Leading with humanity in the age of AI

Peter: Welcome to theUndiscovered Country, A BTS podcast about the future of work. This is PeterMulford. So today I'm speaking with Professor Anna Tavis. Professor Tavis is aclinical professor and the chair of the Human Capital Management Department atNew York University School of Professional Studies. Anna has a reallyinteresting background.

Prior to academia, she held senior talent and learning roles atcorporations such as Motorola Solutions, Nokia United Technologies, and a IGinvestments on Wall Street, where she was the global head of talent in od. ,She is the author of quite a few pieces. On human capital management, includingthe book, humans at Work, the Art and Practice of Creating the HybridWorkplace, which she co-wrote with Stella Luu in 2022.

And it's one of the key topics that we get into. , During thecourse of the podcast, we talk about the efficiency paradox. Which is how do westop optimizing for efficiency and start optimizing for humanity in theworkplace? We talk about AI as an organizational redesign challenge, and we getinto what courageous leadership looks like in this exact moment and how we canrecognize it when we see it, as well as other topics.

I really enjoyed my conversation with Professor Tavis, and Ihope you will too. And without further ado, I bring you Professor Anna Tavis.

Hello, I'm here today with Anna TVIs. Hello, Anna. Thanks forjoining us.

Anna: Hi, Peter.Delighted to be here.

Peter: You know, Iwas thinking about this, it's the last time I think we were together. We wereat the World Science Festival, Brian Green's thing in, um, down in yourbackyard there in NYU. Do you remember that?

Anna: Absolutely. Andwe took a picture with Einstein's. Einstein's image. Yes.

Peter: We did. Thatwas, um, that was funny. You know, I still love it that you're, you're one of ahandful of people that I know I can call up and say, Hey Anna, I wanna go see alecture on theoretical physics. And you'll be like, yeah, why not?

Anna: Yes,absolutely. I think theoretical physics is, very relevant to what we're doingtoday with ai.

Peter: That's, well,that is a, that is a lovely segue. Um, actually, I will have. Formerlyintroduced you in the housekeeping, uh, to this podcast. And I think a lot ofour listeners probably know you already, but for those who don't, you have areally fascinating background, you know, that, that started with studyingcomparative literature and, uh, you know, and ended up in this, this amazingplace.

Um, why don't we start there? How would you describe yourintellectual journey through life? and you know, how did you get to where youare right now?

Anna: Yes. I mean,that was kind of, the journey of opportunity and interest. Uh, you know how,okay, we now advise students, um, and I'm at NYU now, not to kind of exactlyfollow your passion, but follow what the market needs, are and kind of alignyour skillset around the requirements of the jobs that are available.

that didn't work for me. in fact, I started out with mypassion, my interest in languages and culture. Okay. I was actually, I wasactually born in St. Petersburg and, uh, was studying multiple languages fromthe very early age. I studied English from, you know, the age of four. That isnow pretty much my native language.

Then. Um, French and German and Latin as the foundation. Sothat was kind of a. A window into the world for me, um, having grown up in theform of Soviet Union. Um, but then, uh, through the university studies, um, Iended up, um, uh, first in the uk and then here in, I was very interested inlinguistics, uh, linguistics.

That is, you know, the study of languages. And at that time,um, there was a lot of interest and, um, hopes, uh, placed in. The, uh, unionUniversal language that was called Esperanto, if you recall. Okay. It was,there was this idea that all of this Babylon of languages at some point, uh,has to be rationalized so that we all arrive at one language that we can speak.

And, uh, and so I was very interested in, in linguistics, butum, it kind of was very computational analytical at that point, and I decidedthat a better place to park myself would be comparative literature. Right.Okay. Looking at various cultures, et cetera. But it's really interesting,Peter, looking back, I think AI is going to be that aspiro without all of ushaving to learn, uh, one language.

We are just going to have technology that's gonna translate anylanguage into the language we. Stand. And so we kind of, uh, developed acircuitous way of arriving at the ideal that we created for ourselves justabout 30, 40 years ago, uh, with this Esperanto idea. But what I don't regret.Um, you know, about my education, uh, which just, uh, you know, three, fouryears ago would've been considered kind of a, um, a nice to have, but now Ithink it's a lot more relevant with these technologies coming in.

