Cornerstone OnDemand CEO Himanshu Palsule joins Amy and Meg to discuss Generation Beta, the leadership pipeline vacuum, and what it takes to build a workforce for a world that doesn't exist yet. From his World Economic Forum panel on corporate ladders to hiring a Chief AI Officer who asked for just 12 people, Himanshu shares what he's learned leading a major talent platform through complete transformation while the rules of work are being rewritten. Plus: why inference, context, and trust matter more than token counts, how drug development timelines collapsed from 10 years to one, and what to do when your team can't let go.

MIT researcher and People Analytics author Ben Waber joins Amy and Meg for one of the most myth-busting conversations about AI, productivity, and what actually drives enterprise value. From a 23-year-old grad student who discovered that billion-dollar companies don't know how their own teams communicate, to the lunch table experiment that changed programmer productivity by 20%, Ben brings 15 years of behavioral data to challenge everything you think you know about how organizations work — and why most AI claims should make you very skeptical.

Our guest had to cancel (get well soon, Ankur!). So instead of the episode we planned, you're getting something better — us, unfiltered, on everything that's been consuming our lives for the past month. Amy has 100+ hours of vibe coding under her belt and has things to say. Meg has been reading Dan Heath's Reset and watching Jason Lemkin slowly become the worst worker on his own team. And together we've landed on a thesis that might be uncomfortable: the bottleneck in AI transformation isn't capability anymore. It's judgment. It's you.

UNLEASH founder and CEO Marc Coleman joins Amy and Meg for a conversation about what 5,000 HR leaders actually need right now — not in theory, in practice. From launching a disastrous first conference with tangled lanyards and no sleep to building one of the world's largest HR technology events, Marc shares how he reads market signals, why he shifted from benefit-led to decision-led content, and the L'Oréal "journey book” that changed how he thinks about the value of gathering. Plus: why companies winning with AI won't tell you how, the real tension between boards and HR, and Marc's Vegas wedding story. Leadership Corner: what happens when your promotion makes your peers not your peers anymore.

⏰ TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 "Repurposing humanity in the age of machines"

00:14 Introduction — what do 5,000 HR leaders actually need?

01:02 Building communities around big ideas

03:29 The UNLEASH origin story — Chelsea FC and sore heads

06:42 First event chaos: tangled lanyards and one hour of sleep

07:47 How to separate signal from noise as an insider

08:07 The politician effect — why HR leaders can't share secrets

11:26 "I leave the clothes of yesterday behind me"

13:42 "Everyone has the same data — the ones who win make different decisions"

14:37 The L'Oréal journey book — 100 HR leaders, 38 brands, one week of decisions

18:05 What does "good" look like for a conference speaker?

20:44 One sentence can change your career — and a Vegas wedding

22:35 The gap between what boards want and what HR delivers

23:23 Why the hardest part of transformation is always the people

25:12 Boards want capital efficiency. HR manages human complexity.

26:45 Doing your homework — Ethan Mollick and the jaw on the floor

29:17 Why companies succeeding with AI won't share how

31:05 2026 is the year — doing nothing is very costly

32:24 "The execution lives and dies in HR"

33:11 Areas of hope — SAP, Walmart, and pioneering CHROs

34:20 The power of in-person learning and serendipity

37:40 UNLEASH America — March 17–19, Caesars Forum, Las Vegas

39:01 Leadership Corner: Promoted past your peers — now what?

42:23 Build your org structure first, then map the people

46:01 "This is a new job — not a step function of your old one"

47:10 Wrap-up: What HR leaders should focus on in 2026

🔑 KEY INSIGHTS:

- Everyone has the same data — the winners make different decisions, not luckier ones

- L'Oréal sends 100 HR leaders to UNLEASH annually with a custom "journey book" mapping decisions to sessions — the future of how organizations extract value from learning

- AI capability is outpacing organizational design — companies think it's about tools when it's actually about human beings

- The "politician effect": companies succeeding with AI treat it as competitive advantage and won't share publicly

- Boards optimize for capital efficiency while HR manages human complexity — the leaders who win translate between both worlds

- The execution of AI transformation lives and dies in HR — it's not a side initiative, it's the competitive advantage

- Workforce transformation is a team sport — you can't do it alone behind a closed door

- After a promotion: soothe your heart, then build your org completely separate from the relationships in place- A promotion isn't a step function — it's a new job requiring fresh onboarding and relationship building

📚 RESOURCES:

UNLEASH America 2026: March 17–19, Caesars Forum, Las Vegas https://www.unleash.ai/

Ethan Mollick: https://www.oneusefulthing.org/

Jess Von Bank: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jessvonbank/

Kirstin Ferguson Episode (Season 1): https://youtu.be/lceHtsbNAcs?si=rlOuV3HwrFk9r1lx

🔗 CONNECT:

Marc Coleman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marccoleman/

Submit Leadership Questions: [email protected]

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/megandamyshow/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-meg-amy-show

#Leadership #AITransformation #UNLEASH #FutureOfWork#HRLeadership #DecisionMaking #MegAndAmyShow

Radical Candor author Kim Scott joins Amy and Meg for one of the most candid conversations about leadership, courage, and what it really means to care in an era of AI disruption and rising authoritarianism. From managing diamond cutters in the Soviet Union to coaching CEOs at Google, Apple, and Twitter, Kim shares the personal stories behind her frameworks — including the moment a colleague's feedback made her rethink everything and write Radical Respect. Plus: what Kim would tell Workday's returning founder Aneel Bhusri, why Steve Jobs argued against himself, and how to give feedback when AI did half the work.

We're back! In our Season 2 opener, we dig into everything that's happened since we wrapped Season 1 — and there's a LOT. Amy's been vibe coding an app for her mom (with a full AI development team), Meg's been having her brain broken by AI agents, and the business landscape has shifted dramatically.

Amy and Meg get brutally honest about the toxic workplace archetypes every leader faces - and share the real stories that shaped their careers. This isn't just storytelling; it's a masterclass in pattern recognition, strategic response, and hard-earned wisdom.

🚀 Jason Averbook reveals the 4 forces creating the biggest change HR has ever seen—and why 95% of AI projects are failing. This isn't about technology; it's about trust, engagement, and fundamentally rethinking how work gets done.

📚 RESOURCES:

Meg Bear on WTF Is a Forward-Deployed Engineer? by Thomas Otter | https://thomasotter.substack.com/p/wtf-is-a-forward-deployed-engineer/comment/110916540

🚀 FROM FOOD CRITIC TO KITCHEN: John Sumser, HR tech's leading independent analyst for over 20 years, reveals what happens when you step from the sidelines into operations—and why most of what we believe about AI, HR, and career success is wrong. Learn how to navigate uncertainty as opportunity, why "I don't know" is the most powerful thing a leader can say, and what the next 5 years hold for HR in this candid conversation about transformation and truth-telling.

Finland – Universal Basic Income Pilot🚀 THE CASE FOR GIVING PEOPLE MONEY: UBI expert Scott Santens reveals why the most radical idea in economics might be the simplest - just give people cash. Discover how Alaska has proven this works for 40+ years, why his crowdfunded basic income changed everything he thought about work, and what happens when we shift from survival mode to abundance thinking.