Season 11 Recap

[00:00:03] Welcome to the HR Data Labs Podcast, now part of the WorkDefined Podcast Network. Join us as we explore the vital role of compensation, strategy, data, and people analytics in navigating today's complex business world. With the resources of WorkDefined, we're now bringing you deeper insights and actionable ideas from top experts. Now, here is your host, David Turetsky. Hello and welcome to the HR Data Labs Podcast. I am your host, David Turetsky.

[00:00:32] And like always, we try and find the best and brightest to talk to you about what's going on in the world of human resources. Well, today you're stuck with me. I'm not the best. I'm not the brightest. I'm just one of the nice people in HR and I get to talk to you every once in a while. And so today we're going to have our wrap-up episode for Season 11, which is amazing.

[00:00:54] We're about 300 episodes in, and I can never tell which because I count the Brown Bag Lunch episodes as well. But we've done a lot of work with you over the last five, six years about how HR has changed so dramatically in our world of work. And I think you're going to find that today's episode, we're going to highlight that that's actually never been truer.

[00:01:21] However, this past year has been a remarkable amount of change. And some of it's really good change. Some of it's fun change. Some of it's very scary change. And we're going to talk a lot about that. First, one fun new thing about me. Let's see. Chickens. I've been approved to get chickens for the house. I think I may have mentioned chickens in the past, but it's not totally new. But we're going to have chickens, and so the house is going to smell like chickens.

[00:01:49] For those of you who have chickens, you know what I mean. Yay. And so we're going to start with 10 hens and see how it goes from there. So it'll be an adventure. It'll be fun. And if I come in one day and there's going to be chicken feathers all over me, you'll know why now. So today is the episode 25 of Season 11. When we return from the break, what we're going to do is we're going to talk to you about the past season.

[00:02:18] And we're going to talk to you about the future season. And we're going to talk about it all. Stay tuned.

[00:02:59] So Season 11 was fascinating. I think it is a microcosm of what's going on in our world of work right now that Season 11 was dominated by artificial intelligence. It just was. And many of the conversations we had were from various experts talking about the effect of artificial intelligence on the workforce,

[00:03:28] talking about regulation, talking about fraud, talking about trust, talking about data governance. I think we started the season talking about data governance with the folks from the rest when they're saying an Enkit-Aberl episode from Talenode, talking about making sure that you have a good data foundation for artificial intelligence through data governance.

[00:03:57] But even the episodes that weren't focused on it, that focused on organizational change, that focused on burnout, they all had pieces of them that were artificial intelligence focused. Because you just can't escape it right now. I think the way we all work has either fundamentally changed or will be fundamentally changing to incorporate that tool set into what we do.

[00:04:28] I think I find myself as a consultant, as a business leader, as a professional, using artificial intelligence much more so on a daily basis. And I'm finding new ways of being able to incorporate it into everything I do. Not to be lazy or to take away from the personality that is me. Because for those of you who know me, everything I do is personality. Now, that sounds real humble, doesn't it?

[00:04:56] But ostensibly, just like in the late 80s, early 90s, we were trying to figure out how computers fit into the world of work. I told you the story many times about my start in compensation and how computers weren't on every desk. I think in that same vein, every company is trying to find their way to figuring out how to leverage the tool that is artificial intelligence.

[00:05:24] On a regular basis. And so whether it's having an LLM corporate wide that everybody has access to, whether it's buying technologies, whether HR technologies or other technologies that have AI embedded in them. And I implore you to find a technology that's coming out these days that doesn't have AI built in, in some way, shape or form.

[00:05:52] All of those things portend to AI being critical in the role of getting work done. Not just from the HR perspective, but more broadly. And there's nothing we can do to stop that.

[00:06:09] And there's a lot of discussions around the impact to the environment and to our electrical grid and to our water systems for the proliferation of AI.

[00:06:25] In fact, town councils and even states have put moratoriums on building new data centers because of the vast array or myriad cases of the not in my backyard with data centers. Now, you could do worse than having a data center in your backyard.

