HR departments struggle to be all things to all stakeholders while delivering on the most strategic priorities of the business. But when we dig into the OS of HR, we find a resource-constrained function that contains multitudes. Long range people priorities are deemed negotiable, HR’s domain expertise isn’t respected, and the function acts as a service-provider when it should be guiding the organization's evolution.

This week, Rodney Evans sits down with HR industry giant Josh Bersin to discuss his book Irresistible: The Seven Secrets of the World’s Most Enduring, Employee-Focused Organizations and dig into how HR must transform itself to enable a shift to more profitable, resilient, human organizations. They explore what makes a company “irresistible,” the tidal wave that is AI, and the critical role HR plays in shifting a workplace’s culture.

(Editor’s note: This episode was recorded in July, so many things Josh talks about as “upcoming” are already out in the world! Look below for a full list of current references.)

Learn more about Josh Bersin on his website, LinkedIn, and Twitter (X).

Learn more about Josh’s book here.

Learn more about the Josh Bersin Company at their website and explore the courses offered in Josh Bersin Academy.

Mentioned references:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: What’s something that you’re trying to learn right now?

03:33 Story behind the origins of Josh’s book

09:58 The shift behind “Coach, Not Boss”

16:17 Concept of “success” in Irresistible companies vs traditional companies

21:20 How irresistible companies are transforming their HR departments

30:11 HR leader Interview tips to identify an irresistible company

33:49 HR and AI and how to think about it

40:23 Where HR should start engaging with AI

43:04 Wrap up: Share this episode with your HR friends!

“Ask Us Anything” episodes are some of the most fun to make, so we knew we had to include one in our Future of HR miniseries. In the spirit of a well-meaning (but often toothless) HR feedback box, all the questions are anonymous.

On today’s episode, Rodney and Sam look at what arrived in our mailbag and try to solve listener questions. But did they beat the Brave New Work record of answering more than four questions in a single episode? You’ll have to tune in to find out.

Some of today’s questions include:

Mentioned references:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: What is a favorite Halloween costume of yours from the past?

03:21 Question 1 - How do you get Finance and Strategy teams to collaborate in Level 4?

07:17 Question 2 - How does HR engage with higher FoHR levels without making Platform Teams feel “less than”? How do you plan budgets for this?

13:53 Question 3 - How can we change the current perception of HR within an organization?

16:22 Question 4 - How can I sell the value of creating more transparency and inviting more non-management team members to participate in this?

21:45 Question 5 - How do you get a leadership team to truly work together if their remits are very different?

26:43 Question 6 - We’re having trouble identifying our shared work, often popping in and out of silos. Can you help us get unstuck?

30:53 Question 7 - How do you enable collaboration and drive accountability in a fast-paced matrix company?

33:47 Question 8 - We have a traditional HR team with defensive processes. How can we start to shift that into a service mindset? Will Agile HR ever be a thing?

37:55 Question 9 - I have lots of experience in operational leadership and company culture roles, but no formal training. What should I do if I want to make this my career?

41:39 Question 10 - I’m working in a toxic work environment with a bad manager and I didn’t see this during my interview. What questions should I ask in future interviews to uncover this?

46:27 Wrap Up: Share this episode with your HR friends!

Spooky season is here, so it seems fitting to share a horror story. Because there’s a monster draining time and energy from most of our organizations. This sneaky shapeshifter can take any form, show up at any time, and is one of the more destructive, chaotic forces we’re forced to deal with at work.

We’re talking about the monster that is org debt—and HR has been trapped in a maze with it for decades. Worse still, the maze’s towering walls and serpentine corridors come from outdated policies and processes HR largely built themselves. And it’s historically been impossible for many leaders to find the time to clean up org debt—or even know where to look for it.

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Today on episode 10, they help you learn how to identify org debt, shine a light on its hiding places, measure what it’s really costing us, and start eliminating it from your organization for good.

Mentioned references:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: Do you remember the first CD you ever bought, and if so, what was it?

03:20 Intro to org debt

06:41 Why companies struggle getting rid of it

13:36 Clear examples of org debt in HR

20:10 Why org debt is such an issue now

25:51 Stopping the cycle of org debt and creating capacity

33:05 Nipping new org debt in the bud

35:14 Psychological behaviors behind types of org debt

41:43 Financial costs of org debt

42:45 Wrap up: Leave us a review and share this episode with your HR friends!

We’re living in a data-rich time. Searching for a study or report on, say, the benefits of a three-day return-to-office policy? You’re mere clicks away from convincing arguments with shiny graphics and spicy pull-quotes to post on LinkedIn.

But there’s also never been a worse time for data, with a glut of conflicting information being confidently shared from unreliable sources.

