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Join us in the latest HR Leaders episode as we explore the Skills Revolution in the digital age. Our panel discusses fostering a culture of continuous learning, shifting to agile, skills-based approaches, and balancing technology with essential human skills. 

Learn how leadership can drive curiosity and continuous improvement to keep pace in a rapidly changing world.

🎓 In this episode, you will learn:

1. Strategies for leveraging AI and data analytics in skills mapping

2. The importance of integrating soft skills with technical capabilities

3. How to align learning and development initiatives with business strategy

4. Best practices for implementing talent marketplaces and experiential learning

5. How to cultivate a culture that encourages continuous learning and agility

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Chris Rainey 0:00

Chris. Hello everyone. Good morning, good afternoon, actually, good evening. My name is Chris Rainey, co founder here at HR leaders, and I'll be your host for today's live panel discussion where we're going to be talking about the skills revolution and talent development in the age of digital disruption, let me introduce you to our amazing panelists. First up, we've got Zachar, who's the vice president of HR Europe at GSK, David Burke, who's the Senior Director of global talent acquisition and employer brand at work. Human Nick Matlin, who's a global integrated workforce strategies leader at Roche, Matt burns, who's a HR executive and global industry analyst at HR leaders and host of the thinking inside the box podcast, and last but say, not least, we've got charity. Mitra, who's a global head of talent development at Philips, great to see you all. David, I promise that I'll pick on you first. So let me just jump straight into it. What strategies can organizations implement to foster a culture that encourages continuous learning, especially in rapidly changing industries.

David Burke 1:07

Thanks, Chris, yeah, I think, like, you know, just a preface here, it's in terms of continuous learning, it's not a nice to have anymore. It's just expected. It's essential for, you know, company health, but also from an employee perspective, you know, it's just, it's top of mind for people. So it feels like every question we answer it if the last few years have thought us anything, right? But it is another one of those. You know, it's been challenging times, but it has shown us that it's the most agile individuals and organizations that are ones that weather the storm best. So I think we really need to think about agility first and foremost when we're thinking about how we think about continuous learning. So developing a growth mindset around continuous learning development takes time. But I think the first kind of key takeaway for us is that an important early step is to include people. These aren't top down programs in the traditional sense, in the way we've delivered them. Before we need to ask people, you know, what it is they want to learn, but also where and how. You know, what's their experience on mobile, desktop? You know, we've got remote and in person employees, what's the blended experience for everyone? So I think asking those questions will give us really important data, but it will also make the employee feel much more included in the process before it begins. So certainly, I think first and foremost that agility and including people in the design of and thinking in terms of how we shape our approach here. So I think, then, from a culture perspective, it's important to create an environment which supports and celebrates continuous learning. So we need to make sure that our organization culture is aligned to that. You know, we need to make space and time for people to feel empowered and to protect that time. Look, it's busy. I get it. We're all super busy. But people really need to feel that it's okay for their learning and development to be a priority, and that it's a business priority, and not just, you know, a second tier kind of HR box tick. So last piece, I think recognition is a powerful tool which supports that kind of systemic transformation and change. So that's formal or informal, but I think if we're going to develop programs and encourage people to learn in different ways, that leadership buy in and aligning it to core values is really, really important. So targeted recognition shows people that the company values continuous learning. It shows people that the value of developing themselves is recognized by their leaders and their peers, and then it just those continuous recognition moments, you know, just give validation to people spending time. You know, we've done some research with Gallup on when these kind of structures and processes are in place, people are almost four times as likely to be engaged in the work, but crucially, 68% more likely to feel less stressed. Are burned out, some are most of the time. So those recognition moments can build. It can be a building block towards a connected culture, and that embeds the cultural change and systemic change that we want to see around more engaged processes.

Nick Smatlan 4:04

Yeah, I think those are all great points. And definitely from, from where I sit at Roche, we've definitely been moving in this direction of self authored, personalized career development and learning to really accelerate learning and, you know, ensure our employees feel fulfilled and really connected to the company mission, which is, you know, doing now what patients need next, and helping them build that expertise and experience. But something that I think we've learned, and probably, I would say, probably a lot of us have seen, is this piece around mindset is actually really where you need to start. Because I think a lot of people still think about their career in that linear kind of ladder sense. And when you're building your career through a ladder, and you're trying to achieve some sort of goal that's up here with this rapidly changing business environment and industries that we're in, all of a sudden, this that you're working towards could actually shift over here. And if you've really thought about your career in that kind of linear career ladder way, and you've not really built a breadth of skills and. Experiences, it's actually pretty hard to shift as the business shifts. And that's something else that we're really trying to encourage, is not to think about careers purely in a linear way, and to really think about it from a skills perspective, because it actually helps you move as the business moves.

