Reading time: about 8 minutes

 

 

Almost every designer has their own favorites.

 

Behance, Pinterest, Dribbble, Awwwards, industry reports, product‑experience analyses, brand case studies, design methodologies… Throughout our professional journey, we continuously gather inspiration, insights, and lessons learned, with the hope of putting them to use in future projects.

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, reality is often far from as ideal as one might imagine. There are more and more collections, but less and less content is really reopened. Those cases that once dazzled the eye, the articles worth in-depth study, and the carefully saved inspiration screenshots all end up lying dormant in browser bookmarks, cloud‑storage folders, or various knowledge‑management tools. The problem is not a lack of information, but rather our failure to develop a mechanism that ensures knowledge continuously generates value.

 

With the advancement of AI tools, more and more designers are beginning to rethink knowledge management. Rather than building a massive knowledge base, they prefer to have a “second brain” that helps them think, make connections, and continuously generate insights.

 

 

 

Why do designers constantly collect but rarely reuse?

 

The essence of design is not to create entirely new things, but to forge new connections among existing knowledge, experience, and inspiration.

 

An excellent website design solution may be influenced simultaneously by brand strategy, user experience, content architecture, visual design, and technical implementation. A successful digital product often stems from the integration of knowledge across diverse domains. Therefore, designers are inherently called upon to learn continuously, gather insights without cease, and constantly expand the boundaries of their understanding.

 

However, traditional collecting methods resemble warehousing systems rather than thinking systems. It can help us preserve content, but it cannot help us establish connections. When a project actually gets underway, we often recall having come across a particular case or read a specific article, yet struggle to locate it precisely when we need it. Over time, a vast body of knowledge has been accumulated, yet it has not truly been integrated into the workflow.

 

From this perspective, the designer’s real challenge has never been a lack of inspiration, but rather a lack of the ability to rediscover and reinvent that inspiration.

 

 

Why is the “second brain” gaining attention?

 

“The ‘Second Brain’ is not a new concept.” When it was first proposed, its primary goal was not to build a massive database, but rather to help people construct an external cognitive system that could support their thinking.

 

In the past, people managed knowledge by using folders, tags, and categorization. However, as the volume of information continues to grow, this approach has begun to reveal its clear limitations. Because knowledge does not exist according to a folder-based structure; rather, it resembles an ever-expanding network, in which unexpected connections inevitably emerge between different topics.

 

The new generation of knowledge management tools, exemplified by Obsidian, has garnered significant attention, largely because they enable users to establish bidirectional links and knowledge graphs. When a website case simultaneously integrates brand strategy, user research, and content design, these previously fragmented pieces of information begin to coalesce into a networked structure. Designers no longer see a single, isolated note, but rather a cognitive map that is constantly evolving.

 

What truly captivates is not the knowledge graph itself, but the mode of thinking it embodies. Knowledge begins to form connections akin to those in a neural network, and new ideas often emerge at the intersections of these links.

 

 

AI is changing the role of knowledge bases

 

In the past, knowledge bases were more like archives.

 

It is responsible for storing information, yet it struggles to generate value on its own. Designers must rely on their memory to locate information, spend considerable time reorganizing materials, and repeatedly reinvoke the same research processes.

 

The emergence of AI is changing all of this.

 

As AI begins to integrate into knowledge management systems, knowledge bases are gradually acquiring the capabilities of “researchers.” It not only understands content but also helps analyze, summarize, and establish connections. When a new case is added, the AI can automatically identify relevant topics; when a new project is launched, it can also quickly retrieve previously accumulated experience, cases, and insights.

 

For designers, this means the role of the knowledge base is undergoing a transformation. It is no longer merely a storage tool; it has begun to serve as a collaborator in creative work. Tasks that once took hours—such as organizing and retrieving data—can now be completed in a matter of minutes, allowing designers to devote more of their time to judgment, insight, and creativity.

 

 

In the future, design assets may no longer be portfolios.

 

For a long time, the portfolio has been regarded as a designer’s most important professional asset.

 

It documents completed projects, showcases individual capabilities, and serves as an important credential for career development. However, as AI increasingly takes part in design work, merely showcasing execution capabilities is no longer sufficient.

 

An increasing number of foundational design tasks are now being automated, and tools are lowering the barrier to entry for design execution. Meanwhile, the importance of insight, judgment, and the ability to connect across disciplines continues to grow.

 

These capabilities do not stem from any single project, but rather from a knowledge network that has been built up over the long term. A designer’s ability to grasp the interplay among business, branding, technology, and user experience ultimately hinges on a continuously evolving cognitive framework. In the future, truly competitive designers will likely possess not just a portfolio, but also a personal knowledge system that continuously grows and evolves.

 

 

From Information Gathering to Cognitive Construction

 

Looking back over the past decade, we have witnessed a significant increase in the efficiency of information acquisition. From search engines to social media, from content platforms to generative AI, acquiring knowledge has become increasingly easy.

 

At the same time, another issue has become increasingly apparent: the pace of information growth far outstrips individual processing capacity.

 

In such an environment, the focus of knowledge management is shifting. In the past, the focus was on how to gather more information; in the future, the more pressing question will be how to build one’s own cognitive framework. The value of knowledge lies not in the sheer volume of content one possesses, but in whether that content can be interconnected and, when needed, help us make better judgments.

 

The “second brain” has garnered attention not because it offers a new tool, but because it introduces a new way of working.

 

 

 

Over the past decade, the design industry has been exploring design systems, aiming to enable the ongoing reuse and continuous scalability of design assets. And today, similar changes are taking place at the level of knowledge.

 

AI has not reduced the volume of information; on the contrary, it has accelerated the rate at which information is growing. In such an environment, what designers truly need to manage is no longer documents, but cognition. From a favorites list to a second brain, what appears to be a tool upgrade is, at its core, a shift in how we work.

 

Only when knowledge begins to form connections and can be rediscovered, recombined, and reapplied as needed does a personal knowledge base truly become an integral part of creativity. In the future, designers’ most significant competitive advantage may not lie in their mastery of tools, but rather in their ability to build a personal knowledge network and continuously generate new insights from it.

 

 

 

关键词

Second Brain, Personal Knowledge Base, Designer Knowledge Management, AI Knowledge Management, Obsidian, Knowledge Network, Design Workflow, Creative Workflow, Digital Experience, AI Tools

 

 

 

类别

AI Trends/Design Thinking/Knowledge Management/Ways of Working

 

参考文献

打造第二大脑——蒂亚戈·福特

Obsidian官方文档

个人知识管理研究

斯托亚德研究与观察