Dr. David Rock, co-founder of the NeuroLeadership Institute, explains the neuroscience behind the SCARF model and what it means for feedback, hybrid work and AI adoption.

Feedback stings. Return-to-office mandates spark pushback. AI rollouts leave employees anxious about their jobs and their skills. What if these reactions aren’t resistance at all, but the brain doing exactly what it was built to do?

In this episode of foHRsight, Naomi Titleman Colla speaks with David about his new book, Good with Humans: The Neuroscience of What Makes Us Tick and What Ticks Us Off. The book is built around the SCARF model: Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness and Fairness, the five social domains the brain is constantly tracking for threat or reward.

David explains why traditional approaches to feedback often do more harm than good. He shares research showing that the most effective shift is teaching people to ask for feedback rather than give it. He also offers a simple principle for managers in hybrid teams who want certainty without micromanaging: clarity on the end point, freedom on the process.

The conversation also turns to AI. David argues that how most organizations are rolling it out creates threats across all five SCARF domains at once. He also warns that heavy reliance on AI may be eroding insight, judgment and even interpersonal skills. And he shares how a handful of organizations, including DBS Bank, are approaching AI as a leadership and change challenge rather than a technology rollout.

The tools may be new, but the brain we bring to work is not. Understanding what drives it may be one of the most practical things HR can do right now.

About Our Guest

Dr. David Rock is the co-founder and director of the NeuroLeadership Institute, a cognitive science consultancy that has advised more than two-thirds of the Fortune 100 and helped more than 20 million people be more effective through brain science. He is the author of Your Brain at Work, Quiet Leadership and Coaching with the Brain in Mind, and his SCARF model has been cited in close to 2,000 research publications. His new book, Good with Humans, is out November 17.

Resources Mentioned

• Good with Humans: goodwithhumans.com
• NeuroLeadership Institute: neuroleadership.com
• NILES, NLI’s AI learning accelerator (free one-month trial): askniles.ai
• Dr. David Rock on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/dr-david-rock
• Articles David referenced:
  • “The Coming Wave of Toxic Leadership” (Fast Company)
  • “From AI FOMO to AI Hangover”
  • “AI Is Fast Food for Your Brain”

Win a Copy of Good with Humans

Listeners in Canada and the US: post about this episode on LinkedIn and tag future foHRward and/or Naomi Titleman Colla for a chance to win a copy of David’s new book.

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Your relationship with your boss may be one of the most consequential relationships in your working life. Yet most of us are expected to figure out how to navigate it on our own.

What happens when your boss avoids decisions? Micromanages everything? Makes a call you strongly disagree with? Or simply works in a way that clashes with yours?

In this episode of foHRsight, Naomi Titleman Colla speaks with Mohit Misra about managing up as a skill, and why employees have more agency in the relationship than they may realize.

Mohit introduces six common boss archetypes and his Triple M framework for understanding who you are working with, mapping your own needs against theirs, and making an intentional move rather than relying on assumptions. They also explore how to challenge a boss constructively, what to do when respect begins to erode, and why understanding the pressures your leader is facing can completely change the conversation.

They also look at what AI is doing to the traditional boss-employee power dynamic. When employees and leaders increasingly have access to the same information and tools, hierarchy alone creates less value. Transparency, judgment and honest conversation become even more important.

And for HR leaders in particular, Mohit leaves us with a challenge: are we coaching everyone else to embrace ambiguity while quietly expecting perfection from ourselves?

Resources Referenced

• Mohit Misra: mohitmisra.com
• Coaching Under 3 Minutes: store.pothi.com
• Mohit Misra on LinkedIn

About Our Guest

Mohit Misra is a leadership advisor, coach and author with two decades of experience in senior talent roles at organizations including Novartis, Chemours and Bank of America. He works with CHROs and senior leaders on turning leadership strategy into action and is the author of Coaching Under Three Minutes and the forthcoming Managing Up.

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Organizations are investing heavily in AI. Licenses are being purchased, usage is being tracked and employees are being encouraged to experiment.

But has the work itself actually changed?

In this episode of foHRsight, Mark Edgar speaks with leadership advisor and author Tom Mawhinney about the gap between adopting AI and genuinely redesigning work around what the technology makes possible.

