In this episode, host Shannon Peavey speaks with Professor Rebecca Hinds, PhD, a Stanford-trained organizational behavior expert and author of Your Best Meeting Ever. Rebecca, who runs the Glean Work AI Institute, explains why the future of AI at work is not about squeezing more productivity out of individuals, but about strengthening organizations as a whole. She shares her system for applying design principles to create effective meetings and illuminates the ways these can help leaders decide when technology enhances collaboration and when it risks undermining human trust, creativity, and emotion. She also highlights a growing body of research on how AI can expand access to insight and make work more effective – though today, she says, many organizations are getting it wrong. Instead of imposing AI from the top down, she argues that companies should empower employees to experiment, and that they should tolerate and even celebrate failure. Importantly, she says, organizations need to establish thoughtful guardrails that allow people to discover how these tools can truly help teams become more effective.

01:56 First things first, the bad news on AI and meeting culture

03:12 The good news on AI and meeting culture

05:29 Why leaders need to think about meetings holistically

07:10 Seven design principles to appy to meeting design

10:16 The “Four-D, CEO” test for meetings

13:41 Where AI can excel

18:02 Thinking differently about human roles

19:18 Why we should worry about “digital twins”

20:45 Keeping human emotions in mind

23:05 What can happen if you deprioritize people

23:30 Psychological safety at work, and with AI at work

26:09 The critical need to have AI policies

28:30 Enabling employees to find the value in AI

30:54 Tolerating, even celebrating failure

33:48 Collaboration with AI: an individual experience

36:36 The future is managing agents

37:38 Hope for a future of unparalleled insights

40:26 Using AI to help the organization, rather than the individual

42:48 Sharing resources and research

📚Resources:

• Rebecca Hinds https://www.rebeccahinds.com/

• Stanford University http://www.stanford.edu

• The Glean Work AI Institute https://www.workai.institute

• Rebecca’s book, “Your Best Meeting Ever” https://www.rebeccahinds.com/book

• Organizational psychologist Bob Sutton https://bobsutton.net/about-bob/

• Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmonson

https://amycedmondson.com/about/

• Wharton School of Business Professor Ethan Mollick https://x.com/emollick?lang=en

• Charter newsletterhttps://www.charterworks.com/

🌟 Where to find Rebecca:

• On LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-hinds/

🙋🏻‍♀️Where to find Women in Product:

• On LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/company/women-in-product/posts/ 

• Website https://womenpm.org/

• Join the Community https://womenpm.org/wip-community/