Leading Through a Decade of Disruption

00:00:05 Sarah 

Welcome to the Deep Dive, the show where we explore the latest topics in HR, talent management, and the world of work. 

00:00:11 Sarah 

We recently surveyed hundreds of senior HR decision makers, and early warning signs point to real gaps between the pace of change and the readiness of organizations. 

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It’s never been more important to have the right people behind the wheel leading these organizations through this period. 

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So today we’re asking, how can organizations ensure that their leaders are 

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set to drive growth through this next period of disruption. 

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And to unpack all of this, I’m joined by the wonderful Dr. 

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Hayley Lewis, an esteemed occupational psychologist and leadership expert who works with businesses building the kinds of leaders and cultures that thrive through change. 

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We’ll dive into some of our survey findings and what future-ready leadership actually looks like in practice, and how organizations can spot and develop the people who are going to drive growth against an uncertain landscape. 

00:00:56 Sarah 

Hayley, welcome to the Deep Dive. 

00:00:58 Sarah 

I’m sure you’ll be a familiar name 

00:01:00 Sarah 

to many of our listeners, but for those who may not be familiar with you, could you tell us a little bit more about yourself? 

00:01:05 Hayley 

Yeah, well, first of all, thank you for having me. 

00:01:08 Hayley 

Yeah, I’m Hayley, Hayley Lewis. 

00:01:10 Hayley 

I am an occupational psychologist, or as I like to say, I have dual citizenships. 

00:01:15 Hayley 

I’m also a coaching psychologist. 

00:01:17 Hayley 

And I’ve been an occupational psychologist for almost 30 years. 

00:01:20 Hayley 

I’ve worked in lots of different places. 

00:01:23 Hayley 

I started out my career at the BBC. 

00:01:26 Hayley 

primarily working in assessment and development, which is where I first kind of got to work with Savile and proceeding that SHL, and then moved into local government, held a variety of roles, moved away from occupational psychology for a bit, and went into bigger and bigger leadership roles and frontline service roles, which taught me a lot, very stressful. 

00:01:49 Hayley 

and then came back to my spiritual home that I love and set up my own business 10 years ago. 

00:01:56 Hayley 

And I primarily do work around leadership and management behaviour and how that impacts culture and performance. 

00:02:04 Hayley 

So yeah, so it’s primarily executive coaching, but I do lots of teaching and training and talking as well. 

00:02:14 Hayley 

Some of your listeners might know me for my little scribbles, my sketch notes. 

00:02:19 Hayley 

So yeah, whenever I’m at conference, lots of people will come up to me and go, you’re the sketch note lady. 

00:02:26 Hayley 

So lots of people have got to know me for my sketch notes. 

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Many of which go viral now. 

00:02:32 Hayley 

So which always blows my mind. 

00:02:34 Hayley 

So yeah, so that’s a little bit about me. 

00:02:36 Sarah 

That’s amazing. 

00:02:37 Sarah 

I mean, I love the range within your career and I suppose. 

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the sketch notes, being able to distill large, complex topics into easy to understand information is a pretty hard skill to nail as well. 

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So I’m sure very useful for so many people. 

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And I’m not surprised they would go viral. 

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So I’m excited for the episode. 

00:02:55 Sarah 

I assume you’d also have so many great perspectives on the world of automation in terms of AR and HR. 

00:03:01 Sarah 

And I know you’re reading a book on AI and the world of work at the moment. 

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So do you feel like you reflect back on your career and bring in all those different 

00:03:09 Sarah 

parts of it into, I guess, your perspective now, and it’s great to have that range. 

00:03:15 Hayley 

Without a shadow of a doubt. 

00:03:16 Hayley 

And it’s really interesting to me. 

00:03:18 Hayley 

I think lots of clients give me feedback, because when I ask how they found me or why they’ve chosen to work with me, lots of the leaders that I work with say they really value the deep psychological knowledge I have around the issues that they’re grappling with. 

00:03:37 Hayley 

But I’ve also 

00:03:38 Hayley 

to some extent been in their shoes. 

00:03:42 Hayley 

I’ve kind of had that real world experience. 

00:03:45 Hayley 

I don’t just talk about, for example, motivating team members who are no longer motivated. 

00:03:52 Hayley 

I don’t just talk about that from a theoretical perspective. 

00:03:55 Hayley 

I’ve lived and breathed that, you know, that brilliant team member who suddenly just doesn’t want to play anymore and just is not happy and what’s going on there. 

00:04:06 Hayley 

I’ve had to sit in rooms and defend why I’m having to restructure for a fourth time in a year because of budget issues to the unions. 

00:04:14 Hayley 

I’ve had to negotiate that and kind of everything in between as well and kind of wear, I call them my battle scarves, but I kind of wear them with pride and I think that combination to some extent 

00:04:30 Hayley 

gives me a bit of a unique insight that I think lots of leaders value. 

00:04:34 Sarah 

Yeah, absolutely. 

00:04:36 Sarah 

And I suppose to bring that into a problem that, or a challenge that a lot of different companies are facing today. 

00:04:42 Sarah 

On a recent episode of the podcast, we had Matt Alderon and he suggested that recruitment process, could it be 80% automated by next year? 

00:04:50 Sarah 

And according to our own data in the UK, only one in five HR leaders currently feel prepared. 

00:04:56 Sarah 

for a more blended human and machine workforce. 

00:04:59 Sarah 

And I think just generally we’ve seen so much ambiguity around this and people feel a lot of uncertainty and maybe fear around how exactly to navigate this moving forward. 

00:05:10 Sarah 

Like what’s your kind of top note perspective on all of this? 

00:05:13 Hayley 

It’s really interesting. 

00:05:14 Hayley 

I was chatting to my husband about this today. 

00:05:15 Hayley 

I think until the end of last year, I was absolutely one of the people sitting there with crossed arms. 

00:05:25 Hayley 

a bit holier than now about the environmental aspect of AI, for example. 

00:05:30 Hayley 

And then I had this moment where I thought, the genie is out of the bottle. 

00:05:34 Hayley 

You need to lean into this. 

00:05:36 Hayley 

And actually, we have a responsibility, whether we’re HR or organisational development or psychologists. 

00:05:44 Hayley 

I think we have a real opportunity to help steward the way. 

00:05:51 Hayley 

But what I’m seeing is a lot of denial. 

00:05:54 Hayley 

I think a lot of hope that the genie will go back in the bottle. 

00:05:58 Hayley 

And then I’m seeing almost like a paralysis, people not sure how to proceed, feeling out of their depth, but maybe not, maybe because they’re in really senior roles. 

00:06:09 Hayley 

They’re embarrassed to admit they don’t know. 

00:06:11 Hayley 

It was really interesting. 

00:06:13 Hayley 

I was at the Division of Occupational Psychology conference last week and I deliberately went 

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to the sessions that were sharing research about AI, whether it was AI in management, AI behaviours. 

00:06:28 Hayley 

It was really interesting. 

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And what was the most interesting thing is how split the kind of the delegates. 

00:06:36 Hayley 

So there were those of us who were a little bit unsure, a little bit uncertain, 

00:06:40 Hayley 

but were curious. 

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And then there was a lot of arm crossing and a lot of what about the environment? 

00:06:45 Hayley 

What about the ethical aspects? 

00:06:47 Hayley 

What about… 

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And it was absolutely fascinating to me. 

00:06:53 Hayley 

There is no going back. 

00:06:56 Hayley 

So we better get on board. 