Tom argues that the biggest opportunity is not simply to automate existing tasks or reduce headcount. It is to reconsider how roles are structured when AI can take on more of the analysis and production, while humans focus more deliberately on judgment, context and prioritization.

That shift raises an important question for HR. If entry-level work has traditionally been where people develop many of those capabilities through experience, how do organizations build them when some of that work disappears?

Mark and Tom explore why HR can play a critical role in answering that question, how to make the financial case for redesign rather than reduction, and why organizations do not need to transform every job at once. Starting with a few roles, testing what works and proving the value may be enough to begin.

Because having AI available across the organization is one thing. Building an organization that works differently because of it is another.

About Our Guest

Tom Mawhinney is a leadership advisor, author and keynote speaker whose work sits at the intersection of leadership, strategy and technology. Drawing on three decades as an executive, board member, founder and advisor, he helps organizations rethink how those three areas need to evolve together as the conditions around work change.

Resources Mentioned

• Tom Mawhinney: tommawhinney.io Tom Mawhinney
• Tom Mawhinney on LinkedIn: ca.linkedin.com LinkedIn
• Tom Mawhinney’s books: tommawhinney.io Tom Mawhinney
• So... Now What? Recognizing Four Organizational States in an AI-Driven World: goodreads.com

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On November 12th future foHRward will be celebrating our 10-year anniversary and 200th podcast episode in person in Toronto and you’re invited! More information and registration can be found at this link. Hope to see you there!

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HR leaders are being asked to help their organizations adapt to AI at extraordinary speed. But what happens when the technology is changing faster than the systems, leadership models and assumptions underneath the way we work?

The opportunity is bigger than adopting better tools.

In this episode of foHRsight, Naomi Titleman Colla speaks with returning guest Gary Bolles about what it takes to navigate continuous change without losing the humans at the centre of it. They explore why traditional command-and-control leadership is increasingly at odds with the kind of adaptive organizations we need, why leaders may need to trade having the answers for asking better questions, and how changing expectations around purpose and motivation are reshaping work.

Gary also introduces the idea of “synchronous rewards,” a more flexible approach to aligning what organizations need with what individual workers value at different points in their lives. And as AI makes greater personalization possible, he offers an important caution for HR: technology can help us scale human systems, but it can just as easily make them less human if we stop applying judgment, context and care.

For HR leaders navigating both the promise and pressure of AI, this conversation offers a useful reframing: the goal is not to automate the old rules of work. It is to build better ones.

About Our Guest

Gary Bolles is the author of The Next Rules of Work and Chair for the Future of Work at Singularity University. With decades of experience spanning Silicon Valley, technology, learning and the future of work, he brings a systems-level perspective to how leaders and organizations can navigate exponential change while keeping people at the centre.

Resources Mentioned

• Gary Bolles: https://www.gbolles.com/
• The Next Rules of Work: https://www.gbolles.com/
• Possible Futures Podcast: https://www.su.org/possible-futures
• Singularity University: https://www.su.org/
• Nell Watson: https://www.nellwatson.com/
• TR2050: https://www.tr2050.com/
• Gary Bolles on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gbolles/

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Follow us on LinkedIn:

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On November 12th future foHRward will be celebrating our 10-year anniversary and 200th podcast episode in person in Toronto and you’re invited! More information and registration can be found at this link. Hope to see you there!

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Your organization is investing in AI. People are experimenting, training is happening, productivity tools are everywhere.

But is any of it actually making work better?

That’s the question at the centre of this episode of foHRsight, as Mark Edgar speaks with Dessalen “Dess” Wood about moving beyond AI activity and toward meaningful AI enablement.

Dess argues that the first phase of workplace AI was inevitably messy: organizations were handed transformative technology without a clear playbook for what transformation was supposed to look like. Now, the opportunity is to become much more disciplined.

If AI saves someone five hours a week, what should happen in those five hours? Which capabilities does everyone genuinely need? Who actually needs to become a builder? And which parts of HR work should be automated because nobody particularly values the human delivery, versus the moments where human presence is precisely what makes the experience valuable?

The conversation offers a practical framework for thinking about AI fluency at different levels, why learning should be grounded in the tools and experiences employees actually encounter, and why HR does not need to turn every employee into an AI expert.

Most importantly, it challenges People leaders to get much clearer about the work only humans can add meaningful value to, so they can stop defending work that simply keeps the lights on.