[00:06:51] The problem of having a data center in your backyard is it then taxes your electrical grid and it taxes your water systems. And as well, you have these big, ugly boxes that store the data center. And it's just, it just is what it is.

[00:07:13] And so there's a lot of NIMBY conversations going on in my backyard around not building more data centers. Well, more data centers means more AI or keeping up with the demand for AI. And that's tough. Now, funnily enough, AI isn't just in massive data centers. It's on your desktop as well or even on your wrist if you have Apple Watches.

[00:07:41] The newest technologies can be run in small form factor. So if you have things like Raspberry Pi, you'll be able to host an LLM. Yeah, it won't be a massive LLM with lots of data inside of it and lots of factors. But you'll still be able to do that. In fact, on my desk, I think I've talked about this a couple times.

[00:08:10] I actually have two supercomputers sitting on my desk built by NVIDIA. They're DGX Sparks. So that HR Data Labs can run its own AI and actually not worry about our client data being in the cloud. Our client data is being trained on models sitting on my desk. So it's very secure. Of course, my house is secure. But that's next generation stuff.

[00:08:39] I never, if you would have told me last year that I would have supercomputers sitting on my desk, I'd be like, yeah, yeah, I have a great computer. It's a Mac Studio and it's really super. No, no, a supercomputer, a real one sitting on your desk without the need for a cooling system from a very expensive air conditioning system. No, but actually sitting quite nicely there and doing quite well, both of them.

[00:09:07] And they take up no more energy than a computer. Fascinating. But again, we're trying to build in utilizing the LLM and the models that we're building on that in a retrieval access, retrieval augmented generation, RAG, so that we can build our own model based on things we've done, work we've done before,

[00:09:35] so that not only can we use it in our consulting, but at some point we'll be able to turn it over to our clients as well so they'd have access to that RAG too. Yeah, they won't have access to the other client data. But they'll have access to how does compensation get done? How does HR and data governance work? And ask questions of the LLM and actually get work done in the LLM, just like every other one. And that's kind of cool. That's really neat.

[00:10:05] So if you want to check that out, that's at hrdatalabs.ai. You can find out more about that or on the hrdatalabs.com website. But so going back to the context of last season of season, or this season, season 11, we had a lot of other interesting conversations. We had a really interesting conversation with Helena Almeida from ADP.

[00:10:32] She's one of their legal counsels that is specifically focused on artificial intelligence and ethics. And we talked to her a lot about artificial intelligence and AI. We talked to Brian Platz about security and privacy of data and artificial intelligence. Of course, my friend Tim Sackett, we had a really wonderful conversation about talent acquisition. Dara Brenner, one of my best friends in the HR world and in the working world,

[00:10:59] talking with her about recruiting fraud and trust. And I would be remiss if I didn't mention Charlene Lee and her 90-day blueprint, her 90-day AI blueprint. Brody Meyer and dealing with frontline workers. John Kim talking about hiring costs. Cole Knapper talking about how people analytics has changed. Brilliant conversations. Decentralized performance management and pay changes with Jacob Chase and Bruce Cohen,

[00:11:29] my old friend from Morgan Stanley. And then two of the most brilliant people I know in the world of HR, Jess Von Bank, who I'm just such a fanboy of her, and one of my besties, Christy Brown. We're talking about women in leadership. Amy Dufresne, we started off the season talking about workplace substance abuse and how impactful that is. And organizational change with Mark Stelzner,

[00:11:58] him and his IA group have been around for 25 years. It's just crazy. And we've closed out the season talking about burnout with Alison Campbell. And as well, we're going to have some really cool conversations coming up in the next segment. We're going to talk about episodes in season 12. I just want to first say,

[00:12:27] this is my first season without my best friend and colleague and co-host, and I miss him. But we got through season 11, and we'll get through season 12, and hopefully someday we'll be able to reconnect with him and get him back on the program. So let's talk about season 12. We've already put together a lot of episodes from season 12, and I got to tell you, some of them are really cool.