David Burke 5:13

Yeah, just our CEO, Nick, just as little ad there, you know, is pushing us to really think about career rock walls over career ladder. So just for that, yeah,

Matt Burns 5:22

I think it's an interesting topic in general, as we think about changing the delivery model as well. I mean, we're all used to a model where you kind of get sequestered off into this room for a period of time to learn, but the retention is never super high, and it ends up becoming more of an experiential team building opportunity and less so like an academic ingesting some knowledge that you can then apply into the workplace. So I think this gives us a really good opportunity to look at skills in a way that becomes more as we've talked about pull, less, push. People can access the skills they want to build, and we can certainly encourage and provide visibility to the skills necessary on a particular career path, but as it's more self directed, you're gonna have much more success and engagement, which I think is just a critical piece in all this. The question I'm always asking is, there's a huge skills mismatch in the market, and it's gonna get worse, but whose responsibility is it to fill it? Is it the individual? Is it the organization? Is it public education? Is it private education? Like who is going to fill in this skills gap? I think is a very valid question. The answer probably is, everybody, and that starts with programs like this that give more power and autonomy to employees so they can be more empowered in their learning. I

Chris Rainey 6:33

love the part that David you added as well about the culture piece, and many organizations are realizing now you have to correct that culture of curiosity as well, but then also recognizing that curiosity, even when you fail. More importantly, actually, when you fail, there's organizations that chat with now have sort of the biggest failure of the Year award. It's not named. It's not named that they've got a much better name for it, but just also just recognizing that as well, and creating that psychological safety and that culture of curiosity is also a big part of it as well, because we ask people to take ownership of it. But are we creating the environment that they can do so, you know, everyone's like, Ah, you own your own learning. That's great, but have you created the environment that they actually feel comfortable to do that as well, right? And also the opportunity to help learning show up in the flow of work, I think, is important one as well, really, because in the past it was like this thing you did separately as well, whereas, personally in my team, we tried to sort of incorporate in all of our systems and processes, because that sort of shows up in the flow of work for us as well, we're actually applying quickly what we learn as well into the business, if that makes sense, to be more more agile as well. Charles Zach, did you want to add anything to that?

Charu Mittra 7:52

Yeah, I just want to add, I really resonate with what you say. Said. Chris, right. So I mean, I think we all ask employees to take charge of their careers and really drive learning. And Matt, like you said, it is everybody's responsibility, but we talk about 100 year life now, right? Learning doesn't stop when I go to college and I start go to a job, right? And it doesn't even end when I retire. There's no probably retirement in the new world we are all going to be probably in a webinar, still discussing this topic another few years from now and teaching each other. So how do you really, on one side, encourage everybody to take charge of their learning while create the right ecosystem, whether it is availability of learning opportunities? We, for example, at Philips, launched our learning experience platform with LinkedIn learning recently, and you know, so to make sure people have learning in the flow of work available, as you mentioned, but then do they also have the space right the opportunity to learn? Or are we? Are we so busy that there is no opportunity? So so we see a lot of teams planning learning Fridays, blocking half a day to really focus on learning, because that is part of growing the business. And the last thing is, we're actually holding our people leaders accountable to make sure that teams are developing growing they're having career discussions, they are on succession plans and really developing on the job, right through experiences. So those are some things we're doing to create a learning ecosystem from a holistic perspective. And lastly, like Matt also asked, it's a lot of governments, right? Like, if you look at the Singapore government really driving the skills agenda, the ownership is also on educational institutions where we don't still see the curricula evolve to the extent that it focuses on skills, and that's where it needs to speed up, because as industry, we don't get the skills we need from early starters. So those are some additional perspectives I'd love to add. Yeah,

Chris Rainey 9:53

I think that I've seen, I had a few interviews with CHRO recently, have set up their own universities in turn. Literally in their companies, because they're not getting what they need. So they're like, Okay, we're just getting getting people straight out of school and creating our own university and colleges and building that talent pipeline ourselves, because we just it's just too challenging in the current the way it's where it's currently working, and they're having huge success, and their attention they're having once they you know, those employees actually join the businesses that they're so far ahead because they've already as part of their training academies, they're still working in the business, if that makes sense. So the speed to wrap that individual, to be coming, someone who's actually executing and leading work in their businesses, is amazing as well. So I'm seeing companies have to be very creative about how they tackle that challenge as well. What some of the comments in the chat Sharon this kind of links to what you just said, that people are saying, you know, most companies are running towards technology for the solution to this, but that's also there is a concern, concern there as well. How do we balance the integration of technologies with the need to develop and retain, you know, human centric power skills in the organization. Again,