Most frustrating, even if you find all the trustworthy data needed to craft a watertight argument for burning your performance management program to the ground, all the numbers in the world don’t seem to be enough to change a single executive’s rigid opinion, let alone an entire C-suite.

HR has never had more data at their fingertips—so why does that data often feel useless?

To explore this data dilemma, we brought back friend-of-the-pod Brian Elliott to unpack what’s stopping HR departments (and let’s be real, most organizations writ large) from turning this mountain of information into meaningful action. In this episode, Rodney and Brian talk about:

Learn more about Brian and what he’s up to on LinkedIn.

Mentioned references:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: Who is your more interesting relative?

03:35 What Brian’s been up to since SXSW

04:58 Top of mind concerns Brian hears from CPOs/CHROs: #1 - Burnout, #2 - Return to Office

11:09 #3 - Generative AI

16:09 HR leaders feeling “not ready” and “too busy” to change

18:52 You can’t be a strategic partner if you don’t want to/can’t change

20:31 What keeps people from acting on data and research that contradicts the status quo

28:16 Timeline and subtlety of change and the temptation to snap back

31:06 Organizational metrics Brian keeps an eye on

33:35 Cross-functional solutions to data driven problems

39:08 C-suite not supporting HR when they do bring a data backed case for change

41:59 Sourcing and interpreting external and internal data

45:13 How HR can combat entrenched opinions with data

48:17 Wrap up: Leave us a review!

Was it ever possible for our first AI episode to not be a two-parter? Probably not. So we’re back today with more thoughts on AI and the Future of HR.

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Last week, they dove into the AI pool to begin filtering out the noise about how this coming wave will impact all of us. Today on episode 9, Rodney and Sam keep swimming around the deep end. Which reminds us: If you haven’t yet listened to last week’s episode, do that first for some important context (and jokes)!

On Part 2, they discuss:

Mentioned references:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: You’re going for a walk through the forest and see a big rock and flip it over. What are you hoping to find?

02:37 HR’s historically unwinnable battles AI will help with

08:53 Facing fears over your job being automated

14:14 Being “busy” and “productive” as avoidance to doing real work

17:40 Experiments to run on your own, independent of your company

21:15 Wrap Up: Share this episode with your HR friends!

One midnight scroll through LinkedIn is all it takes to be overwhelmed with AI stories and hot takes. There’s a massive amount of confusion, apprehension, excitement, and just general noisiness to make sense of, some which is created by AI tools themselves. But as more and more AI-powered solutions promising to revolutionize HR flood the market—and as more and more employees spiral with worry that the’ll be automated out of their jobs—how are we supposed to get caught up on some AI basics? Let alone actually use these tools at work?

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Today on episode 8, they explore how AI will help the most advanced HR teams move from Level 4 to Level 5 of our maturity model—and how it can be a positive force for change if we’re asking the right questions and trying to solve the right problems. In fact, Rodney and Sam had so much to digest, this episode became a two-parter.

Today on Part 1, they dig into:

Mentioned references:

--------------

Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Introduction & Check-In: What is your favorite evidence that you have had a successful time off?

04:05 Level setting for the AI conversation

08:57 Rodney and Sam’s personal AI adventures

14:16 Exploring AI in Mission-Based Teams

20:01 Knowledge barrier to begin experimenting is low

22:12 AI and counterintuitive moves

25:41 AI’s role in the move from Level 4 to Level 5

30:59: Impact on human beings from atomized marketplace roles

32:40 AI in industrial-era org vs AI in evolutionary org

35:59 Wrap up: leave us a review and share with your HR friends

Stop us if you’ve heard this one before: A company hires a change agent (think anyone with “org effectiveness,” “change management,” or “strategy and efficiency” in their title) with promises of how they’ll be the one to revolutionize the company’s future. Several months later, the change agent realizes the company is fighting them at every turn. Despite all the talk, these roles often have minimal authority and autonomy, so those lofty dreams of change? They end up unfulfilled.

But for HR departments heading toward Level 4, The Marketplace, of our maturity model, these roles need to step off the sidelines and into the game as Market Designers. In this reimagined role, they facilitate a dynamic network of talent and Mission-Based Teams that enables HR to get after its thorniest and most valuable business objectives. And this transformation isn’t one-and-done: Newly empowered Market Designers continually change and evolve the company to meet new moments and challenges 🚀

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Today on episode 7, they explore why Market Designers are ready to make the change their predecessors couldn’t realize, what their relationship with HR Business Coaches looks like, and how they’re instrumental for building the HR marketplace of the future.