Is that I spend a lot of time, uh, not only with languages, butwith cultures and philosophy. In fact, I specialize in, uh, German philosophy.Um, uh, beginning of the century, looked at the beginnings of psychoanalysis,how psychology emerged. Because there, you know, half of the graduates, um, insocial sciences today are psychologists.

But if you think about when the science of psychology, uh,started, that was, you know, literally just about a century ago, it's a very,it's a very young science. And I think also that there's a shelf life topsychology. This is my, you know, my philosophical kind of roots. Um, uh, takeme where I'm thinking backwards and forwards and, and forwards.

I think neuroscience and our, the much better understanding of,um, you know, cognitive function and how kind of the hardware of how we operateas humans will replace, or, you know, not replace, but really validate a lotof. Psychological observations because psychology was based on observation. Youknow, the conversations, the stories, um, Zigmund, Freud and I studied a lot ofthe analytics, um, the early Freudian Analytical society and, um,psychoanalysis and the origins of that, et cetera.

So very, very eclectic background. But I think that preparedme. Well for what's happening now. Um, you know, I did a, I did go and got a, auseful degree in, um, MBA, um, you know, that, uh, put me in the businesscontext. But I did start, start as an academic left academia spent about 15years working globally in the businesses.

Uh, technology and financial services ended up in, on WallStreet, uh, mostly in the HR function. And then, um, obviously used theopportunity, um, that presented itself when I was an adjunct at NYU teachingsome courses in talent management based on my experience working for a IG andother Wall Street firms.

And, um. You know, and then when, um, I got an offer to, uh,come in full-time, I did. And now I am, um, the chair of the human CapitalManagement department studying humans at work. Um, so I think it all kind ofcomes together logically. If you, um, uh, wind the tape back to where Istarted. But if you, um, you know, try to create kind of that logicalsuccession, it's just not gonna work.

Peter: So what Ithink, I mean, there was a lot in there, but, uh, I think what I'm hearing yousay, Anna, is that, uh, life. Is lived moving forward, but it's only reallyunderstood in reverse. So looking backwards, all of the, the connections seemto make sense, but I guess going forward it must have, um, must have seemedlike a, a really wild ride.

Um, you know, on that topic, I, I wanted, uh, you know, youmentioned, uh, you mentioned ai, uh, you mentioned semantics and language and,um, your academic career. And, um, I. In the housekeeping that you've written acouple of books, uh, one of which is, uh, humans at Work and, uh, in 2022 withyour, uh, co-author, uh, oh.

I, uh, Stella, I, I apologize. St. Lu. Sho Lu Shore. Yeah. Who,who's really interesting, who is, uh, who works with you, I know at NYU andshe's a futurist, and I wanna get to that. We've got a lot of ground to coverthere, but I do have one more question, uh, for you. You, after. Taking seniorroles at Nokia and Motorola and a IG and then transitioning into academia.

Uh, I'm curious what actually motivated that, that pivot. Imean, you, you, you told us how you got there, but what motivated the pivot?And I'm wondering how, if at all, did it change the way you think aboutdeveloping leaders? You know, it's one thing to be an academic studying it andteaching it, it's something altogether different to have to be reporting to aCEO and developing leaders, you know, as a, as a, as a matter of, of practicalnecessity.

What, um, what motivated your pivot and how did it change yourthinking, if at all?

Anna: Yeah, I thinkthis is a really good question. Exactly how you describe, um, academia is how Ifelt. Um, um, having gone through Ivy League education undergraduate, Ifinished undergraduate at, uh, Dartmouth College and then Princeton PhD.

You know, and then I ended up, um, teaching, uh, right out ofgraduate school at Williams College. Um, another really small liberal arts,but, um, exquisite education and, uh, rarefied, um, academic campus. Um, youknow, I felt like, um. Just doing research wasn't giving me enough of thegrounding to even understand how people feel, how people live inside companies,you know?

Um, interesting. So it was. It was a very, yes, you could go.Oftentimes academics would argue that they're doing a lot of consulting workthat they're invited to advise, et cetera, et cetera. Um, and that's where, youknow, the ability to actually live that experience, um, was. It was became veryclear to me that each right were to continue.

