MIKE HICKMAN Group Creative Director · AKQA

Mike Hickman Group Creative Director · AKQA

Thinking.

Essays and field notes from a running practice.

WRITING

  • 17 years. Culture compounds.

    Let me start with what I traded. Then what I got instead.

    ESSAY Craft & Longevity 21 AUG 2026 ~3 MIN

  • The Costume of Rigor

    None of my system's worst failures were hallucinations. Every source was legitimate — and every scope was wrong.

    ESSAY AI & Design 13 AUG 2026 ~11 MIN

  • The Founding

    The site was finished. The research said finished was the problem.

    FIELD NOTE WORKING 7 JUL 2026 ~2 MIN

  • Answerable for What You Didn't Make

    AI gives you the time back. The danger is spending it on more of the work it just did for you.

    ESSAY AI & Design 18 JUN 2026 ~3 MIN

  • The work moves

    Flash was amazing. Then it had problems everyone could see and kept ignoring anyway. The ones who survived weren't the best Flash designers. They were designers who'd never confused the tool for the work.

    ESSAY Craft 27 MAY 2026 ~1 MIN

  • The editor and the maker

    My eye has gotten faster than my hands. I know what the work should be. Then I open the editor and the gap between what I see and what's on the screen becomes the work.

    ESSAY Craft 29 APR 2026 ~1 MIN

  • Advocating vs. earning

    I had the whole case. I led with the design instead.

    ESSAY Design Leadership 27 APR 2026 ~2 MIN

  • AI didn't change what good design leadership is. It made it legible.

    The performance of design has nowhere to hide anymore. What's left is the work that was always worth doing.

    ESSAY AI & Design 18 APR 2026 ~2 MIN

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