00:06:58 Hayley 

But I think it’s scary. 

00:06:59 Hayley 

I think it’s scary for a lot of people. 

00:07:01 Hayley 

And particularly for people like, you know, I’m Generation X, if we want to put generational terms on it. 

00:07:06 Hayley 

And 

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I think for those of us, it’s so unknown, it’s scary. 

00:07:13 Sarah 

Yeah, it’s very scary. 

00:07:15 Sarah 

And I think the point you made around, especially senior leaders having to enter a world of a lot of unknowns when maybe there was… 

00:07:24 Sarah 

more certainty around how organizations would structure themselves or I guess like where those boundaries ended or where the kind of norm started and ended as well. 

00:07:34 Sarah 

Now like the norm has changed so much. 

00:07:37 Sarah 

And I think it would be great to get some clarity around that from your perspective. 

00:07:39 Sarah 

Like when you look at the next 5 to 10 years, what do you see as the biggest forces for change? 

00:07:45 Sarah 

to organisations and their people. 

00:07:46 Hayley 

I will say this anytime I’m asked a question like this and it is such a typical response from somebody in my profession, which is it depends. 

00:07:54 Sarah 

Okay, yeah. 

00:07:55 Hayley 

So I think it depends to some extent on the sector and industry. 

00:08:00 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:08:00 Hayley 

So for example, I work a lot with public sector and finance and risk sector and industries and they are very risk 

00:08:12 Hayley 

It’s all about risk management and it’s all about let’s produce that report in order to make that decision. 

00:08:17 Hayley 

And then it has to go through three or four committees. 

00:08:21 Hayley 

That has been completely blown out of the window. 

00:08:24 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:08:25 Hayley 

And that’s a really uncomfortable space. 

00:08:27 Hayley 

So I think there’s something about, I think hierarchy is upended. 

00:08:33 Hayley 

is actually about having the people with the right skills in the room, not about job title. 

00:08:38 Sarah 

Right. 

00:08:38 Hayley 

I think there needs to be a different approach to risk management. 

00:08:42 Hayley 

It can’t be producing really long reports, as I say, that go to this committee and this committee and this committee. 

00:08:50 Hayley 

So I think there needs to be a much speedier, more agile approach to risk management. 

00:08:55 Hayley 

I think 

00:08:56 Hayley 

We’re going to move, if we’re not already moving, to skill-based hiring. 

00:09:01 Hayley 

Gone are the days of you need this degree or this qualification. 

00:09:04 Hayley 

And I think there’s something around what it means to be a resilient organisation in the face of security issues, in the face of the political turmoil, in the face of territories changing and what that means for trade and so on and so forth. 

00:09:22 Hayley 

And I think this is going to be it now. 

00:09:24 Hayley 

just everything is constantly changing. 

00:09:28 Hayley 

And I think organisations from the top down need to have much more fluidity. 

00:09:37 Hayley 

And I think in some sectors and industries, that’s really hard. 

00:09:43 Hayley 

square to circle. 

00:09:44 Sarah 

Yeah, it’s a really interesting point, actually, because especially those industries that are under a lot of regulation or exposed to a lot of risk, it was already such a struggle to be agile and to work quickly without sacrificing quality, for example. 

00:10:04 Sarah 

And I suppose, the addition of AI and automation generally just makes that so much more difficult now, as you’ve mentioned. 

00:10:10 Sarah 

Have you had any conversations recently with those types of organisations and leaders that have been bringing that to life for you? 

00:10:17 Sarah 

Like, how are they trying to navigate it from your perspective? 

00:10:21 Hayley 

Not specifically about AI, which I think is evidence in and of itself. 

00:10:27 Hayley 

It’s data in and of itself. 

00:10:29 Hayley 

I think I’m being asked to deliver a lot of 

00:10:33 Hayley 

sessions on to help organisations and managers and leaders navigate change. 

00:10:41 Hayley 

I have yet to have an approach where a client has been very explicit about and within that can we think about and have space to think about the disruption of AI and what this means for us. 

00:10:59 Hayley 

And look, I don’t put that purely at the door of the organisations I work with. 

00:11:03 Hayley 

There’s something about what am I selling as well. 

00:11:06 Hayley 

And I feel like I’m running to catch up. 

00:11:08 Hayley 

I was chatting to Dominic earlier and I’m now immersing myself. 

00:11:13 Hayley 

I’m speaking to AI experts. 

00:11:15 Hayley 

I’m reading, I’m listening to stuff, but I haven’t felt confident to date to think about what my offer is as a psychologist to support. 

00:11:23 Hayley 

I’m now kind of getting clearer on that. 

00:11:26 Hayley 

So I think it’s a two-handed thing. 

00:11:28 Hayley 

I think organisations aren’t necessarily asking organisations like ours for that specific support. 

00:11:35 Hayley 

I think there’s still this, oh, we’ll go to tech experts when actually there’s a cultural element to this as well. 

00:11:43 Hayley 

There’s A behavioural element to this as well, but there’s something about what’s our offer? 

00:11:48 Hayley 

Are we clear on the value that we can add to help organisations navigate this space? 

00:11:53 Sarah 

Yeah, and I think it seems definitely from our perspective that the uncertainty 

00:12:01 Sarah 

has created a need for someone who has had many of those conversations. 

00:12:07 Sarah 

And that’s a lot of what we’re trying to do is gain more and more of that insight. 

00:12:11 Sarah 

And we talk a lot about AI and how that’s disrupting organizational structure. 

00:12:15 Sarah 

And I think it would be naive for anyone to say they know exactly how this is going to impact each kind of company structure or culture and to be able to advise on that with complete certainty. 

00:12:27 Sarah 

But I do think that there are some interesting perspectives 

00:12:31 Sarah 

perspectives now coming out that help bring that to life so much more as well. 

00:12:36 Sarah 

And we really enjoy having those discussions. 

00:12:39 Sarah 

And I think especially for the companies that you’ve mentioned, those under regulatory pressure, exposed to risk, it’s even more important that they get the right perspective and have that insight of a range of different companies that have faced those same challenges as well. 

00:12:55 Sarah 

and it’s why conversations like these will be so important. 

00:12:57 Sarah 

We saw in a recent Gartner study that among the top priorities for crows in 2026, there are things like mobilizing leaders for growth in an uncertain world, harnessing AI to revolutionize processes as the human and machine era gathers pace. 

00:13:14 Sarah 

It’s definitely not the most straightforward set of challenges to overcome, and we’ve spoken about that a little bit more. 

00:13:20 Sarah 

And there are a lot of buzzwords and terms going around as well, because I think 

00:13:24 Sarah 

to our earlier points, people might not know what the right questions to ask and don’t know really how to define exactly what’s happening. 

00:13:32 Sarah 

But one thing we have heard a little bit about is change-ready leadership. 

00:13:36 Sarah 

How would you define what that is? 

00:13:38 Hayley 

I was thinking about this, I loved this question and I was thinking about this a lot because I think what we thought change readiness was, the definition of change readiness, it’s kind of the book’s been torn up and thrown out. 

00:13:52 Hayley 

I think 

00:13:54 Hayley 

So I’ve been thinking about this a lot. 

00:13:55 Hayley 

What does it mean to be change ready now in today’s world? 

00:13:59 Hayley 

Because a lot of the models and the concepts and the theories that many of us draw upon, I’m not sure I fit for purpose anymore when it comes to change and being change ready. 

