People Managing People

Hosted by David Rice

Business Management EducationInterviews guests

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Episodes

205

Latest episode

Aug 2026

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EN-US

About the show

The People Managing People podcast equips forward-thinking leaders to thrive in the AI era—reshaping teams, systems, and strategy without losing what makes work human. Hosted by David Rice, each episode brings real-world insights from innovators, executives, and people leaders on topics like AI in practice, people-first leadership, performance systems, and workplace culture.

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60 recent

August 18, 202650 min

What AI Surveillance Can’t Tell You About Your Employees

Nobody sets out to build a workforce surveillance system. It usually arrives dressed up as optimization, productivity, wellness, or efficiency. But as AI makes it possible to monitor everything from keystrokes and mouse movements to emotions and physical behavior, the line between legitimate measurement and invasive surveillance gets harder to ignore. In this episode, I speak with Lynn Parramore, Director of Special Projects at the Institute for New Economic Thinking, about what gets lost when leaders assume everything valuable at work can be measured. We dig into why constant monitoring erodes trust, how algorithms strip context from human behavior, why younger workers have good reason to be skeptical of AI, and why leaders need to get philosophical—not just practical—about where this technology belongs. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Lynn on LinkedIn Check out Lynn’s book — Reading the Sphinx: Ancient Egypt in Nineteenth-Century Literary Culture Support the show

August 11, 202632 min

Why The EU Pay Transparency Directive Is More Than A Compliance Exercise

The EU Pay Transparency Directive isn’t just another reporting requirement. As pay reporting expert Tom Heys puts it, it’s closer to the UK gender pay gap regime “on steroids”—combining organization-wide reporting with individual employee rights, restrictions on recruitment practices, and requirements to group jobs of equal value and explain the pay differences within them. The bigger issue is what happens when organizations are finally required to show their work. Pay transparency exposes weak job architecture, outdated job descriptions, excessive manager discretion, and analytical models nobody can explain. And there’s a broader AI lesson buried in all of this: technology can accelerate analysis, but it can’t absorb accountability. Leaders still have to understand—and defend—the decisions made in their name. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Check out this episode’s sponsor: QuickBooks Online Connect with Tom on LinkedIn Visit Lewis Silkin Support the show

August 4, 202626 min

Why AI Isn’t Delivering The Productivity Gains We Expected

AI spending continues to hit record highs, yet most organizations are still struggling to translate that investment into better work. In this conversation, David Rice sits down with Ofir Bloch of WalkMe to unpack the findings from the State of Digital Adoption 2026 report and explore why the problem isn't model capability—it's everything surrounding it. From the massive disconnect between what executives believe employees experience and the reality of day-to-day work, to the growing importance of contextual support and workflow orchestration, this episode argues that the companies seeing results aren't necessarily using the smartest AI. They're removing friction faster than everyone else. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Ofir on LinkedIn Visit WalkMe WalkMe's State of Digital Adoption 2026 Support the show

July 28, 202630 min

The New Leadership Test: What Makes Someone AI-Native?

AI is quickly becoming the new test of executive credibility—but there's a growing gap between leaders who use AI and leaders who've fundamentally rebuilt how they work around it. In this episode, David Rice sits down with JC Christian, President of executive search firm Christian & Timbers, to explore why "AI-enabled" is no longer enough and what it actually means to be AI-native at the executive level. Together, they unpack how executive hiring is changing, why demonstrating real AI deployment experience now matters more than talking strategy, and why adaptability—not decades of experience alone—is becoming the defining leadership capability. As today's competitive advantage rapidly becomes tomorrow's baseline expectation, leaders in every function will need to rethink not just the tools they use, but how they lead. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with JC on LinkedIn Visit Christian & Timbers Support the show

July 21, 202657 min

Why Traditional AI Risk Frameworks Are Breaking Down

AI adoption isn't slowing down—and neither are the risks. The challenge isn't that organizations don't know AI can create problems. It's that employees are already using it in ways leaders can't fully anticipate, while governance models built for yesterday's technology struggle to keep pace. In this episode, David Rice sits down with AI ethics expert and The Ethical Nightmare Challenge author Reid Blackman to explore why traditional AI governance is falling behind the rise of generative and agentic AI. Rather than treating ethics as a bureaucratic exercise or a brake on innovation, Reid argues that the organizations moving fastest are the ones that learn how to identify potential "nightmares" before they become public failures. The conversation offers a practical framework leaders can begin using immediately—without waiting for enterprise-wide policies or perfect alignment. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Reid on LinkedIn Visit Virtue Consultants Check out Reid’s book – " The Ethical Nightmare Challenge: How to Avoid the Worst of AI " Support the show

