Build Back Better? Show Me the Parachute
On dehumanisation, imposed change, and the exhaustion of having to begin again.
Imagine sitting in an aeroplane when a cheerful announcement interrupts your journey. The flight has been upgraded. The doors are opening. Passengers are expected to step into the sky and adapt accordingly.
Someone asks about parachutes. Apparently, there is an excellent onboarding video.
That is the image that came to me while trying to make sense of changes to my familiar AI tools. I had built things around them. I had learned how to work with them. After testing their replacements, I was questioning how much time and energy I should spend making the next version useful to me.
Then the thought widened. The same question can apply to a workplace, a public service, a bank, or any system that changes the way we must deal with it. Each organisation introduces its own improvement. The person at the receiving end has to carry the combined weight.
Better needs evidence
“Build back better” sounds reassuring. It promises that the disruption has a purpose and that something worthwhile waits on the other side. I understand the appeal. We want our effort to lead somewhere.
The fallacy begins when the promise is treated as proof. Calling a replacement better does nothing to establish whether it is better for the people expected to use it. Their time, costs, access, confidence, and ability to continue their work belong in that assessment.
A service may become cheaper to operate while becoming harder to use. A tool may gain features while losing the familiar way someone relied on it. A transition may transfer hours of unpaid repair work to customers and still look successful in the launch report.
Better has to include the person carrying the cost of the change. Otherwise, the word becomes a lovely label on somebody else’s homework.
One person carries all the resets
Picture an ordinary day. A familiar service has a new sign-in process. A workplace changes its procedures. An app moves the function you need. Another platform replaces the tool you finally understood. Each announcement describes a small adjustment. Together, they can turn ordinary participation into an ongoing course with compulsory attendance.
There is no convenient interval in which life waits for everyone to catch up. People may already be managing illness, caring responsibilities, financial pressure, or grief. Others are living with the consequences of war, natural disaster, displacement, or exploitation. News and arguments can add demands on attention even when there is little anyone can do about the events themselves.
Another reset arrives in the middle of that life. The person facing it may have very little energy left to spend.
We cannot infer how many people feel lost simply from those who look as though they are coping. Someone can complete a process while remaining confused by it. Even a person who seems to keep up may understand only one corner and rely on help elsewhere. Ordinary participation should leave room for that.
When a human becomes a faulty user
Dehumanisation can begin quietly. A person needs more time, asks twice, or cannot complete the prescribed sequence. Their circumstances disappear behind an error message. The system recognises the failed transaction more readily than the person trying to finish it.
After repeated difficulties, someone may begin to doubt their own competence. They may give up on a useful tool or postpone a task because attempting it has become exhausting. When an essential service is involved, withdrawal can become exclusion.
“You should be able to do this” is a heavy message to carry when the route keeps changing beneath your feet.
A humane system makes room for differing abilities, knowledge, circumstances, and energy. Clear language, a familiar route, and reachable help are part of making a service usable. People bring their whole lives to the task in front of them.
Let the workflow belong to the person
AI makes this particularly visible. A conversation can begin with half an idea. We ask, clarify, wander a little, and discover what we actually need. That exploration is part of the work.
A workflow can be valuable when it grows from our purpose and remains adjustable. An imposed workflow may demand a goal, a sequence, and an output before we have found any of those. Now we are learning the tool and adapting our way of working at the same time.
The person should have a say in when to explore, when to add structure, and when to delegate. Some tasks benefit from a repeatable process. Some ideas need room to find their shape.
I can imagine AI helping by absorbing technical clutter, explaining unfamiliar steps at someone’s pace, and reducing repeated relearning. That is a useful design goal. Where it affects our decisions or access, we still need to understand what happened and be able to question it. Quiet assistance should leave our choices within reach.
The exhaustion behind “just adapt”
Fatigue, exhaustion, and burnout deserve precise language. The World Health Organization describes burnout as an occupational phenomenon associated with prolonged workplace stress that has been inadequately managed. Its definition includes exhaustion, growing detachment or cynicism toward work, and diminished effectiveness. It specifically concerns work; fatigue in other areas of life should be described on its own terms.
That distinction gives us clearer language for different experiences. Exhaustion outside work still deserves attention, and repeated demands deserve examination before people are simply told to try harder.
Britain’s Health and Safety Executive warns that rapid or continuous organisational change can harm health, and that poorly managed change can increase workplace stress. That guidance concerns workplaces. I think its underlying concern also deserves attention in the services and tools people depend on: the transition itself can place a burden on those going through it.
When the repair work becomes continuous, it can eat into the time available for the actual work and for recovery. Eventually, a person may have to choose between keeping the tools running and doing the thing they acquired them for.
Personal resilience has limits. Responsibility for the demands being imposed must remain part of the discussion.
Put the parachute in the transition
The parachute is practical: enough notice, a manageable timetable, dependable access, continuity where possible, understandable instructions, and someone reachable when things fail. People also need a way to raise concerns and influence changes that affect them.
These principles already appear in workplace guidance. The HSE’s standards for organisational change call for timely information, consultation, clarity about impacts and schedules, training where needed, and access to support. I would like to see the same seriousness applied wherever organisations ask people to relearn essential processes.
Responsibility continues after the announcement. Those introducing a change need to examine who benefits, who struggles, and how much work has been transferred to others. They need to correct failures and account for people who lose access or stop participating.
A launch report should count the hours spent recovering lost work, learning replacements, and seeking help. Those hours are part of what the change costs.
If the people already coping with disruption are also expected to build their own parachutes, the transition has unfinished work.
A human pace deserves a place
People need different amounts of detail, time, and support. Those needs can change from one day to the next. Care and accuracy can remain high at every pace; a simple explanation can still have depth.
Progress should leave people with something they can feel in their lives: more time, dependable access, greater control, or a task made easier. Sometimes improvement means allowing one useful thing to stay familiar long enough for someone to benefit from it.
“Build back better” has to earn the word better. The people carrying the transition need a voice in that judgment, and their exhaustion belongs in the account.
I would like technology to leave me enough energy for the life I wanted its help with. Writing, thinking, caring, making something—or having an ordinary afternoon that requires no tutorial.
If you want us to jump, show us the parachute.
Text with help of openAI’s ChatGPT Laguage Models & Fleeky – Images with help of Picsart & MIB
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