Stepsero

What happens to knowledge work when AI can do the knowing?
In this episode, James Meaden looks at the future of knowledge work: how the idea of the expert professional took shape, why the knowledge people are trained on is going out of date faster than ever, and why work may be shifting from knowledge toward judgment.
The conversation also explores what it means to come out of an era of certainty, when the predictable path of degree, job and career no longer holds. James argues that navigating uncertainty is one of the oldest human skills, even though workplaces have rarely trained or rewarded it. The episode closes on leadership: what leaders can offer their teams when they don’t have all the answers, and why honesty and trust matter more than projecting confidence.

James Meaden is an Industrial/Organizational psychologist and founder of The Alive Institute. His work explores what it means to be human in an age of AI, and how leaders can develop the human intelligence needed to navigate change and uncertainty. Through research, assessment, and coach certification, he helps people lead human again.

References:

James Meaden LinkedIn profile

www.thealive.institute

Imposter syndrome at work is often reduced to low confidence.
In this conversation, executive coach and imposter syndrome specialist Sarah Farmer unpacks that and other common myths, taking a broader view: any mask, from overconfidence to underconfidence, that can stop someone from being as effective as they want to be.
She separates imposter syndrome from the normal nerves of doing something new, challenges the idea that it fades with seniority, and looks at why there’s no quick fix.
The conversation also covers how to tell when it’s worth working on, through three lenses: mental, physical and financial.

Sarah Farmer is an international multi-award-winning executive coach, imposter syndrome specialist, bestselling author of Leader Unleashed and host of the Lead Brightly podcast.

As Founder of Bright & Brilliant Ltd., Sarah helps senior leaders, leadership teams and business owners develop the right level of confidence, emotional intelligence and people skills to lead themselves and others brilliantly.

Blending neuroscience, psychology and practical leadership development, her work helps people challenge the thinking and self-doubt that can hold them back, create lasting behavioural change and take greater control of the future they want to create.

Her mission? A brighter future powered by brilliant leaders.

References:

Sarah Farmer LinkedIn profile

www.brightandbrilliant.com

REPLUG launched just weeks before the pandemic. It went remote out of necessity and stayed remote by choice.

Luca Mastrorocco is an Italian entrepreneur based in Berlin and co-founder of REPLUG, an agency helping companies grow their app businesses. With over a decade of experience in digital and mobile advertising, he leads the company’s commercial growth and runs an international, remote-first team alongside his co-founder.

A father of two, Luca speaks candidly about the practical realities of running a company, leading people, and making work fit around a life that includes more than work.

References:

Luca Mastrorocco LinkedIn profile

www.rplg.io

Influencing without authority isn’t just a challenge for junior employees: it follows people all the way to the top of an organization.
This episode breaks down what influence actually means, using a simple framework of control, influence, and concern, and explores why pushing too hard, too fast, can trigger pushback rather than agreement.
The conversation covers how to identify the people who actually shape a decision-maker’s thinking, why relationships built long before you need them matter more than any tactic, and what it means to manage your own ego when you don’t have formal power to rely on.

Costas is the Founder & CEO of In Tune Executive Coaching. His focus is on helping leaders to be in tune with themselves and their environment, tap into their inner resourcefulness and manage their interactions with others more effectively. To know more about Costas, please visit any of the links below.

References:

Costas Kalisperas LinkedIn profile

www.intune-exec.com

In this episode, we talk with Geoff Curtis, author of Embracing Your Own Purgatory, about what happens when the identity you built around your work disappears. Geoff describes the armor he built around his career, and how he used work to avoid dealing with harder things in his own life. We talk about destination addiction (always chasing the next achievement without stopping to ask why) and what he thinks the antidote is.

Geoff Curtis is former executive vice president, corporate affairs and chief communications officer at Horizon Therapeutics, a biotechnology company focused on researching and developing treatments for rare diseases. During his nearly 30-year health care communications career, he has worked in various roles on both the client and agency side. Geoff is a committed mentor and coach to young professionals and undergraduate college students, and an avid philanthropist committed to education equity and access. He and his wife recently launched Future Voices Collective, a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting first-generation college students pursuing careers in public relations and communications. Additionally, Geoff recently published his first book, Embracing Your Own Purgatory. 