00:14:08 Hayley 

I think when we think about the level of disruption in the world and that organisations are facing, I think to be change ready means being much more prepared to experiment. 

00:14:21 Hayley 

and manage risk in a more experimental way. 

00:14:25 Hayley 

Not everything even needs to go through a pilot. 

00:14:27 Hayley 

There’s one organisation. 

00:14:29 Hayley 

I can’t remember what organisation it was. 

00:14:31 Hayley 

It’s in a book that I’m reading at the moment. 

00:14:33 Hayley 

They built a CRM in a day. 

00:14:37 Hayley 

Now, when I was responsible for digital transformation, when I worked in local government, you know, 15 years ago, it took us three years to get the CRM up and running. 

00:14:47 Hayley 

That’s because we were testing and testing and checking and going to this committee. 

00:14:53 Hayley 

So I think there’s something about getting much more comfortable with experimentation, what that means, the guardrails that you put around that, because it doesn’t mean being risk-free and just kind of being complete mavericks. 

00:15:08 Hayley 

There still need to be guardrails, but I think it’s a different approach to being much more experimental. 

00:15:13 Hayley 

I think 

00:15:15 Hayley 

If we think specifically about AI, for example, again, less of this kind of rigid, hierarchical approach to change readiness and things getting signed off. 

00:15:26 Hayley 

I think having a kind of a much more dispersed approach, just allowing expert teams to get on and do 

00:15:35 Hayley 

and execute and then report back to the hierarchical leadership. 

00:15:40 Hayley 

I think this has always been the case and I think it’s even more so now, having a values led approach to decision making when it comes to some of the decisions that organisations are having to make. 

00:15:52 Hayley 

And I’m not talking about those lovely corporate values that are on posters or mugs or anything like that. 

00:15:58 Hayley 

I’m talking about a leadership team actually saying, 

00:16:01 Hayley 

What are our guiding principles? 

00:16:03 Hayley 

What’s our moral compass for some of the difficult decisions that we are going to have to make moving forward and some of the changes that we might not even know about at the moment? 

00:16:14 Hayley 

What’s going to help us navigate that in as ethical a way as possible? 

00:16:19 Hayley 

And being really clear and kind of setting out those kind of three or four core values that’s going to help that leadership team make those decisions. 

00:16:31 Hayley 

in the wisest way possible. 

00:16:33 Hayley 

So not a straightforward answer to your question, but that’s because I think we’re not in straightforward times. 

00:16:40 Sarah 

No, not a straightforward question. 

00:16:41 Hayley 

We’re not in Kansas anymore. 

00:16:43 Sarah 

No, that is true. 

00:16:44 Sarah 

And I just wanted to go back to what you’d mentioned around teams being more experimental. 

00:16:50 Sarah 

And I think 

00:16:52 Sarah 

that’s a really interesting point because I completely agree with you and I also think that’s so challenging for those companies, especially that are exposed to more risk. 

00:17:00 Sarah 

How practically can you see that playing out within an organisation or a leadership team to be more experimental? 

00:17:07 Hayley 

It’s really interesting because even in some of the most regulated organisations, it starts with the leader’s preparedness to let go a little bit. 

00:17:20 Hayley 

I have this concept of kind of 

00:17:22 Hayley 

tight loose control. 

00:17:24 Hayley 

So that doesn’t mean the leader’s not accountable and it doesn’t mean they’re not paying attention to and keeping an eye on the things that matter, but they relinquish a little bit of control. 

00:17:35 Hayley 

I read this case study with one of the highest serving officers in the UK Army, in the Ministry of Defence, who absolutely demonstrated that with the decision to use AI for 

00:17:49 Hayley 

a really important decision. 

00:17:52 Hayley 

And when I was reading this case study, I was thinking, I’m sorry, if one of the top brass in the army, with all the risks and the pressures and the security issues that they’re facing, can relinquish a little bit of control and encourage experimentation and trust and trust. 

00:18:15 Hayley 

people who aren’t at his level to go and do this thing with AI and report back and work together, then there’s no reason why the rest of us can’t in highly regulated, difficult context. 

00:18:35 Hayley 

So yeah, so that’s kind of what goes through my mind is where can you relinquish control but not relinquish oversight? 

00:18:45 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:18:46 Sarah 

I’m just thinking on that, what are some of the things that enable someone and a leader to be able to do this? 

00:18:52 Sarah 

And if I’m a crow, listening and thinking, what can I do? 

00:18:57 Sarah 

How can I be more enabled to do this? 

00:19:00 Sarah 

What are the gaps there? 

00:19:01 Sarah 

Like from your perspective, what are those things? 

00:19:03 Hayley 

I think if you’re a crow and you sit at the top table, I mean, that’s always the thing, isn’t it? 

00:19:08 Hayley 

Why aren’t we at the top table? 

00:19:09 Hayley 

So if you are at the top table, happy days. 

00:19:12 Hayley 

There’s something about team development. 

00:19:15 Hayley 

So whether it’s the board or the top team, however you refer to yourself, I think there’s something about a dedicated program of development for you as a leadership team around digital intelligence and skills development, the behavioural development to help you become more digitally intelligent. 

00:19:37 Hayley 

DQ is the new EQ as far as I’m concerned. 

00:19:42 Hayley 

or it sits along EQ and IQ. 

00:19:44 Hayley 

We’ve now got kind of digital intelligence. 

00:19:47 Hayley 

And I don’t think we can just leave it to individuals or individual leaders to go off and do this. 

00:19:53 Hayley 

I think it needs to be a kind of a team effort. 

00:19:58 Hayley 

And I think if you’re lucky enough to be a chief HR officer, you’ve got the trust and ear of your board, the chief exec or the managing director, 

00:20:09 Hayley 

then convince them to go down this path, to convince them to do some dedicated work as a team, team building that is very much focused on building digital intelligence and AI literacy. 

00:20:22 Hayley 

It’s not about them becoming AI experts, but they do need to, you all need to understand what it means to make ethical decisions, to be stewards. 

00:20:32 Hayley 

I mean, I keep using that word stewardship, how to navigate experimentation, 

00:20:38 Hayley 

how to kind of manage risk in this way, that takes some focus and that takes time and space to think. 

00:20:47 Hayley 

That would be my suggestion, but I know that’s easier said than done in some contexts. 

00:20:54 Sarah 

And for that leadership team, but also as that kind of digital intelligence filters down into the rest of the company, what kind of 

00:21:04 Sarah 

capabilities would you be looking for or would you be looking to grow within these development programs to ensure like there is that digital intelligence? 

00:21:14 Hayley 

So just as I said, so I think in particular the ethical side of things, so AI ethics, I think there’s cultural intelligence as well and how that plays out. 

00:21:25 Hayley 

I think there’s understanding bias and how that plays out in kind of how 

00:21:33 Hayley 

to use the data that’s coming out. 

00:21:36 Hayley 

For people managers, I think there’s something around helping them learn how to manage hybrid teams. 

00:21:44 Hayley 

And when I’m talking hybrid, I’m talking hybrid of a mix of humans and AI and what that means and the capabilities there. 

00:21:53 Hayley 

So how to manage performance of people and 

00:21:59 Hayley 

AI together, how to work as a team together. 

00:22:02 Hayley 

So there’s a whole host of things. 

00:22:04 Hayley 

And I think just by, this is me being really vulnerable now, I think just by, you can just see, even I’m trying to think it through, because I don’t have all the answers. 

00:22:15 Hayley 

And it comes back to what I said at the start. 