In fact, you know, I got tenure very in my, in my, uh, earlythirties and I just couldn't see myself continuing to kind of spin the wheeland, and, uh, and doing the same teaching and research, uh, chasing downcompanies, asking them to do surveys inside their organizations without. Reallyunderstanding the internal dynamic.

Um, and so, and so I, I was very active at, um, um, ATDs, um,at that time, society for Talent Development and, and SH RM and differentcommittees. And uh, and that's where I met CHROs. And, uh, chief, um, uh,learning officers from companies because I was like a token academic on all ofthose committees and, uh, and I wanted to join one of them.

And so I, um, forwarded my resumes. As we all know, a lot of itis. About who you know and people knew me and they took a chance of me on mebecause Peter, it wasn't very easy to transition out of the academia into thebusiness world.

Peter: I bet.

Anna: Interesting wasthe, even though I did by that time get myself an MBA.

Again, that was all theoretical models. You, you have an MBA,you know, the, the curriculum. So, so it was very important and, uh, whatworked for me at that time, and I think there's a lot more, uh, there are a lotmore PhDs working in the businesses right now than at the time when I made thatPO pivot. Mm-hmm.

What worked for me was that I ended up in Europe because theEuropeans actually not surprisingly, had a lot more. Um, a lot put a lot morevalue in your education than Americans did. Um, for Americans, it's what, whatyou did before, you know, what kind of job you had before and it was more kindof practical.

You had to have that work experience to get to the next job.Um, in Europe, you know, the fact that I was a PhD, you know, I got into a.Fairly senior management role. I was the head of organizational development forEurope, middle East and Africa in mea, uh, based out of London. And it was abig transition for me, obviously to understand that it's not just about niceideas, but how do you operationalize them?

How do you actually make people, uh, do what you want them todo at scale, deliver, et cetera. It was, um, one of the. Uh, major pivots in,uh, um, in the way I thought, in the way I understood, um, work, um, and humansat work. Um, and, um, and I'm really grateful that some people took a chance onme and let me go through that experience.

Peter: So that'sinteresting. I I wanna double click on something for a second there. And, andby the way, Anna, if at any point I put words in your mouth that don't belongthere, just spit 'em out and say that isn't right. Um, but it sounded like yousaid, um, that in general your experiences being that, uh, American firms tendto, uh, much prefer work experience to academic experience as compared toEuropeans.

Where it moves in the other direction is, is. Is, was that justyour experience or do you think that's a general rule?

Anna: Uh, that was,uh, my experience in, you know, the, uh, nineties, uh, nineties. Got it.

Peter: So how do youthink, uh, how do you think that looks today?

Anna: I think todayAmerican firms are a lot more, especially with ai.

Again, I am, I'm an optimist when it comes to this technologyand happy to discuss it.

Peter: Nice. But, butwe're gonna, yeah.

Anna: Yeah, yeah.And, um, but I do think that. Uh, we are going to require, this is where Ithink we, we came the full circle here. We are going to outsource all of thosetactical, transactional operational jobs to technology.

And it's the thinking jobs, the decision making jobs, you know,uh, that, um, will be needed. And for that, if the basic education is now undera lot of pressure and stress around. What, how are we gonna teach? It's thehigher level thinking, you know, thinking in terms of alternatives, scenarios,strategies that is gonna be required, um, in the workplace.

But, you know, where I was starting, it was still very, veryoperational and uh, and I didn't have that experience before. So I had to learnthis the hard way.

Peter: Perfect. Well,let's, that's a lovely on-ramp to, to your book, the Humans at Work. And, um,uh, for people who haven't read it, I highly recommend it. It's Humans at Work,the art and Practice of creating the hybrid Workplace.

Now, you wrote that in 2022 and, uh, what's interesting, youknow, to to, to launch into this, it's at 2022, I'm sure most of our listenerswill recall. Um, the reasoning capability hadn't been developed yet. You know,for example. Yeah. Uh, so you, you chat GPT and a Gemini and copilot, you know,they had capabilities and people were starting to pay attention to them, butthey were, they were quite inferior in terms of their reasoning capabilities towhat you see today.