He received a Bachelor of Arts in English from Lake Forest College, a Master of Arts from DePaul University in public relations and advertising and completed the Leadership and Society Initiative fellowship at the University of Chicago. Geoff currently serves on the board of trustees for Lake Forest College, is a member of the board of directors for Hope Chicago and the Illinois Biotechnology Innovation Organization; is a member of the board of advisors for The Plank Center for Leadership in Public Relations; serves as Vice Chair for the Commission on Public Relations Education; is a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council for the DePaul University School of Communications; serves on the advisory committee for the University of Chicago Leadership and Society Initiative and on the Graham Council for the University of Chicago Graham School.

References:

Geoff Curtis LinkedIn profile

Embracing Your Own Purgatory (Amazon Link)

Giovanni Di Felice talks about what it takes to build a personal brand while representing an employer. He shares why he sees personal branding as helpful rather than necessary, how his following grew organically over just few years, and where he draws the line on authenticity (open about work challenges and opinions, but private about deeper personal moments).
The conversation also covers his view that a well-crafted LinkedIn profile can replace a CV, what counts as a red flag on a candidate’s profile, and the tension between being an executive and being a content creator.

Giovanni Di Felice is Director of Talent Acquisition at Statista. He is passionate about talent acquisition and people development and enjoys building high-performing teams of experts, which he leads with a consultative leadership style. Outside of work, he appreciates art and enjoys engaging in conversations on a wide range of topics.

References:

Giovanni Di Felice LinkedIn profile

Giving feedback is one of the hardest parts of managing people, and most of us were never taught how to do it.

Katie O’Brien Ceccarini is the Founder of Endurance Management Coaching, a Certified Executive Coach, and author of Fearless Feedback: Everything Managers Have Never Been Taught About Feedback. Over the last 20 years, she’s managed, trained, and developed thousands of people — from scaling Customer Success at Yelp to leading Learning & Development at Opendoor. Today she works with organizations like eBay, LinkedIn, and AllState to build high-performing teams with the power of feedback.

References:

Katie O’Brien Ceccarini LinkedIn profile

Fearless Feedback: Everything Managers Have Never Been Taught About Feedback (Amazon Link)

In this conversation, leadership and performance facilitator Richard Gordon Kelly explores the invisible beliefs we carry about who we need to be, and how those beliefs, more than the work itself, create pressure and burnout. The discussion covers where these beliefs originate, why pressure acts as “expensive fuel,” and what happens when a thought is noticed rather than believed.
It closes on presence and slowing down as a way of staying close to what is actually true in the moment.

Richard Gordon Kelly is a leadership and performance facilitator working with executives, leaders, and teams across Europe. For more than 25 years, Richard has worked with people and organisations to explore what allows individuals and teams to perform at their best while staying connected to what matters most. He often notices something simple in his work: people are rarely struggling with work itself as much as with how work is being experienced internally — through pressure, thought, and the meaning we attach to what is happening. 

Through conversations focused on trust, presence, and human connection, Richard helps people see their experience more clearly in real time. And when that clarity emerges, things often begin to shift naturally. Less pressure. More awareness. Better conversations. More sustainable performance. Not because something new is added, but because people reconnect with what was already there.

References:

Richard Gordon Kelly LinkedIn profile

Cecilie Steenbuch Traberg joins Stepsero to discuss her co-authored paper, “AI is turning research into a scientific monoculture.”

Cecilie Steenbuch Traberg is a Dr in Psychology from University of Cambridge and an assistant professor of digitalisation at copenhagen business school, where she conducts research on the intersection between psychology and technology.

References:

Cecilie Steenbuch Traberg LinkedIn profile

In this episode, Olga Solovyeva explains why AI adoption inside organizations is so uneven, often coming down to leadership.
Some leaders give teams freedom and time to experiment; others pause and “park” AI altogether. That caution has a cost. When leadership restricts AI, employees often turn to personal accounts instead (what Olga calls shadow AI use) which strips away any oversight the organization would otherwise provide.
The conversation then turns to risk: data leaks from sensitive information entered into AI tools, and hallucinations that have already damaged reputations at major consulting firms. Olga closes on a subtler one: as AI makes longer reports easy to produce, those reports get AI-summarized on the receiving end too, leaving discussions built on content no one’s actually read, and no one’s accountable for.

Olga Solovyeva, PhD, works at the intersection of technology governance and strategic communications. She advises boards on AI governance and risk at Chairwell Partners, and writes on the human side of AI adoption. Her doctoral research examined how tech companies wield political power — a thread she’s now pulling through a book on the transformation of one of Russia’s largest tech firms under state pressure.

References:

Olga Solovyeva LinkedIn profile