Elevating human abilities through context-aware, user-centric AI solutions

AI can either be a game-changer or a source of frustration — it all depends on how it’s designed.

At Fractal, we’ve identified key UX principles that ensure AI systems truly understand and empower users. Let’s explore these principles through stories that show how thoughtful design makes all the difference in elevating human abilities.

Picture this: It’s Monday morning, and a supply chain manager wakes up to news of unexpected delays.

Weather disruptions, traffic congestion, and sudden demand fluctuations threaten to disrupt deliveries. Scrambling through fragmented data and manual processes, the manager struggles to figure out a solution.

But with an AI-powered assistant, the picture changes entirely. Within moments, the system integrates weather forecasts, traffic conditions, and real-time demand data to suggest rerouted plans, mitigating risks before they spiral out of control.

Principle 1: Create context-aware systems

Construct systems with a comprehensive understanding of context, utilizing situational and historical insights to provide complete user perspectives.

“How effectively does your AI system adapt to the real-world environment it operates in?”

The supply chain manager's challenge reveals a fundamental design principle we call create context-aware systems. When unexpected disruptions threaten to derail operations, an AI system that truly understands context becomes invaluable. This principle involves designing GenAI systems that intuitively align with users' real-time environments, providing personalized and proactive support.

Contextual Awareness means creating tools that not only work with data but also with the dynamic, complex contexts in which users operate.

Consider FlyFish.ai, the e-commerce chatbot, as a prime example of contextual awareness in action. When a customer inquiries about an order status, the chatbot automatically retrieves the most recent shipping information based on the customer's order history, providing a real-time update with options to modify or track the order further. The chatbot can also understand customer product comparison requests with minimal explanation, drawing from conversational and external context to provide precisely what the user needs.

*Disclaimer: The images shown are for illustration and reference purposes only

The interface features an online shopping assistant that intuitively understands situational and past conversational contexts, providing personalized guidance and enhancing the shopping experience through sophisticated AI comprehension.

To embrace this principle, designers should examine their AI solutions by asking:

• Does the AI system understand the situational context the user is in?

• Can AI anticipate user needs and prepare appropriate output?

• How much historical context or information will the system remember after an interaction?

Now consider: A new user opens their mobile banking app for the first time.

With little familiarity with the interface, they feel overwhelmed by the complexity of managing accounts, tracking spending, and setting up alerts. However, the app is aware of this and provides simple, easy-to-understand prompts that guide users step-by-step through the process. It’s intuitive, straightforward, and makes managing finances accessible, even for a beginner.

Now, imagine a more seasoned user — someone comfortable with technology and managing finances. As they open the app, they’re greeted with a more advanced interface that provides deeper insights into their spending trends, savings goals, and investment opportunities. The app adapts to their expertise, offering tools and features that match their level of familiarity and comfort, helping them make more informed financial decisions.

Principle 2: Evolve with the user’s maturity

Adapt complexity and guidance to match the user's experience level, growing expertise, and iterate with the user’s feedback.

“Is your AI system designed to meet both novice and expert users where they are?”

The mobile banking app's ability to adapt to different user expertise levels illustrates another critical design principle: Evolve with users’ maturity. This principle goes beyond one-size-fits-all solutions, recognizing that users have diverse skill levels and learning curves.

Responsive AI is about creating interfaces that dynamically adjust to each user's unique journey. This means tailoring experiences that evolve with the user's growing capabilities.

Consider a Learning and Development platform that creates personalized learning paths tailored to an employee's job role, performance, career aspirations, and past learning behaviors. Similarly, a financial app can transform its dashboard to provide increasingly sophisticated insights as a user becomes more financially savvy.

"Illustrative example above: Photoshop with GenAI features offers intuitive entry points for novice users, while retaining advanced tools and workflows for experts. This enables diverse user experiences and tailored pathways based on skill level."

The key questions designers must ask are

• Do the user experience and features change with the user's skill level?

• Is there a user experience personalized to each unique user and their requirements?

A designer is working on a new layout for a digital product.

She opens an AI-powered design tool, expecting it to suggest layouts and structures that can streamline her work. The AI analyzes the project’s requirements and presents several intelligent design suggestions, helping the designer explore new possibilities. However, the key here is that the AI doesn’t dictate the design decisions. Instead, it acts as a creative partner, offering suggestions while leaving the final decisions to the designer.

In this scenario, the AI enhances the designer’s capabilities, offering efficiency and inspiration without compromising her control. The user feels empowered to make decisions, trusting that the AI’s insights are there to help.

Principle 3: Elevate humans' abilities

Empower users to do more than ever, by amplifying users’ creativity and capability, delivering innovative tools and insights, and thereby improving human effectiveness.

“How can we design AI tools that boost human capabilities while preserving their decision-making power?”

The designer's interaction with the AI design tool perfectly embodies the principle of elevating human abilities. This principle recognizes that the most effective AI amplifies human expertise. The goal is to ensure that AI tools enhance user capabilities without creating dependency.

Imagine a coding platform that not only assists with code generation but also explains its modifications, adding relevant comments to help users understand and improve the code. Or an enterprise data analysis platform that generates interactive visualizations, offering insights and highlighting patterns while ultimately encouraging users to draw their conclusions.

The key is striking a delicate balance:

• Does AI allow humans to do more than before?

• Does the human feel restricted or enabled by AI implementation?

Designing AI that understands, adapts, and empowers

The first three principles of the framework — Create context-aware systems, evolve with users’ maturity, and Elevate humans’ abilities — are about building AI that is intuitive, adaptable, and genuinely helpful. These principles turn AI into a trusted partner in tackling everyday challenges.

“These principles move us beyond theoretical benefits to practical tools that seamlessly integrate into daily tasks, delivering scalable impact.”

In the next article, we’ll explore the remaining principles: Make humans in charge, Clarify how AI thinks, and seamlessly blend AI into workflows, which focus on trust and safety. Together, they complete the journey toward AI systems that don’t just work but truly work for you.