, giving firms a decisive edge in a market where rapid iteration is the new norm.
Key Takeaways
- •Agency, not just skills, drives success in AI‑augmented work.
- •Designers and PMs should prototype in code to understand AI agents.
- •High‑agency employees reshape roles, bypass traditional job boundaries.
- •Early AI playgrounds lower friction, accelerating product experimentation.
- •Balancing coding with strategic thinking prevents shallow feature churn.
Summary
Max Schoening, head of product at Notion, argues that the AI era shifts the competitive edge from raw technical skills to personal agency – the belief that one can shape outcomes and iterate rapidly. He observes that the first 10% of a project – ideation and prototype – is now almost free thanks to large language models, prompting teams to experiment without the traditional cost of building scaffolding.
The conversation highlights several trends: designers and product managers are moving from static Figma mock‑ups to code‑first prototypes, learning the material of AI‑driven agent loops. This hands‑on approach forces a deeper understanding of how prompts, feedback, and model behavior interact, rather than merely shipping superficial UI tweaks. High‑agency individuals, like Notion’s Brian Leven and Eric Lou, exemplify the new mindset by redefining roles, recruiting proactively, and turning strategy documents into functional prototypes.
Schoening stresses that coding is valuable not for production volume but as a learning tool that reveals the constraints and possibilities of AI‑augmented software. He warns against conflating rapid feature output with quality, noting that while the quantity of software has surged, reliability remains uneven. The goal, he says, is to master the medium – the AI agent – before scaling it into a polished product.
For businesses, cultivating agency means empowering employees to treat the product as a malleable system, encouraging cross‑functional fluency, and investing in low‑friction experimentation environments. Companies that embed this mindset will adapt faster to evolving model capabilities, maintain higher product quality, and avoid the talent bottlenecks that arise when roles become overly siloed.
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