The Infection of Today’s Immediacy Culture

We are at a critical inflection point in consumerism today. As Artificial Intelligence makes the consumer experience faster, we humans, are unknowingly training ourselves to overly rely on “immediacy,” while blatantly overlooking the necessary tools and operational systems to support our consumer behavior. 

In simpler terms, no one considers the mechanisms behind the “order now” or “curbside delivery” is being processed, managed, communicated, or delivered. In fact, at the consumer level, things couldn’t seem easier. However, where we are seeing this bottleneck, is in the actual development of tools and systems that allow this steadily increasing demand for immediate convenience and efficiency. 

As a consumer, only a few short taps on a palm-sized screen can select, place, order, and deliver in a matter of seconds. And what goes on behind the scenes, is a chaotic combination of human madness and artificial intelligence. 

Let’s take Amazon Prime Whole Foods delivery for example. 

With the Amazon Prime App, customers are invited to shop for their items, place their order, and curbside pick-up time, only to arrive on time to pick up their items. Beautifully simple, right? 

What the customer does not see, are the dedicated humans working behind the scenes assigned to shop, choose, navigate, bag, organize, and scan the items, efficiently, to have everything just right in time for the scheduled delivery time. 

Another example would be Tesla’s vehicle delivery. With only a few short clicks on the screen, an excited new owner can order a custom-built Tesla model. While the system prompts the customer to upload the necessary information for vehicle ownership, there is a team of humans working behind the scenes typing away to keep up with the demands of this instantaneous culture.

Don’t get me wrong. We are all happy recipients of this accelerated technology in some form or another. However, what we all imagine may SOON be replaced by robotics, and AI, is currently being handled and processed by hardworking humans who are being stretched thin in an effort to meet the demands of today’s SHOP NOW culture. 

These steady conveniences give way to the critical inflection point I mentioned above. 

With higher demand for immediate service, tech giants and industry leaders are investing billions in creating technological infrastructure to enhance the speed, convenience, and user experience for customers to continue to invest their dollars in the goods and services that said the company is providing. 

Higher product demand means an increased need for a digital infrastructure to keep up. 

And until we can fully transition to a mostly digital, robotically run supply chain system, we’ll watch, as our humans dance delicately alongside the ever-evolving Artificial Intelligence. Doing whatever it takes to make themselves irreplaceable, or at least, more valuable, than the technology that’s being built behind the scenes. 

Think of it like this. Unless one is in the industry of supply chain, direct-to-consumer sales, or operational management, it is easy to believe that what is being delivered today, is simply a side effect of the ever-evolving times. 

However, what is happening is the unconscious training of the human ecosystem to become accustomed to faster, more efficient, conveniences. 

Next time you scroll, tap, pay, order, and take delivery, pause for a moment and consider, what was involved in getting me this delivered ever so conveniently. Whose hands passed through this to support my convenient lifestyle? What can I do to thank this person? 

The hope is that one day soon, human toil will be traded for human power. That our technological advancements will remove the burden from human hands, and give us the space to explore our innate creative potential.