And yet, uh, you had the presence of mind back in 2022. I thinkyou were quite prescient. To notice that, uh, how people lead and how peoplenavigate the workplace was going to change in fundamental ways beyond simply,uh, using AI to summarize emails or, you know, as a pure, um, uh, a back officeutility tool.

So let's, let's, let's talk about that. Um, my first questionis, what compelled you to write the book in the first place? And why did youemphasize your subtitle? That is this idea of noticing that there is an art andpractice related to, um, working in the hybrid workplace. And by the way, ifyou, if you wanna reply and say, look, my editor made me do that, I get it.

But I think there's something really interesting that back in2022, even before we had reasoning models, you had the presence of mind to say.Uh, this is about both an art and a practice about a hybrid workplace. It's notabout prompt engineering. So t tell me what was, um. What prompted you to writethis?

Anna: Yeah. Thank youso much, Peter. Um, if you recall, 2022 is when the book came out, but thewriting happened, uh, at, at the height of the pa, the pandemic that we had.Mm. And I have felt for quite some time that the tension between technologyanalytics and the human side of work has been building up through.

Um, at least this century. Obviously it started in the middleof the last century, but again, to your point, it was kind of confined to the,um, you know, the engineers, the, you know, the people who, uh, developers,people who were working on these very advanced, um, uh, tools, uh, reasoningtools. Mm-hmm. Lambs, et cetera.

But, uh, but the tension has been building because we, since weintroduced computers into the. Space, you know, uh, what became a, an issue forme, again, looking at how we developed people educationally, et cetera, etcetera, that we were, uh, pushing people to become computers. Mm-hmm. That waskind of the breaking point for me.

Um, you know, when we sent three year olds to computer campsand eliminating all of the humanities, education, et cetera, et cetera, and thework. Um, was becoming, you know, servicing these tools, um, in a, in a verykind of, uh, tactical, very operational way. HIRS systems started to come in.And if you recall in your business, when you do organizational transformation,it's usually around technology.

And the way it was done is that we needed to be. Twisting humanbehavior around the technology that was thrust on them, usually by the seniormanagement that decided that that will be more efficient operationally and uh,productivity will go up. But it was about. Primacy of technology the way itexisted and the humans had to change their behavior and they were hiring peoplelike BTS to help them go through that transformation.

And I think that's how we met in one of those. That's right.Yeah. Yeah. I think that's, we one of those pivots when I was working forcompanies that brought in. Your services to help them change the way humansbehaved at work because of these new technological, um, uh, transformations ortechnology from the point of view of business models that they were bringingin, right?

So, uh, and as I mentioned to you in the intro. I deliberatelychose a co-author, Esella Lipor, who was an engineer and she had that biasbrought in, uh, from her experience when she was introducing those systems, shewas on the IT side. Of technology transformation where I was coming in on thehuman side of the transformation and so, so I think that was a precursor to behonest with you, to some of the challenges that we are experiencing with thenew technology, but the beauty of AI and why.

If everything goes well, this will be the most amazing toolthat Oh, amazing technology that, um, humanity had access to. Because I thinkwith AI, we are reversing this equation where humans need to adapt totechnology. Now we have technology that is adapting to the humans, and sohumans at work. Was kind of anticipating the importance of prioritizinghumanity, because guess what?

We let technology catch up with the humans. And now withpersonalization, with the coaching that I'm, um, you know, spending a lot oftime on with, um, AI being able to guide us through the most difficult pivotalmoments. Customizing the approach to how we operate, how we learn, what ourbodies require for optimal productivity, et cetera.

So, um, that's kind of how, uh, it came together. But again, itjust happened to be participating. This I reversal where we, I'm. Myself and,and, uh, Stella, we were exploring this tension in the organization and we werearguing on the side of the humans. And I think humans have won with thistechnologies now being developed that help us stay human, and I would evenargue done right, are going to be bringing humanity back, uh, to our, ourhighest potential.

Peter: Okay, welllet's, uh, let's, let's double click on that. Um, I mean, so there was a lot inthere again, uh, but one of the interesting things you said is, you know, youtalked about, um, how you're, you're a co-author. Stella was an engineer, whichis kind of interesting. So it's almost like the engineer in the philosopher atwork.