00:22:17 Hayley 

I think so many of us feel like we’re kind of just grappling around and running to catch up. 

00:22:23 Hayley 

And I very much feel that as well. 

00:22:25 Hayley 

And I am absolutely not sitting here. 

00:22:28 Hayley 

proclaiming to be an expert in this space, but I am really curious and I’m open to learning and I think curiosity and openness to learning is also really important for CHROs and people who are in leadership and management roles who want their organisations to thrive in this space. 

00:22:49 Sarah 

Yeah, I was going to say on top of that curiosity, like thinking 

00:22:53 Sarah 

on an individual level, do you have an idea of what a perfect or near perfect future really leader looks like? 

00:23:00 Hayley 

I don’t like the word perfect. 

00:23:02 Hayley 

I hate the word perfect. 

00:23:04 Hayley 

I think it puts too much. 

00:23:05 Hayley 

I think it just puts too much pressure. 

00:23:08 Hayley 

Well, particularly because a big issue that comes up in a lot of coaching sessions is perfectionism. 

00:23:13 Hayley 

And I think perfectionism can be really paralyzing and cause all sorts of kind of maladaptive behaviours in leaders. 

00:23:22 Hayley 

So I think there’s something about what’s good enough, because I think that’s the space we’re in now. 

00:23:27 Hayley 

For sure. 

00:23:27 Hayley 

I’m waiting to be the perfect leader. 

00:23:30 Hayley 

You’re going to be outdated by the end of the day, let alone tomorrow. 

00:23:34 Hayley 

So true. 

00:23:34 Hayley 

Getting comfortable with relinquishing control, but not oversight and accountability. 

00:23:40 Hayley 

I think getting even better at communicating and engaging with people. 

00:23:48 Hayley 

your people on these issues. 

00:23:51 Hayley 

I still continue to be shocked at just how poor organisations can be and people in senior roles can be at communicating to staff about what’s happening and doing that in a timely way and doing that in different ways. 

00:24:10 Hayley 

and doing it in ways that help people really understand and doing that in empathetic ways. 

00:24:15 Hayley 

Or they focus so much on the broadcast, they figure out about the engagement aspect. 

00:24:19 Hayley 

When I was in a head of communications and engagement role and people would be like, get comms involved, I’d jokingly go, and engagement. 

00:24:28 Hayley 

Because that’s really important. 

00:24:30 Sarah 

Yeah, completely. 

00:24:31 Hayley 

Yeah, I mean, I’m preaching to the choir and yeah, I don’t see those skills 

00:24:39 Hayley 

readily enough. 

00:24:41 Hayley 

And I think that’s going to be really important, being able to communicate this stuff and hold spaces for staff to be able to ask questions and talk this stuff through and learn together. 

00:24:55 Hayley 

I think facilitation skills are really going to come into their own for people in leadership roles to be future ready leaders. 

00:25:04 Hayley 

Those are the things that matter. 

00:25:05 Hayley 

Being able to build different kinds of teams, those are the things that matter. 

00:25:11 Hayley 

And build teams really quickly and then disperse those teams to build another team. 

00:25:16 Hayley 

I just think that’s 

00:25:19 Hayley 

That’s the future that we’re facing, but the future is now. 

00:25:22 Sarah 

Yeah, There’s so many important things to think about there, which reminds us of a really relevant stat that appeared on a recent survey we did to over, I think it might have been over 300 HR leaders, but don’t quote me on that. 

00:25:36 Sarah 

It was hundreds anyway. 

00:25:37 Sarah 

And we got some really great perspective on, I guess, the industry as it sits now or the world of work. 

00:25:45 Sarah 

And within the survey, HR leaders reported that one in six 

00:25:49 Sarah 

leadership hires or promotions have been mistakes in the last three years, which was quite an interesting and possibly alarming stat. 

00:25:57 Sarah 

So with the stakes incredibly high at this level, especially at the moment, and we’ve touched on that at multiple points in the podcast so far, you know, they talk about lost revenue, increased costs, definitely cultural damage as well. 

00:26:10 Sarah 

Where do you think the biggest impact is felt when things go wrong? 

00:26:14 Sarah 

Like which areas is underestimated or that goes under the radar all of the time? 

00:26:20 Hayley 

The biggest thing that I see, and it might be some of your listeners see other things, but the biggest thing I see is your most talented people go, because they can. 

00:26:33 Hayley 

And people don’t have to put up with working for a rubbish boss. 

00:26:39 Hayley 

anymore. 

00:26:41 Hayley 

And people will vote with their feet. 

00:26:44 Hayley 

So yeah, your best people will go. 

00:26:47 Hayley 

I’ve seen that time and time again. 

00:26:49 Hayley 

I’ve witnessed it myself when I worked in organisations. 

00:26:54 Hayley 

I think the big impact when that wrong decision is made is trust erodes. 

00:27:04 Hayley 

And that’s hard to get back. 

00:27:06 Hayley 

There’s that beautiful quote. 

00:27:08 Hayley 

I’ve never found out who came up with this, but it says that trust is built at the speed of a snail and lost at the speed of a racehorse. 

00:27:16 Hayley 

And I think once you get somebody who is not fit for post, if you don’t exit them quickly enough, 

00:27:27 Hayley 

the damage becomes really hard to undo because that trust will take a long, time to get back. 

00:27:34 Hayley 

Because it’s not just not trusting the poor hire. 

00:27:39 Hayley 

There’s also a lack of trust in the people who decided to hire that person. 

00:27:46 Hayley 

For sure. 

00:27:46 Hayley 

So it kind of leaks out. 

00:27:49 Hayley 

And then, you know, we’ve all got stories, haven’t we? 

00:27:53 Hayley 

And I think that discontent 

00:27:55 Hayley 

and the conflict that can emerge in a team then starts to leak out. 

00:28:00 Hayley 

whenever I’ve been asked to come in and help resolve team conflict, often at the heart of it is… 

00:28:09 Hayley 

not an effective leader. 

00:28:12 Hayley 

But when I speak to other teams that the team touches or customers, internal customers that the team touch, it’s leaked out, you know. 

00:28:21 Hayley 

So yeah, it can start to kind of creep out across the organisation. 

00:28:27 Sarah 

Yeah, what are some of those early warning signs? 

00:28:31 Hayley 

Early warning signs are grumbles, grumbles from staff. 

00:28:36 Hayley 

complaints from customers. 

00:28:38 Hayley 

If you’ve got this team that were formally engaged and motivated, suddenly they go quiet. 

00:28:46 Hayley 

That’s a big clue in and of itself. 

00:28:49 Hayley 

And I’ve been part of a team that went through that myself. 

00:28:54 Hayley 

More and more silence, maybe an increase in sickness. 

00:29:00 Hayley 

So some of it’s easy to spot, some of it 

00:29:04 Hayley 

is a bit more under the radar. 

00:29:05 Hayley 

And I think if you’re aware of this team, you’ve kind of really got your finger on the pulse of this team. 

00:29:13 Hayley 

So if you’re, if for example, you are this person’s manager and you are really aware of this team and you see this team suddenly start changing, that’s your data. 

00:29:22 Hayley 

That’s evidence in and of itself. 

00:29:23 Hayley 

So there’s something about paying attention. 

00:29:25 Sarah 

Yeah, definitely. 

00:29:26 Hayley 

Yeah. 