About Our Guest

Dessalen “Dess” Wood is a global Chief People Officer at Syntax, where she has played a key role in advancing AI enablement across the organization. After spending much of her career in retail and service environments before moving into technology, she brings a cross-industry perspective on what actually drives human performance, learning and organizational change.

Resources Referenced

• Syntax — the global technology company where Dess is Chief People Officer and where much of the AI enablement work discussed in the episode is taking place. syntax.com
• Reclaim the Plot: How Leaders Rewrite the Story When AI Rewrites Work by Dr. Kelly Monahan — Mark references Kelly Monahan and her recent work while asking whether AI is actually making organizations better. Reclaim the Plot
• Cognitive dissonance — the behavioural concept Dess references when explaining why action can precede attitude change, particularly around mandatory AI learning and adoption. Learn more about cognitive dissonance
• Dessalyn Wood on LinkedIn — Dess specifically invites listeners to connect with her there at the end of the episode.

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On November 12th future foHRward will be celebrating our 10-year anniversary and 200th podcast episode in person in Toronto and you’re invited! More information and registration can be found at this link. Hope to see you there!

Support the show

NOTE: We will be welcoming Dr. Gleb to our community for an interactive webinar November 25th. To go deeper on this episode and take the opportunity to connect with Dr. Gleb live, register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/HfJOZAaIRI6DBXc84CSCSA. Hope to see you there!

Most AI adoption strategies start with tools, training and governance.

But what happens when the real barrier isn’t knowing how to use AI?

Employees may be wondering whether the technology will eventually replace them. Experienced professionals may feel that work they spent years learning to do can suddenly be generated in seconds. Others are already using AI successfully but are reluctant to admit it because they worry it will make them look lazy, less capable or as though they have somehow cheated.

Those aren’t technology problems. They’re human ones.

In this episode of foHRsight, Naomi Titleman is joined by behavioural scientist Dr. Gleb Tsipursky to explore what leaders often miss when trying to drive AI adoption at work.

They unpack three very different forms of resistance: fear and anxiety about job security, threats to professional identity, and the social stigma that can keep productive AI use hidden. Gleb shares practical ways leaders can respond, including starting with the work employees actively want off their plates, modelling AI use openly, creating opportunities to share what is working, and giving people genuine space to experiment.

The conversation also looks at the growing problem of AI-generated “work slop,” why critical thinking becomes more important rather than less important in an AI-enabled workplace, and how psychological safety needs to be paired with accountability and human review.

For HR leaders navigating AI adoption, the challenge is no longer simply choosing the right technology.

It is creating an environment where people can learn how to use it without feeling that doing so puts their job, identity or credibility at risk.

About Our Guest

Dr. Gleb Tsipursky is a behavioural scientist, seven-time bestselling author and author of The Psychology of AI Adoption at Work: From Resistance to Results. His work focuses on how leaders and organizations make better decisions and adapt to changes in the future of work, drawing on extensive research and consulting with organizations navigating AI adoption.

Resources Referenced

• The Psychology of AI Adoption at Work: From Resistance to Results — Dr. Gleb Tsipursky’s latest book. Georgetown University Press
• Free book sample + AI adoption resources — disasteravoidanceexperts.com/aibook
• MIT research on GenAI ROI — referenced in the discussion about the majority of AI pilots failing to show ROI. MIT Project NANDA
• Harvard Business Review on AI “workslop” — referenced in the discussion about poor-quality AI output creating more work for colleagues. Read the article
• Amy Edmondson on psychological safety — referenced in the conversation about balancing experimentation with accountability. Amy Edmondson

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On November 12th future foHRward will be celebrating our 10-year anniversary and 200th podcast episode in person in Toronto and you’re invited! More information and registration can be found at this link. Hope to see you there!

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AI is moving quickly into HR, but the most important question may not be how much work it can automate.

It may be what HR chooses to do with the capacity it creates.

In this episode of foHRsight, Mark Edgar speaks with Franco Girimonte about what the next phase of AI means for HR operating models, skills, workforce planning and the role HR needs to play in enterprise AI strategy.