Charu Mittra 11:02

a really good point, right? So I'll start with an example. So a couple of years back, I was leading the capability building for our digital transformation at Philips, and we started with identifying a skills infrastructure, right, skills framework, so looking at some of our most critical roles, let's say software development. What are the most critical roles, skills we need them to build to really lead Philips to success in terms of digital transformation. And we sat down with the number of business leaders to identify, Hey, what are the skills of the future? What do you miss? And I was fully, fully expecting to hear only cloud, right data? Ai, what surprised that was the number of soft skills, the number of human skills that came up. So I was like, really? And we had just like, a small bucket, right? We were like, okay, all data, AI, skills, and then a small bucket for soft skills. But that bucket grew so big because, and David, you touched on it, right? It's about learning agility. In the software world, it's moving so fast new skills are needed, so fast that if the individual does not have learning agility, they're going to be, you know, out, you know, outnumbered, out maneuvered, right? So, empathy, customer orientation. So in software developer, when they are coding or to create a software platform for us in healthcare, do they really understand how it will impact the patient's life, how it will impact the healthcare practitioners life? Are they going out? Are they able to empathize with our customer and consumer? So the way these soft skills came up was was massive and surprised us, right? And as we go more and more towards automation, we keep and we have a lot of HR people on the call, HR leaders on the call. I don't have to preach to the choir, but human skills are just becoming more critical, our ability to connect, to empathize, and, again, not to put everything on people leaders, but what we're doing is to work with our people leaders, to really say you need to bring the human experience alive for all our 70,000 employees. So that's where we really lean into their leadership skills, their ability to empathize and create an environment of care for our people.

Chris Rainey 13:21

Thanks. Cheryl, saka, I saw you nodding away. That

Zakaa Farhat 13:26

definitely resonates with us, and I think it's just to add as well more is that the way people are now dedicating time to learning has been also different from the past. I mean, employees are not willing to spend time on learning something if it's not relevant to what they are doing. Right now, I think that's a big change. So I think the importance of being intentional about what, what to learn, when to learn, and I think that has been valuable as well, depending on the generation differences. I think we've seen the Gen Z like to learn a different setup than the, I think the older generation, but people are more inclined to learn something on the spot if it is really relevant to what they are doing right now. And I think make it accessible is another issue, because we have loads of learning opportunities material out there, and it's very difficult to find the right one.

Chris Rainey 14:26

It's almost like too much options. Yeah, you find if you give people too many options, they actually don't take any of them, because it's overwhelming, right as well. So also to your point, like, how do we create a unique experience, a tailored experience for each employee. And I think that's where technology can actually help us achieve that.

Matt Burns 14:48

Well, how do we use science to inform it? So mean, I don't want to be the person in the corner with, you know, opinions, but in terms of the educational system and traditional education. Conversation, the method of delivery is not backed by science. Like none of us learn through memorization and recitation and lectures and PowerPoint slides. That's not the way adults learn. It's not the way children learn. We know this, but we still continue with that methodology, because there's a system in place that rewards it, and it's tough to change, like Change is hard and technology is the catalyst to explore whether change is possible and whether it's realistic. And with the previous regime in previous times, again, with maybe a lack of knowledge, it makes more sense. But now, when we have the knowledge and awareness of what works and the technology to bring it to life, that's a really powerful combination. And I think the opportunity we have is understand that technology alone isn't the solution. It powers the solution. So if we intentionally design the technology and its user experience to fit into our problem sets, we're going to be able to get solutions that we're really trying to look for going forward

Charu Mittra 15:52

totally and I can, I can add something to that. Matt, so again, going back to this example, where we were on this mission to build our digital transformation skills, right? We launched self paced learning journey. You know, learning journeys through online courses for our employees who we were hoping they will, you know, spend the time on it, learn new skills. But what happens, you know, when any of us goes through an E Learning Program? I mean, it's really dependent on my motivation, my commitment, and so many people just don't complete the courses, right? So we really created a curated learner experience around it, so and very simple things, right? Just the launch of the program, getting together with thought leaders to discuss what you learned, leaderboard, right? So a bit of gamification, and then graduation. So that human touch you can't take away. I can have multiple programs on LinkedIn, learning O'Reilly, right? There's more stuff available than I can go through, but the learning together in a cohort from your peers, from mentors, from experts, is irreplaceable, and that's what we kept hearing from learners, that they really valued. I

David Burke 17:04

think there's a post learning implementation phase, a combination about yourself and that we're saying that charity, like, it's like, what is Completion? Is it when the course finishes, or a period of time after, when those learnings have been embedded in tasks?