00:29:27 Sarah 

Another point that our survey had brought up, 

00:29:30 Sarah 

is that top performers don’t automatically make great managers, backed up by the stat that, well, 71% of our respondents agreed with it. 

00:29:38 Sarah 

Why do you think organisations still seem to promote based on performance rather than potential within that role? 

00:29:45 Sarah 

Like what’s the gap there? 

00:29:47 Hayley 

Because it’s easy. 

00:29:48 Sarah 

Right. 

00:29:50 Hayley 

We just do what we’ve always done. 

00:29:51 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:29:52 Hayley 

And we can kid ourselves. 

00:29:54 Hayley 

We’ve got evidence. 

00:29:55 Hayley 

I mean, it’s been really interesting on LinkedIn. 

00:29:58 Hayley 

It feels like there’s this really anti-performance management and anti-performance appraisal rhetoric going on at the moment and dismantle the system and from lots of really prominent HR folk as well. 

00:30:11 Hayley 

So I’m really kind of curious about that. 

00:30:13 Hayley 

Are we about to see a backlash on that? 

00:30:16 Hayley 

I think 

00:30:18 Hayley 

We don’t give ourselves space and time to think of other ways. 

00:30:21 Hayley 

I was speaking at an HR conference a few years ago and I cited the example of Spotify. 

00:30:31 Hayley 

So this is before the pandemic. 

00:30:33 Hayley 

I came across a case study with Spotify. 

00:30:35 Hayley 

It was written about, I think, in People Management Magazine. 

00:30:39 Hayley 

And Spotify were experimenting with different managers 

00:30:47 Hayley 

you would have a subject matter expert manager and a people pastoral manager. 

00:30:54 Hayley 

That’s interesting. 

00:30:55 Hayley 

And I’m really interested in that. 

00:30:56 Hayley 

Now that’s hard work to do that. 

00:30:58 Hayley 

But I think that opens up. 

00:31:01 Hayley 

It just creates so much opportunity. 

00:31:04 Hayley 

I was once running a workshop for a group of people managers. 

00:31:09 Hayley 

It’s how to build a high performing team. 

00:31:11 Hayley 

We do lots of practical stuff. 

00:31:12 Hayley 

I share the evidence. 

00:31:14 Hayley 

And I kid you not, Sarah, 

00:31:16 Hayley 

There was a point mid-morning where I could just feel them like going… 

00:31:24 Hayley 

And I called it out, I said, I’m sorry, does this all feel like too much hard work? 

00:31:29 Hayley 

And one of them like cheekily nodded and I said, if you, that’s fine. 

00:31:36 Hayley 

If you don’t want a high performing team, just carry on doing what you’re doing, like have a good team. 

00:31:42 Hayley 

But if you want to go to the next level, these are the things that really work and it requires effort in your pie, requires you really getting to know each and every person in your team and not having a one-size-fits-all approach. 

00:31:56 Hayley 

And then I was just feeling it and I said, how many of you actually like people? 

00:32:04 Hayley 

And a few of them said, no, not really. 

00:32:07 Hayley 

But they’ve gone into people management roles because they need the money. 

00:32:11 Hayley 

Because it’s the only way to progress in one’s career, because it’s the only way to get that extra money because your family’s growing and your mortgage has got bigger. 

00:32:19 Hayley 

And so that’s why I was really interested in this Spotify example. 

00:32:24 Hayley 

And I don’t know what’s happened since, as I say, when I first read that case study, that was pre-pandemic. 

00:32:29 Hayley 

But I just think 

00:32:30 Hayley 

We need to offer different pathways for people to progress. 

00:32:36 Hayley 

And going back to your kind of question about the confusion around performance and potential, I think you’ve answered your own question is because we’re confusing the two, but not everybody is cut out to be a people manager. 

00:32:53 Sarah 

And to your point, it sounds like there are other options. 

00:32:57 Sarah 

as well, the Spotify case study being an example of that. 

00:33:01 Sarah 

And I also found it funny, you touched on how when I asked, like, why does this still happen, people getting promoted based on potential, and you said it’s evidence. 

00:33:09 Sarah 

And I find that really interesting because we work shameless plug in the world of assessment, which is another form of evidence which should be able to give you an indication of potential to perform. 

00:33:23 Sarah 

without that being based solely on performance, but on the qualities that are going to make that person the best for the team. 

00:33:30 Sarah 

So I think, evidence is important, but catering that evidence to the decision you’re trying to make is important as well. 

00:33:36 Hayley 

I think we’re still heavily entrenched in that somebody’s really good at their technical job. 

00:33:43 Hayley 

They’re really, really good. 

00:33:44 Hayley 

And when they’re like a high flyer, so let’s get them, let’s get them, let’s put them in that 16 box or that nine box talent thing. 

00:33:52 Hayley 

and let’s encourage them to go into this bigger role. 

00:33:56 Hayley 

It doesn’t mean the bigger role’s right for them. 

00:33:59 Hayley 

And it’s interesting, this has been coming up a lot in coaching conversations with people who are middle management. 

00:34:05 Hayley 

And it’s really interesting to me that the number of people who are on the cusp of living other people’s dreams for them, as in the organisation’s dreams for them, which are very much based on that very traditional 

00:34:18 Hayley 

linear step by step, let’s move you up the ladder. 

00:34:21 Hayley 

And actually, that’s not what they want. 

00:34:25 Hayley 

They want stretch, they want progression, they want bigger responsibilities, but they don’t necessarily want all the stuff that goes with people management or all the stuff that goes with traditional leadership. 

00:34:42 Sarah 

Thinking along those same lines, what seemed more alarming within the survey results as well is that more than a third told us that they witnessed senior leaders bypass formal hiring and promotion processes, often or always to place their own choices in the role. 

00:34:58 Sarah 

And yeah, I mean, this clearly isn’t a unique experience. 

00:35:02 Sarah 

What advice would you give to our listeners who are probably nodding along at this point? 

00:35:06 Sarah 

How can they push back if they see that kind of thing happening? 

00:35:10 Hayley 

Kind of, I’m sitting here, I’m sitting here thinking, who am I to give advice to your listeners who will be so experienced? 

00:35:18 Hayley 

You know, you’re going to have chief people officers and the like listening to this, who know how to handle this situation. 

00:35:27 Hayley 

But if there is somebody listening who’s like, I don’t, I’m not sure. 

00:35:31 Hayley 

First of all, a one-on-one conversation with the decision maker. 

00:35:35 Hayley 

So if it’s the chief exec, for example, there’s a, you know, doing it in private. 

00:35:40 Hayley 

I think, and just having that non-judgmental conversation, which doesn’t get their back up, just asking them for what they know about this person and kind of trying to dig into what evidence they have. 

00:35:58 Hayley 

So asking, you know, let’s face it, doesn’t matter what sector you’re in, it’s all about the money. 

00:36:04 Hayley 

So whether it’s about efficiency savings in the public sector, whether it’s about making more money, 

00:36:09 Hayley 

in the private sector, asking questions like, what do you know about, what’s their track record of increasing profit or what’s their track record of efficiency savings in this area? 

00:36:23 Hayley 

Do you know? 

00:36:24 Hayley 

And I think just having that very, very non-judgmental, genuine spirit of inquiry approach with a decision maker can be 

00:36:35 Hayley 

really helpful. 

00:36:36 Hayley 

And then having a conversation about potential risks. 

00:36:39 Hayley 

what are the pros and cons that we might need to think about? 

00:36:43 Hayley 

What are the kind of the risks of onboarding this person into this role that we might need to mitigate? 

