Digital HR Leaders with David Green

Hebba Youssef, Chief People Officer at Workweek and creator of the I Hate It Here newsletter, explores AI-driven work redesign. She discusses how AI reshapes job design, internal adoption tactics, and what managers need to supervise people plus AI. She covers risks to early-career roles, prioritizing AI investments, and the governance needed as HR shifts toward performance-focused work.

Connie Noonan-Hadley, organizational psychologist and research professor focused on work relationships and loneliness. She explores how AI is reshaping who we turn to for coaching, advice and companionship. She discusses task-level redesign, experimental human-AI org charts, and why return-to-office mandates may not fix loneliness. Practical ideas for measuring and protecting connection appear throughout.

Kenneth Matos, Director of Market Insights at HiBob and organizational psychologist focused on people analytics, explores why fragmented HR and finance data creates decision friction. He discusses managers spending hours stitching data, the need for shared HR–finance views, real risks from missing data, and how AI can help when built on good foundations.

Jacob Morgan, author and futurist on the future of work and employee experience. He discusses why 2026 could be a turning point for accountability. Short takes cover how AI is changing how work is measured, the need for CHROs to lead ethical AI adoption, balancing empathy with performance, and redesigning flexibility and people strategy.

Angela Geffre, Head of Human Capital at Growth Curve Capital and industrial-organizational psychologist, digs into how private equity ties talent, leadership, and culture directly to value. She outlines people due diligence, year-one priorities, scaling practices, leadership changes, and AI’s role in products and early-career pathways. Practical, speed-focused HR lessons for driving measurable business impact.

Vincent Barat, founder and CEO of Albert and SWP specialist, explains why workforce planning must link skills, scenarios and business drivers. He discusses how AI shifts tasks beneath job titles. He warns that cutting entry-level roles can hollow leadership pipelines. Practical tips focus on governance, where SWP should sit, and delivering small, visible wins to move from theory to action.

People analytics has spent years building credibility through data. Now the pressure is different. Business leaders aren’t just asking for insight - they’re expecting direction. Where should we invest? What should we stop doing? What risks are we not seeing yet? But many teams still find themselves pulled back into reporting cycles, ad-hoc requests, and an overemphasis on metrics that don’t always lead to better decisions. So what shifts when people analytics starts operating more like a product and less like a project function? In this episode, David Green is joined by Ashar Khan, Head of People Insights and Solution Design at Autodesk, to explore how the function evolves from delivering data to shaping choices at scale. Join this conversation as they discuss: The skills and mindsets modern people analytics teams need beyond technical expertiseWhat an effective people analytics operating model looks like in practice The core capabilities required to bridge HR technology and HR strategy Where “metric fixation” leads organisations toward false confidence and poor decisions Why the assumption that AI automatically means “fewer people” misses the bigger picture Practical advice for CHROs building or redesigning a people analytics function today This episode is sponsored by Worklytics. How productive is your organisation, really? Worklytics makes it clear - with privacy-first insights from everyday work data. See how meeting volume, manager effectiveness, collaboration health, and AI adoption are impacting your team’s focus, efficiency, and outcomes - so you can make smarter decisions, faster. No surveys. No assumptions. Just clear insight into work. Right now, Worklytics is offering podcast listeners a free 30-day trial of their productivity analytics dashboard. Learn more at worklytics.co/productivity Link to resources: The Strategic Workforce Planning Handbook  David Edwards’ Dark Artistry Newsletter  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

David Edwards, strategic workforce planner and author of The Strategic Workforce Planning Handbook, draws on finance and transformation experience. He discusses shifting focus from headcount to capability, capacity, cost and risk. He explains why analytics and planning must align, why contingent workers and bots matter, and why AI forces organizations to redesign work before redefining skills.

Philip Arkcoll, Founder and CEO of Worklytics, explains how workplace data reveals why AI has made people busier, not freer. He digs into meeting overload, decision-making as the new bottleneck, rising manager spans, and the split between AI winners and those left behind. Short, data-driven ideas on measuring, redesigning work, and reclaiming focus time.

Kristen Kavanagh, a leadership strategist and former Tesla HR head, dives into the crucial theme of courage in the workplace. She discusses the dangers of fear-based leadership, emphasizing that it brings short-term gains but long-term damage. Kristen introduces her Agency Loop framework to help leaders navigate challenges and make courageous decisions. She also highlights the unique opportunity HR has to shape a more humane future, especially in the era of AI, advocating for an integration of humanity and technology in leadership.