Nick Smatlan 17:17

Yeah, and guys, I think, you know, a super important piece too, is being able to practice it. Because it's one thing to learn it, and if it's through it, you know, through a module or whatever, it's actually able to practice it. And I think probably a lot of folks on this call as well are also working for organizations where they've, you know, they've launched opportunity marketplaces to get people into rotations and to gigs so they can actually learn through doing, versus sitting in front of their laptop and watching a video and taking notes, but then not actually putting it to use. So I think that's another super, super important piece around leveraging technology is, you know, having a platform where you can also create those opportunities for folks to actually go and practice what they're learning.

Chris Rainey 17:55

Yeah, that's some of the most important things. I don't think we spend enough time on speaking to my friends about this recently, because we all consume content, we read books, we listen to podcasts. The difference between the people that are truly successful is they are the people executing. Because you can, we know we all we've all read a diet plan, and we've all got a gym program we've written out, but actually you have to have to go and execute on that to have have the impact. So what are you measuring the fact that someone watched a series of videos, and did the online course, or you measuring the application and the business and the impact that that's had as well. We spoke about skills a lot, and quite a few people in the chat have asked the question, that's great, but how are you identifying those skills in your organizations that need development within the business? Nick, can you start us off on that one?

Nick Smatlan 18:41

Yeah, I think typically, where do you need to start? You need to start with, what is the business strategy, right, going off and just doing skills for the sake of skills, thinking, Where are we going as a business, right? What? What is our strategy, and what are the skills that are going to underpin that? Right? Or capabilities, whatever language you're using to identify that so you can be focused, because it's easy to put together a laundry list of things. So I think it really starts with, where are we going as an organization, and what are the skills that we're going to need to to be successful, to execute on our strategy? And then the next piece is communicating it right? Because it's one it's one thing if it's sitting on a sheet of paper, it's another thing for our employees to also understand. These are the capabilities. These are the skills we're going to we know we're going to need for the future. So people, once again, back to, you know, kind of personalized education and learning. Can also plan for that, right? And start to say, Ah, okay, this is a skill or a capability we're going to need going forward, let me start thinking about how I can, how I can, you know, either through a rotation or through through learning, actually start to pick that, pick that skill up and develop it. So it's just one example, but I think it really does start with identifying them with with the business leaders, and then be able to communicate that back.

Chris Rainey 19:59

Yeah. David, you're doing this with many, many, many customers. So what are some of the best practices that you've seen that work? Well, well, the stuff

David Burke 20:07

that's top of mind for us, really, you know, internally, first, of course, is, you know, it's really important not to talk too much about soft versus hard skills, like they're in opposition to each other, like it's a symbiotic relationship where, like, we've been using technology for 1000s of years. So the results invariably, are, you know, accomplishing more lifting more mass, build more cars, crunch more data, whatever. So we're all talking about AI, but again, it's the symbiosis, it's the people plus the tech that will allow us to create real change. So like today, AI, if it's AI or other advanced technologies, what are they doing? They're allowing us to do more. But what's the win here for us? Like importantly, that's more time back. So more time back is a huge win for developing these soft skills. So that's more time for leaders to spend on their people, more time for people to take the time to recognize each other and join together culturally, you know, more time for our organization to develop in a more human way. So really, like, in terms of balance our you know, organization should spend times analyzing the skills they need, both today and tomorrow, both human and technical, to Nick's point. So if we have, like, a really comprehensive map and a plan for how that looks like, it might change in the future, you know, then that gives us a much better opportunity to plan for re skilling up skilling or hiring externally. So I think that blend of technical skills, which are, you know, perhaps easier to measure soft skills, but slightly more difficult to get a holistic view on. If we can get a combination of those both really working in parallel, and crucially, culturally and at leadership level, the importance of both being really recognized. I mean, that unlocks, you know, fabulous potential. Yeah,

Nick Smatlan 21:47

maybe just, just to add to that too, because I know probably a lot of, a lot of folks in this call have said, how do you, even, you know, start to quantify what you've got in your organization? And I've seen, you know, every, every possible way, from, you know, surveys and spreadsheets to what you know, where I see it's really moving is using, using artificial intelligence, advanced analytics, predictive analytics, to really map your workforce, to actually help you understand what's even what's even there. And that, to me, is going to be a game changer. I think it's, I don't know if it's nascent anymore, I think it's, there's multiple providers out there that are doing things in this space, but I think even in our organization, we're still getting our arms around that in terms of how to leverage that data to really understand how far off are we from the skills we're going to need going forward, versus what we have in our workforce. But also, what's really cool with a lot of the technology that's out there is they're also going to tell you, hey, if you've got this skill, these are the adjacent skills that can be built on. So you can also be very targeted in terms of where do you start?