00:36:47 Hayley 

And just kind of coming at it from that perspective is certainly something that I’ve done. 

00:36:52 Hayley 

I remember working with a group of politicians 

00:36:56 Hayley 

who were the decision makers for an executive director role. 

00:36:59 Hayley 

And I ran an assessment centre and had all sorts of evidence. 

00:37:03 Hayley 

And they ignored all the behavioural data and the personality data. 

00:37:11 Hayley 

And it fed into the interview and they ignored it all. 

00:37:14 Hayley 

And they hired the person that came out as probably the least appropriate person for the leadership role. 

00:37:23 Hayley 

And I had to have a really 

00:37:25 Hayley 

difficult conversation with the main decision maker who was the most powerful politician. 

00:37:34 Hayley 

And along those lines around, let’s just talk through the risks, potential risks of this, what might we need to put in place to manage this. 

00:37:43 Hayley 

Sure enough, this person didn’t stay in post. 

00:37:47 Hayley 

Ultimately, a decision maker will, particularly if they’re in a position of power, 

00:37:51 Hayley 

They’ll do what they want. 

00:37:52 Hayley 

And I think, but as long as you can, as long as you can hold your head up and know that you were brave enough to lean in and have that important conversation and that it’s, there’s a record of it somewhere and then managing the risk around it, that’s sometimes that’s all you can do. 

00:38:07 Hayley 

But I’d hope if you’ve got a good relationship with the decision maker, the hiring manager, they’ll listen. 

00:38:16 Hayley 

And there might be a third way. 

00:38:17 Hayley 

I’m a great believer in kind of, is there a third option? 

00:38:21 Hayley 

Is it like a longer probation period, for example, or something along those lines? 

00:38:27 Sarah 

Yeah, no, it makes so much sense. 

00:38:30 Sarah 

I wanted to go a little bit deeper now into what actually changes for leaders when machines and increased automation become a part of their day-to-day. 

00:38:39 Sarah 

Can you talk to us a little bit more about what are some good new habits for leaders to be getting into to keep people, performance and trust on track, which we spoke about being really, really key? 

00:38:51 Hayley 

So I know some leaders that I work with who are managing in really tough environments, like blue light services, for example, or crisis response situations. 

00:39:04 Hayley 

who, when things have gone back to normal, have continued using things like daily huddles. 

00:39:10 Hayley 

So daily huddles will be something that some of your listeners will be familiar with, particularly those maybe who work in tech industries. 

00:39:17 Hayley 

But I think the daily huddle is a really good touch point each day. 

00:39:23 Hayley 

So you’re not just waiting for that weekly or monthly team meeting to find out what’s going on, to check in with people or that one to one, where it’s just you as the manager and the person hearing from each other. 

00:39:35 Hayley 

I think the daily huddle, which is 5 to 10 minutes, you’re all stood up if you’re able to stand up or, you know, you might all be online or it might be hybrid. 

00:39:47 Hayley 

But just that kind of check in 

00:39:50 Hayley 

What have people got going on? 

00:39:51 Hayley 

What’s front of mind for people, including the kind of the leader of the team? 

00:39:56 Hayley 

What do we need to pay attention to? 

00:39:59 Hayley 

And then you kind of go into the day. 

00:40:02 Hayley 

And I just think it’s that touch point that’s really powerful. 

00:40:08 Hayley 

I do have a sketch note summary of a selection of huddle questions that you can choose from as a manager. 

00:40:14 Hayley 

So I can send that over and you can put that in the show notes if you want. 

00:40:16 Sarah 

Yes, of course, that’d be great. 

00:40:18 Hayley 

But yeah, that. 

00:40:20 Hayley 

I’ve worked with so many kind of heads of service who found that a really helpful habit to incorporate and they’ve just continued with it. 

00:40:29 Sarah 

So over half of HR leaders responding to our survey told us that they believe that they have untapped potential going unnoticed in their organisation. 

00:40:37 Sarah 

But a similar number also reported that they don’t have ready now successes for critical leadership roles. 

00:40:44 Sarah 

And with the next decade requiring more adaptable leaders, surely the big question is how organisations can join the dots and surface and develop the existing potential within their teams. 

00:40:55 Sarah 

I think this is something we hear about all of the time, like having the right organisational insights to work out how to create the most optimal team. 

00:41:02 Sarah 

And what’s your perspective on that? 

00:41:04 Hayley 

A bit provocative. 

00:41:05 Sarah 

Oh, great. 

00:41:07 Sarah 

Tell us, please. 

00:41:08 Hayley 

Well, first of all, and this is 

00:41:11 Hayley 

This is always the question I’ll ask. 

00:41:13 Hayley 

When I was reading through the questions, my question was, why? 

00:41:18 Hayley 

don’t they have ready now? 

00:41:20 Hayley 

Successes, what’s been getting in the way? 

00:41:22 Hayley 

Because you need to understand that. 

00:41:24 Hayley 

What are the barriers to that? 

00:41:26 Hayley 

And that will be different, I think, for different organisations. 

00:41:30 Hayley 

So that’s my first cheeky retort back. 

00:41:33 Hayley 

What are the barriers? 

00:41:34 Hayley 

The provocative thing, maybe it’s not that provocative. 

00:41:37 Hayley 

You might have listeners sitting there going, that’s not provocative, Hayley, but it feels provocative. 

00:41:41 Hayley 

which is what is the definition of ready now. 

00:41:45 Hayley 

So I think it’s really important that leadership teams with the help of kind of the CHROs are defining what ready now means for them in their context. 

00:42:00 Hayley 

But then I think being ready now doesn’t mean you’re ready tomorrow. 

00:42:05 Hayley 

And that’s the space that we’re in. 

00:42:07 Hayley 

Like everything is, it feels like everything is changing. 

00:42:11 Hayley 

day by day, what does it mean when another pivot or disruption happens tomorrow? 

00:42:18 Hayley 

So you might have been ready today and have the skills and behaviours, but does that help you navigate? 

00:42:26 Hayley 

So there is, it comes back to your word, adaptability. 

00:42:29 Hayley 

I think again, you’ve kind of answered the question, but that was what was going through my mind. 

00:42:34 Hayley 

What have been the barriers that have stopped you 

00:42:37 Hayley 

having ready now successes, and what is your definition of ready now for your context? 

00:42:43 Sarah 

And so once you understand the ready now, that will help you to develop the existing potential. 

00:42:48 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:42:49 Hayley 

It all starts, you know, my students will tell, I used to have a part-time academic role and training other psychologists in my space. 

00:43:01 Hayley 

And 

00:43:02 Hayley 

I say you’ve got to define the problem. 

00:43:04 Hayley 

You’ve got to have a clear definition because everything else is, that’s the springboard. 

00:43:08 Hayley 

Without that, you could blindly be going down the wrong direction. 

00:43:12 Hayley 

So have a definition for what ready now means for your context. 

00:43:15 Sarah 

Yeah, love that. 

00:43:18 Sarah 

The advancements in tech and AI can actually improve development programmes. 

00:43:23 Sarah 

And I think there is also, you know, a lot of 

00:43:25 Sarah 

ambiguity around that and how exactly we implement that, especially with a lot more regulation around AI coming out. 

00:43:30 Sarah 

But we hear a lot about the personalization angle in particular. 

00:43:35 Sarah 

Like what do you think the future of talent development looks like? 

00:43:38 Sarah 

A very broad question, but yeah, tell us what your perspective is. 