[00:12:58] One of them is the entirety of the HR Data Labs team getting on a podcast and talking about pay and how it affects them. It's a really cool episode. We also recorded from the NACO conference in New Orleans, Louisiana a few weeks ago. And that was really fun, talking to counties about what issues they're facing in the world of pay and HR

[00:13:25] and to have some of the conversations that we had with some of these brilliant people that run these very complex county organizations that we kind of take for granted happen. But these are the people that keep our county jails running, our sheriff's office running. They keep the counties running to make sure that your roads are paved, that your stuff gets done in your county. And it was a lot of fun.

[00:13:53] And we have other conversations, too, coming up. Nicole Ward, Betsy Irizarry, some just brilliant people with their own take on what's going on in the world of HR and pay. I think we're going to see a lot of AI-dominated conversations, but I think we're also going to see a lot of practical conversations as well about how the world is changing and how we have to stay on top of it and how we as human resource people and business people

[00:14:20] need to be able to transition quite well between these technology changes without skipping a beat. And we're going to have lots more conversations about that. But as you know, one of the things we do when we go through these episodes that end seasons, episode 25s, and we've gone through a bunch of them, we look back on the predictions that we made for this time, for this past six months,

[00:14:49] and we review those predictions, and we see whether or not they were accurate or not. And then we give our own predictions for the next six months. And I've learned a lot that six months is a long time, but it's no time in the concept of making predictions. And so after doing 11 episodes that end seasons, my brain,

[00:15:18] it's kind of funny how sometimes you can nail six months and sometimes you can't. And in the world of utilizing artificial intelligence, I used Claude to try and rank the predictions that I made in the last episode, season ending episode, episode 10, sorry, season 10, episode 25. And actually perplexity had, because I had been using perplexity a lot,

[00:15:47] had made a prediction that says, AI and HR flips from experimentation to mandatory ROI phase with CHROs under real pressure to prove tangible business outcomes, productivity gains, lower turnover, faster hiring, blah, blah, blah. Well, Claude went back and reviewed that and said that perplexity's call landed close to the mark. Industry data through mid-2026 shows 61% of business leaders feeling more pressure to prove AI ROI than a year prior.

[00:16:15] MIT reported that roughly 95% of generative AI pilots still aren't showing P&L impact. And about only 19% of the AI initiatives meeting or beating their business goals. So exactly the experimentation gives way to prove it or cut it dynamic that perplexity did describe. And Gartner and Sherm's CHRO research echoes that same shift towards scaling

[00:16:44] only high value HR use cases. I'll be honest with you. I think that we're still early days and I don't think there really are very many proven HR use cases. Yeah, there's the chatbots, which are giving employees answers to questions. But I think the HIL, human in the loop, is still very critical.

[00:17:12] And that's why we're seeing not really a lot of ROI yet, but a lot of experimentation. And I would applaud organizations that are experimenting, are trying to find ways of being able to put together artificial intelligence tool sets and trying to figure out what fits in their culture and fits in their world and the way they work. My prediction was that

[00:17:40] there would be federal HR relevant regulation, that the federal HR regulation wouldn't move as fast or as hard as it had been in the past. But HR regulation on states, especially from California, New York, New Jersey, would create protections around workers and their data. And what Claude said was,

[00:18:09] David's prediction also tracked, well, no federal AI preemption law actually passed. Trump's December 2025 executive order directed a task force to, a DOJ task force, to challenge state AI laws. Go figure. And then a 2026 March White House framework pushed for broad preemption, but neither converted into binding law so that it didn't happen. But California, Illinois, Texas, Utah, Maryland,

[00:18:37] and New Jersey have AI hiring bias and bias audits actively enforced with New York creating a RAISE Act huge for 2027. And so that kind of lands pretty close. So let's give both of them solid A or A minus. I think that both work quite accurate. Now I'm going to ask Claude real time

[00:19:06] to predict the next six months. Actually, I'm going to pause while we do this. So I'm going to play the bumper while we create this.