Matt Burns 22:46

And that's the answer. It's, it's will be ultimately data driven, and the opportunity will be present for individuals and teams to build skills in the flow of work, because the model is going to require more agility in terms of how we identify it and how we solve for it. The days of us expecting, again, a student to come out of a bachelor's or undergraduate degree and be this complete product, ready to be molded, people's experiences are different. They're coming with different experiences into the workplace, into different roles. So we're starting in a different place, but hopefully ending at kind of a similar ish place, depending on the role and time in the organization, that agility with learning programs is absolutely key to making sure we can take them on that journey. Otherwise, you have far too many people who will not feel like they're fit in that program and will ultimately leave

David Burke 23:30

is there not, I know that's a really big question, but we go back to the university, or, you know, third level institutions, like, is there a crossroads here in terms of the value of a very broad, you know, foundational set of learning, or something that's a little bit more compressed and focused on those core, foundational skills, communication, problem solving, and then everything after that is a modular career that, really, you know, back to the rock wall thing can go in a different way. Like, I know that, like, that type of change seems very far away, but is that the future kind of foundational, you know, early stage hire that we're all going to be looking for.

Nick Smatlan 24:04

Maybe just to give you guys, guys a little anecdote, my son's school. He's in elementary school, and this is exactly what his teacher said. We're not teaching him to memorize and just repeat things. What we're actually doing is teaching them how to learn and how to be adaptable. Because, frankly, we don't know what the future is anymore, right? And I thought that was really, really cool. And I don't know how many other schools have adapted, sorry, adopted, adopted this philosophy, but I think it's fantastic. Because, frankly, this is what I think you know, the next generation coming is going to have to have more than necessarily, you know, coming out of university with a set of skills that, as we've already said, by the time they've graduated, may be obsolete. Yeah,

Zakaa Farhat 24:46

on this and the challenge that lies on the current organization structure that we have now. I mean, typically, many companies now we have very, I would say, traditional organizational structure that really is revolved around. Jobs, job descriptions, you know, competency. So I think, and then all the HR practices is around that. I think what we are discussing right now, just like, really, the future, you know, and we talk talking about AI disruption. We talking about, like, how we can create capacity for people to develop different skills and so on and, and definitely the, you know, the what we are all aligned on this, I would say human skills. But I think, just like the question is right now, how we shift from what we have right now to really the future, and how we create that agility without disrupting performance, without disrupting, you know, company goals and objectives. I mean, I think this is where I think everybody is now rallying about, okay, where we need to start. You know how, how we really need to move from those traditional titles and jobs to really skills? Because when you talk about skills, you don't talk about me as a head of HR, or you doing head of finance or whatever it is. It's just really skills only. And then you gather them in a way that is really linked to the initial key initiatives of the future of the company, and really try to go towards that goal in an environment definitely that is agile and allow people to build a skill in a supply and demand environment, because in the future, we want employees to choose what they want to develop what kind of skills because the company needed. So, you know, everybody goes like in, you know, in the past, people will go to engineering because it's demanding, you know, to do engineering or lawyers. Now, what kind of skills, it's going to be very, very specific, and it's going to be really changing as well.

Chris Rainey 26:36

I see that a lot in one of the things I do every week is interview people analytics leaders. And one of the things you hear when I ask about their backgrounds, they come from finance, they come from sales, they come from marketing. The same skills, yeah, functions. Exactly. Those skills are exactly applicable for them to be a people analytics leader, right? Does that make sense? But in most of those companies I speak to, if they had a talent marketplace. They were a skills based organization, so they can identify that they had those skills across the business, right as well. One of the problems I'm seeing when companies are mapping their skills at the moment is they're mapping the skills of today, not the skills of what's going to be required in those departments or in those functions for tomorrow. And I think that's where technology can help with skills inference and to give you kind of a visibility, okay, we've just said this is the skills we have now in the team, which is what most companies do, and even then, it's already out of date, but these are the skills we're going to need moving forward. So I think that's the part where technology can also help us as well. But I've also seen, I've got friends in companies like that now, and they're really motivated as well. They're like, Wow, I get to work on this project over here. I get to work on that project over there. Retention has gone through the roof in those organizations. They've got the diversity as well of thought and perspective and that cross knowledge that just happening and innovation just coming from that. And let's face it, you kind of have to be agile in this day and age to be able to move quickly enough. Otherwise you're not going to survive much in this current environment that we're in right now. Any of you working on talent marketplaces, I have that in place at the moment, yeah, I