In fact, as you were speaking, Anna, I had this, this picturein my head of the, um. The Fresco by Rafael, the School of Athens. Have youseen that one? That's in Vatican City. Yeah. With like Plato and Aristotle inthe center. I suddenly had you and Stella in the center having a, having a,having a debate. But, um, one of the things you talked about both here and inyour book is, uh, a kind of efficiency paradox, right?

Where you argue or argued. That leaders need to stop optimizingfor efficiency and start optimizing for humanity. Right? That seems to be oneof the, the central themes of your book that that certainly finds its, itsrelevance in the AI powered world we're in. But here's my question for you. Um,for A CFO listening to this, that sounds expensive, right?

Whenever I hear Optimize for humanity and satisfaction on thejob, um, uh, it sounds. Great until it makes contact with sg and a as apercentage of revenues. So make that practical for me. Putting on yourengineering cap, what evidence do you have or what evidence have you seen thatreally optimizing for humanity isn't just a nice to have it, it really issomething that will drive superior market value, uh, over the long term.

Anna: Yeah. And Ithink that that last, um, point you made about the long term

Peter: Hmm.

Anna: Is, um, the keyto solving for this, you know, efficiency optimization is the industrial model,right? This is, I mean, where does efficiency come from? It comes from, youknow, taylorism, you know, uh, that where. Humans were, again, the extension ofthe machines in a sense that they were, um, uh, in a calculated way, executingon one fraction of that conveyor line function.

Right? That's, that's kind of the history of how we've evolvedand our organizations evolved thinking about humans as this. But it is justanother cog in a big production machine and with a goal of, um, you know, witha goal of, um, uh, more efficient outcomes.

Peter: Mm-hmm.

Anna: And so, butthat, that is the outdated model going forward because as we are seeing it withour own.

We've been smart enough to develop technologies that are goingto take care of efficiency. In that sense, you know, these are the jobs andthat work has started. Um, you know, in the middle of the last century, and ifyou, if you recall, the first, uh, the first computers were actually humans,right? That's a job.

A computer was a human job. Uh, the, it's somebody who wasdoing all of the data, um, calculations, collection, et cetera, et cetera, andthen eventually was replaced by a machine. And this is what we are gonna seehere as well. Even in the white collar jobs. You know, we are going to seeefficiency. It's almost problem solved, check mark.

And now the, with the robots coming in into the, on the, intothe production lines, uh, as you know, uh, Amazon and other. Uh, warehouseworkers, et cetera. Robotics is the next generation of optimization, um, ofthose types of skills and tools. And this is where, you know, the question ofwhat's human at work is existential.

I mean, this is where philosophically, you know, we need tothink what else. Can humans do? What is the function of the human? What is therole of a human at work? We need to be thinking about it now, um, because itcould not be reduced to the common denominator, you know, and, uh, in amathematical equation.

And even though I would say technology is, is pushing in that,in those areas as well. But that's a little bit down the road. But right now.Um, I think, um, we have to engage the working population in a, on a differentcycle of, uh, work engagement, which is not about optimization. Um, of, of thatparticular one function.

If you think about. To, to give you a, an example ofperformance management that I wrote about this, et cetera. So we introducedperformance management historically. About and, and, and again to function insync with the work cycle, annual work cycle. We established, you know, withthe, um, goal setting in the beginning and making sure that the goals, um, aremet by the end of the year.

There's a performance appraisal and based on that appraisal wejudge and, uh, how. You know how well particular individual performed, and thenwe rank them on that performance scale and compensate and reward respectively.And, um, so that model is totally scrapped because right now we will need torethink the entire infrastructure of what humans are doing at work, because howdo you evaluate performance if, you know, one human has spent 20 years gettingto the level of proficiency and decision making, et cetera?

Um. And then somebody else is just coming out of the, uh, eliteMBA program and is really good about using technology and can get to the samelevel of productivity, performance, et cetera. So what do we reward here? Do wereward the time at in place or do we reward the actual outcome? So there's abig crisis around.