00:43:43 Hayley 

And I am not a talent development expert. 

00:43:45 Hayley 

This is, that’s not my gig, but I have thoughts. 

00:43:49 Hayley 

I think it’s going to need to be faster. 

00:43:53 Hayley 

I think personalized. 

00:43:55 Hayley 

It’s going to be less about hierarchical, the kind of traditional hierarchical approaches to kind of talent management. 

00:44:03 Hayley 

I think it’s going to be having talent hubs where people can be quickly deployed into teams that need their skills, like really kind of grappling with kind of really tough issues and then being pulled out and being put somewhere else. 

00:44:20 Hayley 

And they’re kind of building their knowledge and their skills, but they’re also inputting their knowledge. 

00:44:25 Hayley 

and their skills. 

00:44:25 Hayley 

So I think talent development is going to be much more active, much more agile, much more personalized and a hell of a lot faster. 

00:44:33 Sarah 

I think you’re completely right. 

00:44:35 Sarah 

Do you think it’s important to now develop as elite leaders that are super tech savvy themselves? 

00:44:41 Sarah 

and across the latest innovations, is that a part of that digital intelligence? 

00:44:46 Hayley 

Yeah, I’ll say it again. 

00:44:47 Hayley 

I really think DQ is the more I’ve been reading, the more I’ve been listening to experts and talking to experts. 

00:44:53 Hayley 

DQ is the… 

00:44:55 Hayley 

the new EQ. 

00:44:57 Hayley 

I know it’s a bit of a sound bite and there’ll be some evidence-based practitioners rolling their eyes, but I do, I’m just really struck by some of the leadership development programmes that I kind of contribute to or I’m being asked to contribute to, and nowhere can I see any reference to digital intelligence and kind of developing that alongside all the other things that we need to develop in leaders. 

00:45:22 Hayley 

So if you’re listening to this and you’re doing that, 

00:45:26 Hayley 

You need to get yourself on this podcast and share your case study. 

00:45:29 Sarah 

Absolutely. 

00:45:30 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:45:30 Sarah 

No, very interesting. 

00:45:32 Hayley 

Because you will have an amazing story to share that others can learn from, I think. 

00:45:35 Sarah 

Yeah, absolutely. 

00:45:36 Hayley 

I think we need more stories. 

00:45:39 Hayley 

I think a lot of the stories that we’re hearing about in the kind of tech, AI, digital disruption space are coming from tech leaders. 

00:45:49 Hayley 

And I would love to hear from people in the HR, 

00:45:53 Hayley 

space, who are doing great work around this, who are working on that digital intelligence, who are supporting leaders and managers with this. 

00:46:01 Hayley 

We need to hear your stories because then I think it helps other people create their stories and try stuff out and give them confidence to do stuff. 

00:46:10 Sarah 

Definitely. 

00:46:11 Sarah 

Yeah, absolutely. 

00:46:11 Sarah 

And if you’re listening and you have a good story, please reach out to us because I think those stories will become 

00:46:17 Sarah 

so much more common as we move forward, or they’ll have to become so much more common as HR leaders have that demand on them to have that digital intelligence. 

00:46:26 Sarah 

So completely agree with you. 

00:46:28 Sarah 

We’re coming to the end now, which is very sad. 

00:46:30 Sarah 

But before we do go into the quickfire round, there may be some people who are listening that are currently in leadership positions, feeling a little bit overwhelmed and possibly underprepared themselves. 

00:46:42 Sarah 

With your coaching hat on and all of the experience you’ve had, how might you try and position the next decade as something to be like really excited about? 

00:46:51 Sarah 

How do you see, I suppose, that and what advice would you give to those people? 

00:46:55 Hayley 

I’d say you’re not alone if you’re feeling like that. 

00:46:58 Hayley 

You know, my coaching philosophy, I take a strengths-based approach. 

00:47:03 Hayley 

So kind of a useful activity to do is on a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you? 

00:47:12 Hayley 

in your ability to navigate the next decade and all the disruption that we’re facing, kind of just mark yourself down on that. 

00:47:20 Hayley 

And then, so say you give yourself a four out of 10, then think about what are you doing, what strengths do you have in place that enabled you to give yourself a four and a three or a two or a one? 

00:47:31 Hayley 

I think that’s really important to acknowledge that, you’re not 

00:47:34 Hayley 

hopefully you’re not starting from zero. 

00:47:37 Hayley 

And that can be, whenever I use that approach with clients, they find that really, they almost have a moment, oh. 

00:47:43 Hayley 

Because when we’re holding it all around in our heads, it all feels overwhelming. 

00:47:48 Hayley 

And then it’s like, okay, over the next six months, where do I want to nudge to? 

00:47:53 Hayley 

So you might say, I want to nudge to a six. 

00:47:55 Hayley 

Okay, what does that gap between 4:00 and 6:00 look like? 

00:47:58 Hayley 

What would I be doing at a six that I’m not doing at a four? 

00:48:01 Hayley 

And just kind of have a little bit of a brain dump, even talk it through with someone, maybe a trusted peer if you don’t have a coach. 

00:48:08 Hayley 

And you’ll probably identify two or three things and then choose one of those and think, what’s the first small step I can take? 

00:48:15 Hayley 

And it might be, I’m going to go and read a book on this, or I’m going to speak to someone. 

00:48:23 Hayley 

I’m going to go, I’m going to ask to, I’m going to speak to someone in the technology team to see if I can shadow them more. 

00:48:31 Hayley 

But the key with this, I think, is leverage your strengths and recognise that you do have strengths. 

00:48:38 Hayley 

And then break it down into the smallest step you can take just to edge yourself forward. 

00:48:44 Hayley 

I think underpinning all of this, having humility and curiosity, I think those are the two watchwords for all of us. 

00:48:51 Hayley 

Being humble enough to hold your hands up and go, do you know what, I don’t know. 

00:48:56 Hayley 

You know, I’ve done that a couple of times in this conversation and for somebody who others hold, I would never call myself an expert, but others hold me up as an expert, they look at the doctor title, that’s a lot of pressure. 

00:49:08 Hayley 

And sometimes I get a little bit frightened of saying, do you know what, I don’t know. 

00:49:11 Hayley 

But actually, I think it’s important that I’m role modelling. 

00:49:14 Hayley 

It’s okay to say, do you know what, I don’t know, but I know how to find out or I know to go and talk to someone. 

00:49:20 Hayley 

So there’s something about having that humility to just acknowledge, I don’t know. 

00:49:26 Hayley 

And then just being curious and going, but I can find out. 

00:49:29 Hayley 

And there’s so many, there’s so many people who are 

00:49:32 Hayley 

who’ve got podcasts about AI and there’s so many brilliant people writing accessible stuff. 

00:49:38 Hayley 

There’s so many great people to go and talk to. 

00:49:40 Hayley 

So having that curiosity to go and find out, I think humility and curiosity are going to, if you have those, you’re going to be okay. 

00:49:50 Sarah 

Yeah, I love that. 

00:49:51 Sarah 

And I think those two things, curiosity and humility, 

00:49:54 Sarah 

coupled with within your organisation, having that values-led framework will help you wade through a lot of the noise because there are so many perspectives out there on something where there is a lot of ambiguity and it can be hard to know who to trust, what to listen to, what’s the right approach. 

00:50:11 Sarah 

But I think a combination of what you’ve talked about helps make that a lot clearer for people. 

00:50:16 Hayley 

Absolutely spot on, Sarah. 