Nick Smatlan 28:15

think probably most, yeah. I

Chris Rainey 28:16

know it sounds like an obvious question, but I love to hear your thoughts on kind of what you're seeing, what you're hearing,

Zakaa Farhat 28:23

actually, maybe just to start, I mean, I first, actually, I remember I piloted task marketplace in 2016 it was like the buzz word at that time, started to work on emerging markets and how we can really differentiate skills and and create opportunities for people to to to participate and connect. And because the challenge was really connecting people and really learn what is, what excites them, you know, and be part of different teams. Because, again, what we said about organizational structure that are traditional. So this talent marketplace allows people to tap into different teams and work with different people, with different managers, and really allow them to to stay in their job, so give them the stability and security that they really need, while really building incremental type of skills in the at pace and also be passionate about it. I think it's really great. But again, Chris, you mentioned, I think a very good point about now in the future, because, because the AI is more of like now the experimentation with AI, we still don't have clarity about how AI is going to be the change jobs. I mean, there are definitely a clarity about what, where, where, the use case of AI in HR, in different functions, but how people will really integrate, and what kind of skills that they really need to to start building, I would say then, I mean, the obvious one is the soft skills, which we call it, which is, by the way, soft

Chris Rainey 29:57

skills. Let's not use Soft Skills anymore. Yeah. Power. Skills Exactly, exactly. So

Zakaa Farhat 30:01

this is our like, the things we started, like, long, long time ago, but, but, but we neglected some basic human skill in the evolution of technology over the last 10 years. Like, things about the emotional intelligence. Like, how you really be be curious, how you really use your intuition. I mean those basics, but really you have to have as a as a leader, sometimes some sort of intuition to be able to collaborate, you know, connect, and really leverage and and, and really to bring the organization with you. I think those are very important for the future,

Charu Mittra 30:39

indeed, zaka And I mean, I think talent marketplace allows you to build such a wide set of skills, right? So I'm running projects in my team currently, and I have, I think, about five, six people from different functions doing a project with me based on their application for talent marketplace, their interest in talent development. And also for us at Philips. It's been a couple of years in the journey. It's It's fascinating. And we had, for the first year, I think we had about three, 400 applications for what we call gigs, which are basically projects that you do in the side, right, whether you want to develop soft skills, hard skills, whatever interesting area to explore. And now this year, I was just looking at the data. Last year was already 1500 right? So it's it. We pitch it as a developmental tool to build new skills. And of course, based on AI. You know, the system recommends potential projects for you based on your profile in the system, which is fantastic, right? People have suggestions coming up. And as a hiring manager, when I put up a project or a gig, as we call it, I have recommendations for candidates who I can tap on the shoulder and say, Hey, would you be interested? And it's been so fascinating to have people from quality finance work with us on projects. Right? We also pitch it as a key developmental tool to build experiential learning. You know, we talk about the 7020, 10 approach, so it's been fascinating. We now have LinkedIn learning, and our effort is to see how we can integrate the platform so so the two connect. So based on your profiles and what you've learned, you know, through these gigs, you also get recommendations for learning in the flow of work. So that's that's just some thinking we're doing at the moment, but it's been, I can only see it growing. I think a lot of people get hired based on the projects and the gigs they do in another team, anybody I interview for a role, and if they don't make the cut, I offer a gig too. So that's my strategy for future,

Chris Rainey 32:41

that's a good idea.

Charu Mittra 32:42

It's working well, so

Chris Rainey 32:43

far, yes, a few people, thank you. Firstly, Terry, that was great. And a few people asked in the chat, and maybe David, you could help on this. Of this sounds great, but then how do you link it back to the overall business strategy? So I know obviously many of our clients use work human IQ to map the skills, and that's great. So be great to hear exactly how you do that. But the challenge I'm hearing in the chat is, how do you link that back to the overall strategic decisions and the business strategy? Does that make sense? David,