The entire infrastructure of managing people and organizationsthat, uh, that we are on the verge of. We need to decide how we are going toposition humans at work, how we are gonna evaluate them. Where is the, uh,where will the reward system land? A whole kind of judgment about humans andhuman role will need to shift.

And my argument in the book that it needs to be done with thepriorities, uh, for the humans, you know, holistically in mind. Because if wejust take the efficiency model, the CFO decision making, we are gonna put thesepeople out in the street and saying, you know, technology comes in. Humans areinefficient.

You know, they need vacation, they need benefits, they needtime off. Uh, we are gonna be bringing the technology in and, uh, you know,humans are disposable and that is a very dangerous track to take. I argue thisis where we need to be thinking holistically and help humans even reinvent.Ourselves in the context of work, because at the end of the day, we keeptalking about how technology's evolving.

What we forget to talk about is how humans are evolving, and weneed to accelerate that learning evolution, et cetera, so that humans arealways in the lead. And Well, you've,

Peter: yeah. Again,there was a lot in there, and I know you've, you've argued. That AI isn't alabor substitute. It's more of an organizational redesign challenge.

So double click on that for me. What are, what are the earlysigns that a company is doing? The kind of organizational redesign you'readvocating for versus merely automating tasks and trying to scale. Ai, youknow, for the CHROs listening to this, how would they know they're moving inthe right direction vis-a-vis, uh, these technologies?

Anna: Yeah, I think,I think we, um, we do not, uh. Uh, replace jobs. Every job is a wholeportfolio, a bundle of tasks. And what's happening now is that we have AIreplacing certain tasks within that bundle of. Uh, that constitute a job. Andso, so far we do not have the entire substitution of a job, right? It's kind ofa gradual, uh, scale where certain tasks are being.

Um, replaced by technology and then other tasks could be addedat the higher value for the humans to, uh, step in. And so it's really workprocess redesign. Peter, to your point. So we need to think about. What, youknow, what that workflow work process consists of? What kinds of tasks And keepmoving humans with the next potential along that trajectory.

Clearly there will be some people who are more adaptable orsuited for this type of transition and now others who are not, and that'swhere. Some will learn on their own. Others will need to be, uh, handheld tomove there or, uh, replaced with those who can. But I do think we are talkingabout incremental.

Um, incremental transitions with gradual introduction of thesetools where humans will need to decide what parts of their jobs are going to bereplaced. So what CHROs need to be thinking about is, um, a less of replacingwholesale jobs, but more thinking about what represents a job, as you know.

Peter: Mm-hmm.

The

Anna: conversationabout. A job as a unit of measure of which we've, you know, held dear for solong is actually disappearing. It's kind of a continuum of different tasks,right? And therefore we've argued for hiring, learning agile individuals fromthe very beginning, and that's now, it has to be an absolute requirement thatwe bring people in.

Who are constantly learning and moving, and that is the mostimportant characteristic that we need to be looking for when we are looking atthe human to bring in.

Peter: So you've, um,you know, on, on that topic, you've highlighted, I think it's some of yourwriting, uh, examples that you admired from Moody's. And from Cisco, I believeit was, and the way they've been building ai, workforce enablement teams.

What, what is it for people who might not be familiar with whatthey're doing? What is it that they're doing differently that really caughtyour eye that you think is worth emulating?

Anna: Yeah. And, andthat's exactly this kind of redesign approach rather than optimization andefficiency approach.

Peter: Mm-hmm.

Anna: Um, with, uh,and Cisco has been known, I've, I've admired Cisco for a long time about, youknow, how they looked at, um, you know, jobs, performance management and thewhole kind of architecture of.

People management and continuing transition. And I think thosecompanies, uh, technology companies are, uh, really in, um, in their, uh, incertain areas. Obviously, if you look at, um. Amazon, I don't think it's afully technology company. There's a technology component to that, but theywarehouse, et cetera. But the technology companies, Microsoft, Cisco, um, and,and, and others, they have always focused on talent that can.

Continuously learn the Got it. And in fact, the mantra of, um,Satya Nadela, the CEO of Microsoft has always been a growth mindset that comesfrom, uh, Carol Dweck, as you know. Mm-hmm. Um, uh, growth mindset as opposedto fixed mindset. And, uh. You know, hiring for that talent, continuouslycultivating that talent, just being in the practice of learning, in the art oflearning, allowing their people to flourish, experiment, et cetera.