July 14, 202637 min

The Team Habit That Separates High Performers From Everyone Else

AI isn't creating high-performing teams—it’s exposing the difference between teams that already know how to work well together and those that don’t. In this episode, David Rice sits down with social psychologist and Superteams author Ron Friedman to unpack new research on what separates the top 8% of teams from everyone else. The conversation challenges the assumption that AI is a universal productivity boost, revealing instead how it can amplify poor habits, deepen burnout, and create false confidence when used without judgment. They also explore why the best teams protect focus over busyness, replace brainstorming with brainwriting, rethink meetings entirely, and create cultures where experimentation—not perfection—drives performance. If you're leading people through the AI era, this episode offers a practical blueprint for building stronger teams instead of simply working faster. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Ron on LinkedIn Check out Ron’s website and book “ Superteams ” Free masterclass and discussion guide Support the show

July 7, 202642 min

Why AI Usage Reports Don’t Mean Much

AI transformation doesn't fail because the technology isn't good enough. It fails because organizations try to layer it on top of cultures that were already struggling with trust, learning, experimentation, and leadership. In this conversation, David Rice sits down with Meagan Bond, Founder and CEO of The Human Method, to unpack why psychological readiness—not technical readiness—is the real foundation of successful AI adoption. Together they explore the hidden costs of dysfunctional culture, why managers play an outsized role in determining whether AI succeeds or fuels burnout, and why organizations chasing quick AI wins often undermine their long-term competitive advantage. If culture is treated as an afterthought instead of infrastructure, AI simply accelerates the problems that were already there. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Meagan on LinkedIn Visit The Human Method Support the show

June 30, 202641 min

Your Best Candidate Might Have The Worst Resume

Resumes still matter—but not for the reasons we think. In a world where AI can polish anyone’s experience into a compelling narrative, the traditional hiring signals many organizations have relied on are losing their value. Heather Krueger, Chief People Officer at Engine, joins David Rice to explore what comes next when a polished resume becomes proof of tool usage rather than proof of talent. Their conversation challenges hiring leaders to rethink where and how they evaluate candidates, shifting from credentials and company logos toward judgment, learning velocity, resilience, and real-world decision-making. They also unpack why pedigree is often an expensive shortcut, how experimentation should influence both hiring and leadership, and what actually predicts success in an AI-driven workplace. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Heather on LinkedIn Visit Engine Support the show

June 23, 202639 min

AI Is Forcing Everyone To Become Their Own Economy

AI isn’t arriving as a gradual workplace evolution—it’s arriving as a societal shift that many leaders are still struggling to describe honestly. In this conversation, David Rice sits down with Leap Academy founder and CEO Ilana Golan to explore what happens when skills expire in one to two years, organizations expect dramatically higher productivity, and career stability becomes the exception rather than the rule. Together, they unpack why adaptability is becoming the defining professional skill, how portfolio careers may become a necessity rather than a choice, and why the future belongs to people who can continuously reinvent themselves. From the “pattern interrupt” needed to escape career pigeonholes to the practical 5-5-5 framework for making faster decisions, this episode offers a candid look at what it will take to stay relevant in an era of relentless change. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with Ilana on LinkedIn Visit Leap Academy Support the show

June 16, 202634 min

Why Making Employees Work The Same Way Backfires

David Kolbe argues that most organizations are only measuring two-thirds of what drives performance. We assess what people know (skills) and how they tend to behave (personality), but often ignore how they instinctively take action. That missing piece—what Kolbe calls conation —shapes how people gather information, solve problems, make decisions, and navigate uncertainty. In this conversation, David Rice and David Kolbe explore why burnout is often a mismatch problem rather than a motivation problem, why high-performing employees can be the most at risk of quietly disengaging, and why leaders who want better results may need to stop trying to standardize how work gets done and focus more on creating environments where different working styles can thrive. Related Links: Join the People Managing People Community Subscribe to the newsletter to get our latest articles and podcasts Connect with David on LinkedIn Visit Kolbe Corp Check out David’s book: Do More, More Naturally Support the show