David Burke 33:14

yeah, so I guess, well, like firstly, working on the course is known as a recognition company, which we are absolutely at our core, but we're also very much a data company. So one of the richest sources of data we have are the messages that one human sense to another as part of that recognition moment. So like you know, if you think about 8 million users and a recognition moment every two seconds, that's a lot of data. So that data can be mined in all sorts of ways, and that includes exploring skills demographics within a team. So we're customer zero here for our product teams, which is great. So we're also super users of our own platform, so we've huge amounts of our own internal data. So our data science team been working with us on skills mapping internally. So we're really kind of excited about what that's going to mean for our customers as we as we bring it to them in the future. So, you know, what we're trying to do is, is lean into all of the available data that we have and allow us to holistically build a skills map that focuses on a lot of that, you know, less technical skills ecosystem, and that allows us to make really, really informed decisions about, you know, where we have gaps or opportunities within the business to leverage, you know that that talent, so we're doing that for ourselves, of course, but also, you know, for organizations, through the work human IQ team. So an example be a global consulting firm. So they had a huge internal skills repository, so they tracked everything that you would expect, technical capabilities, training levels were essentially all hard skills, and what they didn't have was a way to capture those, those human skills. So the work human like Q team worked with them, and that's, you know, the intellectual horse bear in the business. I know people will be defended. Me sign up. But they definitely are, psychologists, data scientists, researchers, linguists, NLP, people. So. So, and our kind of AI parent solution so, so they looked at all the recognition moments and balance that with the skills taxonomy that was in place. Developed a nine grid system for for performance and potential. So that gave this clean mate strengths and weaknesses for their strategic growth. And then also looking at like Development and Succession opportunities, where they had multiple candidates in line for senior leadership roles, and were clearly able to map out business performance and hard skills. But then crucially, had a really good window into their leadership capabilities from a less hard skills perspective. So tying into succession plan, succession planning leadership opportunities. But then also, crucially, to Charis point earlier, where's the business going? And Nick said, there said earlier, you know, What's tomorrow? Skills breakdown look like. So, so it's really integral to every business decision that we're making. If we

Matt Burns 35:51

could just spend a minute talking a bit more about AI, I think we talked about in a couple of different contexts that are really valuable. So the idea of content creation and curation really valuable in today's marketplace, the idea of matching and being able to pair candidates or employees to scale it into jobs critical. What I think is even more impactful for this conversation is the ability for us to curate content that's meaningful for the actual end user. And traditionally, we don't do a good job when it comes to learning programs thinking about that end learner. We've all sat through those programs, and we've all built those programs that are not going to win awards for the highest engagement on an E Learning Program or best workshop, like we know that we're asked to deliver something or meet a certain objective check a box, and ultimately, we're doing everybody a disservice. And I think AI has the opportunity for us to put content into bite sized pieces, to do so in the flow of work, to be thoughtful about pairing the right thing at the right time for the right person, and not forcing everybody through a consistent channel that may or may not be relevant and may or may not be a good use of their time, given all the things they're currently balancing, which I'm willing to better more than better more than they were in 2019 so I think all these things kind of conspire to create a really cool environment and an opportunity for us to rethink things differently. But I would just encourage people not to think about AI or technology or any of these things as the solution. They will power the solution, and they are an invitation for you to re examine the things you're doing in your organization, and are a force multiplier. So there are things that you can do now for pennies in the dollar that may not have been attainable for you. Six months ago, 12 months ago, two years ago. I've worked in organizations most of my life that although they were large, they were very cost conscious, and unless I could build a business case that had a three or five to one payback, I didn't get the resources. And a lot of times, even if it did, I still didn't get the resources. So that was just the reality I operated in, and that's the reality a lot of people operate in. We don't have the big, fancy budgets to throw, you know, hundreds of 1000s of dollars at ideas. But the great thing about these new solutions in the market is they're very easy to quantify the benefit. They do create significant value in very short amounts of time, and also for very low cost, and create space within your organization to in, you know, invent to look at engagement, to look at different things in your business. So I think, Chris, it's a it's a really cool time to be doing this. It's a lot happening at once, but we have an opportunity to build things that just frankly, weren't attainable for most of us in a very short period of time ago.

Zakaa Farhat 38:16

Oh, sorry.

Charu Mittra 38:19

I'll just add one small thing, David and to what Matt said, I think. And the key to building that business case is really to link it to business value, right? And like Nick said, What is your business strategy? What? What will create value in the future? So which are the most critical capabilities you want to go after? And if you have to make a business case, which, which we did for our digital transformation, we and we got more budget than we could spend. Very honestly, if you can show the business leader,

Chris Rainey 38:50

I'm gonna give it away. I'm gonna cut it out. I'll edit this out for you. Charis, and no one will ever

Charu Mittra 39:02

know. But the point is, if you can show your business, you know how this will help them in executing strategy, because that's the biggest pain point. We have great strategic plans across organizations. What gets translated and what really we're able to do on the ground many times, is limited by not having the right talent with the right skills and the roles. So if you can build the case, you will have the support. And my call to everybody is not to think of just the skills based organization for the sake of it or for the love of HR that we all have, but really for the love of adding value and delivering impact for the business. Well, Cheryl,

