The Missing Middle: The AI Workers Who Are Neither Building Nor Simply Using the Model
Researchers affiliated with the AI Adoption Initiative argue that the workforce meets AI through what they call an AI Labor Stack, made up of three roles: innovators, facilitators, and users. The facilitators are the ones doing the translating — turning AI capability into practical deployment across firms, sectors, and public services.
They are also, the researchers argue, often "the missing middle" in national AI strategies. That is a useful way to see an otherwise fuzzy problem. Innovators attract the research funding and the headlines; users get the training sessions. The people in between, who work out whether a model fits a particular workflow at all, fit neither category neatly — even though their work is where adoption either happens or stalls.
AI-generated discussion · Different perspectives
AWS's own write-up uses the same idea to address facilitators directly, pointing them to the international standard ISO/IEC 42005:2025 and its guidance on folding AI impact assessments into an organization's broader governance.
A vendor telling the missing middle which standard to adopt is also a vendor helping decide what counts as good governance. Worth noticing who wrote the syllabus.