[00:20:15] Well, while Claude's working on the prediction the next six months, I'm going to give you my prediction for the next six months. And I'm going to choose AI again. But I mean, you're going to be like, duh, of course he's going to choose AI. But I'm going to say that we're going to make more significant progress in the context of figuring out what will happen in the world of AI and HR.

[00:20:45] And that there are more companies coming out, more organizations coming out and saying that they found significant use cases or cases that make more sense for their organization and their culture to be able to fit into their world of work. And we're going to see the sentiment going to that prove the ROI and creating that ROI case that you can take to finance much more easily. And I think that will

[00:21:15] lead to the best adoption of AI in the world of HR for the worker benefit, the leader benefit. Finding those ROI use cases and then proving them out, I think we're going to make significant progress in the next six months. So let's say in January of 2027, by January of 2027, we're going to have some significant use cases that we'll be able to study as case studies and say, yeah, these make sense and this is where the AI has gone.

[00:21:46] So Claude came back and let's give their prediction. So, and, yeah, of course, Claude's going to say, the highest impact story for HR in the next six months won't be a new wave of AI adoption. Of course Claude said this. It'll be cleaning up the AI headcount mistakes already made. Meaningful share of the layoffs companies attributed to AI in 2025-26 will quietly reverse. Firms rehiring for the same roles are often offshore at lower pay while HR absorbs

[00:22:15] the credibility hit, of course we will, with both the workforce and the board. At the same time, HR gets pulled into defending against AI redundancy washing scrutiny and media regulators and employees pushing back on companies that used AI as a cover for plain cost cutting rather than real automation. And it goes on to say, while this one matters the most, it's the intersection of several signals already converging as of August 2026, nearly a third of hiring managers who cut a roll hot-siting AI

[00:22:44] have already rehired for it. Wow, that's impactful. Forrester's 2026 outlook explicitly predicts half of AI-attributed layoffs often quietly get rehired, often offshore, and Deutsche Bank analysts are already flagging AI redundancy washing as a named pattern. Layer on Gartner's prediction that 20% of orgs will flatten management structures using AI, and then the CHRO ROI pressure that's been building all year, HR is going to spend

[00:23:14] the second half doing damage control decisions it often didn't make while still being expected to show AI is working. So there you go. And I think that makes sense. It's fascinating that I'm predicting that AI is going to find a home within HR and that we're going to prove ROI use cases. The AI is telling us that it's not going to be as successful

[00:23:44] in the world of work and that a lot of the hiring that was done, or sorry, a lot of the firing that was done falsely under the guise of AI efficiencies are going to be rehired because companies find it impossible to get work done without those folks. and often offshore them at lower prices. Makes sense. We've seen this happen time and time again. So, I think that's a really cool place to stop. I think that

[00:24:14] one of the things that we will see in the next six months, first of all, we're going to have another sparkling array of brilliant people talking to us about the world of work. We already have a ton of episodes already created. And I think if you look back on Season 11, I don't know how we matched Season 11. Season 11 was a highlight for me because, as I said, I got to talk to Jess Von Bank, who I've just been a fanboy of for many years.

[00:24:42] But I think we'll have some other conversations like we are going to the HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas. And as you know, I have marathon sessions interviewing people left and right, all my friends in the HR technology world. And hopefully I'll have many, many conversations there with people around the world of work and around how it's changing and the context of that change, whether it's AI-based or not. So, I want to end there. Thank you so much

[00:25:12] for sticking with the HR Data Labs podcast. I really appreciate it. Please check out the HR channel. It's one of our proud accomplishments at HR Data Labs to create a channel completely focused on the world of work and the world of HR. And also check out the Work Defined Podcast Network and all of the brilliant people that are on the shows that come to you from across the spectrum of different types of HR background as well as

[00:25:42] rock stars across HR and different opinions about it. And I thank William Tinkup for his partnership in that journey. Again, thank you so much. Really appreciate your support. Take care and as always, stay safe. Thank you for listening to the HR Data Labs podcast. Don't forget to hit subscribe and share it with your network. You can also check out the recordings on Spotify

[00:26:10] or the HR channel now on Roku and Fire TV. Thank you. Take care and stay safe. Thank you.