Chris Rainey 39:41

I was about to wrap things up and ask everyone for their parting piece of advice, and you just gave such a great one right there. Nick, I can see like you're itching to jump in. Nick, so go for it. No, no, I

Nick Smatlan 39:50

was just gonna just agree with both. You know what Matt and Trevor were saying. And I think what's important is to think of AI as an enabler. Not as the solution, because I think it can enable so much, but it's not a magic wand either, but it gives us the power to do things that honestly, we couldn't have done before and and at a cost that is a lot smaller than what it would have cost in the past to try and achieve these things.

Chris Rainey 40:15

Yeah, no, I agree. And some of you may have seen we've just launched our HR copilot Atlas, and the stuff we're seeing right now the ability for us to have 10,000 hours of our content that we've created over seven years, and to ask a question to that and immediately be taken to the exact second in a video where a leader says, This is how I did it here, and this is how it worked, and then, at the same time be provided with the data, and at the exact same time be provided. Here are five models you can use to implement that within a second. It just sort of blows my mind. We'll have users next week listening to this session inside of our in Atlas and say, Hey, what were the key things that Charu shared in that session? And immediately go to those moments and say, Hey, here's some research references based on what charity just mentioned. Here's some vendors and that also offer those solutions. Here's some case studies. So that's speed as well. I feel also excited about the speed that we able to operate at as well, to make, to make, to make our lives a little bit easier as well. If all given some great advice, but if we could do like one parting piece of take away from each of you, and then we'll say goodbye, Zakah, do you want to kick us off? Yeah,

Zakaa Farhat 41:29

thank you. And I just want to say, always think about customers. I think we sometimes we like to do things just for the sake of them. I think using digital, AI, whatever you just use about the Think about the use cases just really bring the most value for our customers, being internal and external, and always put in mind that business calls might be changing faster than we think it is, so spend less time Making decisions and do more actions.

Chris Rainey 42:00

Thank you, Matt. Amongst

Matt Burns 42:01

all the things we talked about, I just want to remind people that it's okay to give yourself permission to learn yourself. We oftentimes put that on the back burner and can prioritize our own learning. And this is, you know, the idea of AI and all these innovations like it can be a lot if you haven't really dipped your toe back in that space in quite some time. And this is an invitation for you to learn through experience. If you don't have chat, GPT, get the platform. If you don't have Atlas copilot, get the platform like start to experiment with these tools, best way to learn on the job. So then you can bring that innovation to your workplace, to your teams. It comes from a much more empowered place when it's experiential. And yeah, just good luck on your journey.

Chris Rainey 42:41

Made it sound really easy. David, yeah,

David Burke 42:45

I guess being mentioned a bit, but like the way we think about things today for this topic, like job profiles, competencies, you know, CVS, they're fixed. What skills evolve. So like, let's start by looking at your systems and processes for how you collate and evaluate skills. So think about that from a data perspective. So what data do we collect internally through third party? You might be surprised at what rich data is already there through some service or or process that you have in place. And so really good place to start, where you always already have some, some mature data. And what can that tell you and give you some insights? And so don't necessarily look for something new. Start with what's already in place.

Chris Rainey 43:21

Quick, funny story. Very quick. When I left my last company to start this business, I looked at my old CV, and I'd been at the company for 12 years, and I looked at the skills on my CV when I started at the company 18 years old to where I was now, and I was like, wow, they're still basing Chris's skill was based on that CV from 12 years ago. Imagine, right? That's what they're going to be uploading into the system as well. So it made me laugh when I saw it as well. Charu,

Charu Mittra 43:51

I already gave my I know you did recap the business case budgets. You'll get unlimited, then you have to deliver Yes, don't

Chris Rainey 44:03

forget that part. Yeah, show the ROI. Love it. Thank you Taro. Thank you Nick. Wrap us up. Nick.

Nick Smatlan 44:09

Look, as I said earlier. I mean, make sure whatever you're doing is also tied to the business strategy. I think that's the first thing, to make sure you're getting buy in. And then the second piece is like, make sure you're bringing data to the table that will really help ensure it's focused and fit for purpose.

Chris Rainey 44:24

Yeah, amazing. Well, that's a wrap, everyone. Thank you so much for tuning in. Thank you to all of our amazing panelists for joining us. Also, thank you to David and the team at work human for supporting the show and helping us bring this together. We'll see you all again soon. Thank you everyone. Goodbye. Thanks a lot. Bye.

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