00:50:17 Hayley 

When we move up into more and more senior roles, we put this pressure on ourselves 

00:50:21 Hayley 

to have all the answers to everything and save the really clever, clever things. 

00:50:26 Hayley 

Actually, the cleverest thing you can do is ask questions. 

00:50:31 Hayley 

Ask questions. 

00:50:32 Hayley 

How does that work? 

00:50:33 Hayley 

What might the implications be if we go down this path? 

00:50:36 Sarah 

So true. 

00:50:37 Hayley 

Sometimes that’s the cleverest thing. 

00:50:38 Sarah 

Yeah, definitely. 

00:50:39 Sarah 

And that’s that curiosity and just wanting to learn more and not assuming, I suppose, that you already know everything, especially with something like automation in the world of AI or AI within HR as well. 

00:50:50 Sarah 

It’s, yeah. 

00:50:51 Sarah 

Yeah, it’s the Wild West, as they say. 

00:50:53 Hayley 

Oh, without a shadow of a doubt, yeah. 

00:50:55 Sarah 

Cool. 

00:50:55 Sarah 

Before we finish up today, we’ve started doing like a little quick fire round in the wrap up. 

00:51:00 Sarah 

Hope that’s okay with you. 

00:51:01 Hayley 

I feel like this is mastermind. 

00:51:02 Hayley 

I feel like you’re Clive Myrie and I’m about to undergo. 

00:51:06 Sarah 

Yes, get prepared. 

00:51:07 Sarah 

It’s quick answers only. 

00:51:09 Sarah 

No, we actually do love the conversation. 

00:51:10 Sarah 

So if you’d like to, you know, expand on what you’re saying, then all good. 

00:51:15 Sarah 

But the first question. 

00:51:16 Sarah 

If you could change one thing about how most organisations spot and grow future leaders, what would it be? 

00:51:24 Hayley 

Stop going to the obvious pools of people. 

00:51:28 Hayley 

Think about who are the problems? 

00:51:31 Hayley 

Who are the disruptors? 

00:51:33 Hayley 

Who are those annoying people who ask lots of questions? 

00:51:38 Hayley 

Why not think about them? 

00:51:39 Hayley 

But often we don’t. 

00:51:42 Hayley 

We want good corporate citizens. 

00:51:45 Hayley 

who do as they’re told and make life easy for everyone else. 

00:51:48 Hayley 

And so sometimes, but sometimes we need to lean into the disruptors in the organisation. 

00:51:57 Hayley 

because we need disruptors to help us navigate through the disruption that we’re in the middle of and that will be ongoing forever now. 

00:52:03 Sarah 

Yeah, and that’s a part of that experimentation. 

00:52:05 Sarah 

Yeah. 

00:52:06 Sarah 

Number 2, what’s a leadership trait we still over reward? 

00:52:09 Hayley 

It’s not solely a leadership trait, but it’s one that I see a primacy put on for leaders is extroversion, you know, being the talkative one. 

00:52:20 Hayley 

If I have, if I, 

00:52:23 Hayley 

The number of people have approached me to coach, particularly female up and coming leaders, to lean in more and be more talkative at the board. 

00:52:32 Hayley 

We’re encouraging people to talk for the sake of it. 

00:52:35 Hayley 

And actually there’s a real power in more thoughtfulness, being thoughtful leaders. 

00:52:39 Hayley 

And it’s not that you’ve got nothing to say, but when you speak, you’ve got something important to say. 

00:52:43 Hayley 

You’re not just speaking for the sake of it. 

00:52:46 Hayley 

So yeah, this whole 

00:52:47 Hayley 

We value the most chatter. 

00:52:49 Hayley 

There’s me chatting a way, but they talk, they’re articulate, therefore they must be a good leader. 

00:52:55 Hayley 

And we overlook and make invisible maybe the quieter, more thoughtful one. 

00:53:00 Sarah 

Quick fire question #3. 

00:53:02 Sarah 

What’s one question a manager should ask more often than their one-to-ones with their team members? 

00:53:07 Hayley 

How can I best help you? 

00:53:10 Sarah 

It’s not being asked enough. 

00:53:11 Hayley 

No. 

00:53:12 Hayley 

I’ve got a cheeky follow-up. 

00:53:14 Hayley 

How have I hindered you this month? 

00:53:17 Sarah 

That’s an interesting one. 

00:53:19 Sarah 

Okay, quick fire question #4. 

00:53:21 Sarah 

Best piece of advice you’d give a crow to succeed in 2026? 

00:53:25 Hayley 

I would advise a crow, develop your own DQ. 

00:53:29 Hayley 

It’s going to put you ahead of the game. 

00:53:32 Hayley 

Go on your own development programme that you create for yourself if you don’t have access to one already. 

00:53:38 Sarah 

Okay, and last question. 

00:53:41 Sarah 

Finish this sentence. 

00:53:42 Sarah 

If you want leaders who can handle AI-driven change, you need to. 

00:53:46 Hayley 

Have a DQ program, which includes the board, or read this book that I’ve been reading, which is called Rewire or Retire, and it’s by Mark O’Ryan and Alistair Lechler, I think. 

00:54:01 Hayley 

Absolutely brilliant. 

00:54:03 Hayley 

So some of the… 

00:54:05 Hayley 

I feel like I’m their agent. 

00:54:06 Hayley 

I’m not at all. 

00:54:08 Hayley 

But some of the case studies that I talked about earlier, so for example, the Ministry of Defence one, the UK, I meet is in here. 

00:54:16 Hayley 

So they’ve interviewed all sorts of people from different sectors, different organisations in different countries. 

00:54:26 Hayley 

They interviewed this general about his approach to taking a big risk using AI for part of the armed forces. 

00:54:35 Hayley 

But there’s some brilliant, brilliant stuff in here and they’ve set out almost a mandate and a structure for what digital intelligence looks like. 

00:54:44 Hayley 

They even have a whole section about how high and low digital intelligence, what it looks like in boards. 

00:54:52 Hayley 

So they look at it through the lens of the crow. 

00:54:55 Hayley 

the chief technology officer, the CEO, the COO. 

00:54:58 Hayley 

So I would say crows, get a copy of this book because no one else will be reading this and it’s going to put you ahead of the game and give you lots of ideas. 

00:55:07 Sarah 

You’ve heard it here first, everyone. 

00:55:08 Sarah 

Thank you so much, Hayley, for your time today and your insight and for bringing the information to life with all of the stories. 

00:55:14 Sarah 

It makes it so much more, I mean, it’s always going to be interesting to listen to, but just really helps put it into context for our listeners and for myself as well. 

00:55:23 Sarah 

If our listeners would like to hear more from you, 

00:55:25 Sarah 

and access more of the amazing information you’re putting out, where can they find you? 

00:55:30 Hayley 

The main place to find me is on LinkedIn. 

00:55:34 Hayley 

I’m there a lot and some of your listeners may be there following me or connecting with me already. 

00:55:40 Hayley 

And then I’ve got lots of resources, lots of useful articles on my website, which is halopsychology.com. 

00:56:00 Sarah 

Thank you, everyone, for listening. 

00:56:01 Sarah 

If you want to find any of the information we talked about in the episode, you can look in the show notes below. 

00:56:06 Sarah 

But otherwise, make sure you’re liking, following, subscribing, and we’ll be back soon for more with another episode of the Deep Dive. 

00:56:13 Sarah 

Thanks so much, everyone.