Franco shares research from The Hackett Group estimating that by 2030, 43% to 49% of HR roles or activities could be automated. But rather than seeing that solely as a headcount story, many HR leaders see an opportunity to redirect capacity toward work that has historically been under-resourced: strategic workforce planning, deeper business partnership, better insights and helping employees and leaders adapt to AI.

The conversation also explores why HR and IT increasingly need to lead AI transformation together, why standardized processes matter before organizations can capture the benefits of automation, and how HR roles may shift from producing work to orchestrating work across people and AI agents.
For HR leaders feeling both excited and overwhelmed by AI, this episode offers a useful place to start: not with every possible tool, but with the work your organization needs HR to be capable of next.

About Our Guest

Franco Girimonte is a Principal at The Hackett Group, where he works within HR transformation and brings extensive experience across HR consulting, organization design, operating models, research and benchmarking. His perspective combines hands-on transformation work with a broad view of how organizations across North America and Europe are adapting their HR functions for the future.

Resources Referenced

• The Hackett Group — thehackettgroup.com
• 2026 HR Key Issues Study: Building the Agentic HR Organization — View the research
• AI World Class Human Resources — View the research
• Microsoft Copilot — copilot.microsoft.com

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If you are looking for more foHRsight, sign up for our monthly foHRsight newsletter. It’s free and includes access to our quarterly white paper. This quarter’s white paper is about Rethinking Entry-Level work in the Age of AI, produced with Dr. Miranda Rodak from Indiana University’s Kelley school of business - an important topic for HR, Leadership and parents, students and society as a whole! https://www.futurefohrward.com/subscribe

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AI is making hiring faster. But is it actually helping organizations make better decisions about people?

Candidates are using AI to write, tailor and scale applications. Employers are using it to screen, evaluate and increasingly interact with those candidates. The result can quickly become an arms race where both sides automate more, trust each other less, and lose sight of what hiring is supposed to uncover in the first place.

In this episode of foHRsight, Naomi Titleman Colla speaks with Jeremy Schifeling about what HR leaders should be paying attention to as AI reshapes recruitment, early-career work and the talent pipeline.

At the centre of the conversation is a simple question: does AI move us closer to people, or further away from them?

They explore why candidates may be using AI differently than employers assume, where automation genuinely creates room for better human connection, why transparency in the hiring process matters, and what organizations risk when short-term efficiency removes the entry-level opportunities that develop future leaders.

They also consider a bigger shift underway in how organizations assess talent. As technical tasks become easier to automate, qualities like initiative, relationship-building, judgment, creativity and the ability to use AI to accomplish meaningful work may become increasingly valuable signals.

For HR and talent leaders, the opportunity isn't simply to add more AI to an old hiring process. It's to question whether the process itself is still measuring what matters.

About Our Guest

Jeremy Schifeling is a former LinkedIn executive, early OpenAI partner and author of three number-one Amazon bestselling career books. Through his work with job seekers, students, career changers and working professionals, he brings a ground-level view of how AI is changing the experience of getting hired and what those changes mean for employers and the future talent pipeline.

Resources Referenced

• Unbreakable by Jeremy Schifeling: https://www.thejobinsiders.com/unbreakable
• Fortune: “Robots Screening Robots: Inside the AI Arms Race Reshaping Hiring”: https://www.fortune.com/2026/06/01/robots-screening-robots-inside-the-ai-arms-race-reshaping-hiring/
• Stanford Digital Economy Lab: “Canaries in the Coal Mine? Six Facts about the Recent Employment Effects of Artificial Intelligence”: https://digitaleconomy.stanford.edu/publication/canaries-in-the-coal-mine-six-facts-about-the-recent-employment-effects-of-artificial-intelligence/
• future foHRward: “Rethinking Entry-Level Work in the Age of AI”: https://www.futurefohrward.com/subscribe
• Jeremy Schifeling on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/schifeling
• CNBC: “The No. 1 AI Mistake Job Seekers Make”: https://www.cnbc.com/2024/03/18/dont-use-chatgpt-to-write-your-resume.html

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If you are looking for more foHRsight, sign up for our monthly foHRsight newsletter. It’s free and includes access to our quarterly white paper. This quarter’s white paper is about Rethinking Entry-Level work in the Age of AI, produced with Dr. Miranda Rodak from Indiana University’s Kelley school of business - an important topic for HR, Leadership and parents, students and society as a whole! https://www.futurefohrward.com/subscribe

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