Creating that social support for this type of environment toexist is what these companies are doing. Right. Um, and the companies that go.With, uh, efficiency and, uh, con, uh, job replacement and layoffs. Whatthey're creating, Peter, in my view, is an atmosphere of fear. Um, aresentment, even with the people who they're keeping.

Obviously I'm not talking about people who will have to go outthere and talk about how unfairly they've been treated, et cetera, but peoplewho are staying are afraid. That we do not want at this moment oftransformation. I would caution all, um, company leaders to be careful not tocreate that anxiety, fear, distrust among their employees because that'sexactly what is gonna prevent them from.

Learning, adjusting and helping them integrate these newtechnologies into their workflow.

Peter: Well, let's,let's, let's talk about that for a second. I mean, I, I think I've heard yousay something along the lines of you can't ask people to learn when they'reterrified or, or some version. I, I may have misquoted you there, but I, Ithink the general idea is, it's, on the one hand, you're saying, look,something that Cisco and Moody's has done really well.

And other successful have done well is they create anenvironment where you're learning faster than the rate of change. And you know,whether you're doing it at the level of one task or multiple tasks, as youreimagine workflows, this is a way to win. Um, but at the same time, it's hardto ask people to do that when they're worried.

And you mentioned Microsoft, even Microsoft. You know, which isgreat. Laid off, I think 15,000 people. Yeah. Yeah. In, in 20, 25 alone. And,you know, and, and Satya Nadella has said both, uh, publicly and privately thatit weighs on him. I think the language he uses, it really weighs on himpersonally. He doesn't like doing it, I don't think any leader.

Does, and yet there is the practical necessity of competition.So how, how would you advise our listeners to stand in the space betweenasking, you know, the Venn diagram, if you will, of making sure our people havea growth mindset and they learn fast in the rate of change on the one hand. Uh,while recognizing on the other, there is the practical necessity that everycompany feels all the time to be as efficient and as profitable as possible.

Because if you don't. You'll be put out of business by somebodywho doesn't have that hesitation.

Anna: Yeah. Theadvantage that all of those, and I obviously watched, uh, Microsoft and a fewother, um, companies, um, go through the layoffs. First of all, we all knowthat they overhired during the. COVID, um, uh mm, boom.

And, uh, and unfortunately it, it goes through these swings ofthe pendulum in the job market. Um, secondly, I think, uh, if we take ourlessons from COVID or, or, um, and apply them to the ai, um, uh, reductions inEnfor and Contraction is, there are some there. There've been some, um. Reallyspectacular examples of leadership in that space.

And I think I even wrote about it in, uh, humans at Work thatthe leaders, it's about how leaders communicate, how they support those people,who they need to lay off, um, you know, uh, with the opportunities for them toleverage there. Uh, brand of the companies they worked for because they know,having worked for Microsoft for a certain number of years gives you a, a prettystrong platform on, you know, going to different sectors where those types ofskills are really much in demand and.

In the sectors that were not able to recruit that level ofskill because they couldn't compete on the south, et cetera, et cetera. So thiskind of, uh, the entire market realignment and what I would like to see is. Uh,uh, again, what we've learned from COVID and you know, I just really hope thatwe will do it again, collaboration among companies in kind of a bigger societalapproach to this phenomenon.

We will have to all come together. This is where, you know, thecommunities come in, how do we help these types of transitions to happen? Youknow, Peter, from my own experience, I was at a IG in 2008, 2007, 2000. I wasthe head of global talent for a IG, where we laid off thousands of peoplebecause of the financial crisis.

Peter: Hmm.

Anna: So. So the ideawas that we could help people re-skill, find their next opportunity, et cetera,et cetera. Kind of doing this with a view of, yes, the industry requirements isthis, but for, for you the opportunity we want to invest.

Testing your next step and, uh, and, uh, a lot of companies,you know, to what extent the benefits are being extended, uh, learningopportunities, like for example, I know of companies that where employees were,for example, on a tuition reimbursement programs. Okay. Where they were. Theywere in the middle of getting their master's degrees or even bachelor's degreespaid for by the company, and then they're laid off, so why not extend thatbenefit and let their employees finish their education?