Mentioned references:

--------------

Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: What’s an award you received as a child you were prouder of than you probably should have been?

04:26 Why change agents have trouble changing the organization

07:43 Changing the org chart first usually isn’t the right move

12:25 Day-to-day of a Market Designer

15:11 Transferring skills from consultants to Market Designers

18:15 Difference between HR Business Coach and Market Designer

20:29 How many Market Designers does a company have?

24:17 Future of CPO/CHRO in Level 4 and beyond

27:56 What a healthy HR talent marketplace looks like

33:26 Sam’s adventures into DAOs and unregulated marketplaces

38:32 Why HR is ideal for a talent marketplace

40:54 Wrap Up: Send us your burning HR questions!

Since last fall, we’ve spoken/joked/laughed/cried with hundreds of HR leaders and change makers about the Future of HR and the industry’s evolutionary tipping point. And despite spending time with many inspiring CPOs and CHROs, there’s none quite like Hebba Youssef. Along with being Workweek’s Chief People Officer, she’s also the author of “I Hate It Here”, a no holds barred newsletter unpacking HR’s thorniest problems and putting into words what everyone’s thinking but too afraid to say. Plus, her GIF game? Unparalleled.

This week, on episode 6 of our miniseries, Rodney Evans sits down with Hebba to talk about how “I Hate It Here” came to be, how a role often tasked with putting out one fire after another can stay focused on strategy, and why being CPO is the hardest and loneliest job in any organization.

Learn more about Hebba Youssef:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: What’s something that you love that is kind of embarrassing?

04:20 Origins of “I Hate It Here”

09:36 What resonates the most in the “I Hate It Here” community?

10:32 Sources of burnout in HR

15:58 Balancing strategy with the day-to-day as CPO

21:23 HR’s martyrdom complex

23:48 Isolation and loneliness in HR

30:25 The CEO-CPO relationship

34:52 HR as the organization’s doctor

40:09 Hebba’s top HR mission to solve

46:03 Wrap up: Leave us a review!

The role of HR Business Partner is often a tale of two experiences. On the one hand, HRBPs are some of the most empathetic and passionate people you’ll ever meet. On the other hand, they’re stuck on the hamster wheel of busywork, bouncing from crisis to crisis without the authority to prioritize their energy—and without the respect from leadership to make a real difference. Look up “burnout” in the dictionary and odds are you’ll find a picture of an HRBP.

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Today on episode 5, they explore how this critical role took a hard left turn from it’s intended purpose, what its future-of-work glow-up (hello, HR Business Coach) could look like, and how HR Business Coaches + Mission-Based Teaming = unlimited potential.

References mentioned:

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website.

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro + Check-In: What was your favorite show to watch as a small child?

04:05 Why the HRBP role isn’t working

10:41 Why Future of HR requires rethinking the HRBP

12:53 Skill overlap between HRBP and HR Business Coach

21:03 Shifting from “service mindset” to “product mindset”

25:07 HR Business Coach’s point of view

27:20 Recap of Level 3 and what’s changed

29:26 Who does the HR Business Coach report to?

34:55 Wrap up: Send us your burning HR questions!

In this miniseries, Brave New Work’s Rodney Evans is joined by friend-of-the-pod and Ready OG Sam Spurlin to dive into how HR can become more resilient, efficient, and equitable.

Last week, Rodney and Sam teamed up with Future of HR team member Meg Saxby to explore our new maturity model, assessment, and the six key capabilities every HR department needs to learn, strengthen, and evolve to succeed in the future of work. Today, on episode 4, Rodney, Sam, and Meg finish that two-parter. Which reminds us: If you haven’t yet listened to last week’s episode, do that first for a 101 overview of our maturity model.

This episode focuses on the capabilities needed to succeed in Levels 3-5 (and our secret bonus level):

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Learn more about The Future of HR at our website

Curious where your company sits on our 5-stage maturity model? Take our assessment and find out!

Have a burning HR question for Rodney and Sam to answer? Email us at [email protected].

Ready to get started moving your HR department into the future? Email us at [email protected] or [email protected].

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00:00 Intro and Check-In: What is a language you would like to speak (or speak better than your currently do) and why?

03:03 Why these are Varsity 2.0 level skills

04:31 Key Capability 4: Facilitation and Future of Work Coaching

08:04 What Future of Work coaching looks like in practice

11:34 Key Capability 5: Solution Design and Market Management

15:31 Why solution design is such a big shift for HR

18:18 Key Capability 6: Data Literacy and Automation

19:56 Big potential wins for automation in HR right now

23:32 Impact of AI on capacity planning

24:58 Holding our predictions lightly

26:51 Wrap up: Send us your burning hot HR questions!