This is just an example that I come across sometimes being oneducational side, where some of my students come in and say. You know, intears, you know, I, I've been laid off. I can't afford this education anymore,and I'm in the middle of the program. Right, right. So there are multiple waysin which this needs to be done with the humans in mind.

Peter: You know, thisis, um, so I think we're almost at the end of our time together. This has been,this is a lot in there. Thank you for that, Anna. Um, and I think maybe whereyou've taken us is to a quote. Um, I think, I can't remember which piece it wasof yours, but you said something great. You said, um, if leadership matters atall, it matters.

Now. Um, in light of everything we've talked about so far, andin light of everything you see coming, what does courageous leadership actuallylook like in this exact moment? By your lights and, um, how can we recognize itwhen we see it? Because, you know, the world is, you know, this, the world isfilled with books on leadership and classes on leadership and podcasters onleadership.

You know, bring all this together to something that, uh, aleader could recognize in, in terms of behaviors. What, what, what should itlook like in this moment, and how would we recognize it when we see it for you?

Anna: So I thinkPeter, you know, kind of the, the foundational laws of, you know, leadershipare such that creating the connection to the people, personal connection,personal stories.

Mm-hmm. Authenticity in its most. Original sense of the word,not the fake one that's, you know, consultant generated, et cetera. I thinkpeople are crazy that Yeah. No, no, no. And I don't mean, no, I'm completelywith you. I don't mean, I don't mean, um, you know, specifically you, because Iknow you, you are, you know, you are in a different class, um, as far as I'mconcerned.

But, um, you know, this, um. F friend, um, my good friend ofmine and colleague Toma Chamorro psychologist, he just published a book, uh uh,why authenticity is overrated in what to do about it. Mm-hmm. And I think hisargument is not that authenticity is overrated, but it became so commercialized

Peter: interesting.

And I think

Anna: stepping out ofthat. Um, you know, uh, ivory Tower of Leadership, um, at the, you know, inthe, on the top floor of your headquarters. And really walking the, the room,going back to the very, very basics, um, not replacing, you know, your personalhandshake with, um, you know, AI generated presentation, right?

Uh, I think that type of human. Authenticity and how leadershipthinks about that, even with the people who are gonna be affected is, you know,every leader should sit back and do a serious reflection about how they show upin this age where there's so much fake stuff around us. And then the other oneis the obligation to help humans transition, whether they're gonna stay withyour company or not.

Again, extending the benefits, creating alumni networks,creating support, human support networks where people are not just let go inleft cold in the street, right? Which is gonna be a really unfriendlyenvironment. So. I think that that is in the long run is going to pay offhugely. And we see some of those leaders stepping up, um, uh, especially inthis, you know, very divided environment we're in.

Um, I think that this is going to be tremendous. Um, and, um, Ibelieve, you know, I was just, I just wanna quote at the end, Peter. Uh, fromSam Altman. Of all people he published, um, he, uh, wrote a tweet at one pointon, on the on X and said, um, which I think is very profound, that we keepcomparing AI to the industrial age.

We should really compare it to the renaissance.

Peter: Nice.

Anna: Renaissance isthe emergence of humanity on the other side of this industrial age. Phase ofevolution that we've been, uh, through. But again, we need to be very carefulof how we approach this technology that, uh, we have to approach it with thehumans in mind first.

Peter: That's, uh,that is a perfect, perfect way to end. Um, and, uh, you know, if it's, if toyour quote, if leadership matters at all, it matters. Now, it's, uh, it's greatto know. I know that there are leaders like you out there. thinking aloud, uh,asking these questions and, um, moving students and business people alike, uh,alike in the right direction.

Uh, the book again is Humans at Work, uh, the Art and Practiceof Creating the Hybrid Workplace. And I know you have another book, the DigitalCoaching Revolution, how to Support Employee Development with Coaching Techs,which we will have to get into, uh, on our next podcast, which I hope we havesoon.

Thanks a lot for your time, Anna.

Anna: Thank you,Peter.

Peter: Take it easy.

Anna: Okay, thanks.

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