Special Audience Q&A Episode S1 Finale: Career Shifts, Taking Risks with AI in a Volatile Job Market

Speaker A: M. Hey, everyone, and welcome to here's the Deal, the show where we unpack the challenges of leadership, culture, and the future of work through fresh perspectives and unexpected inspirations. I'm Giselle. Um, and joining me is my co host, Sujat. We both have a background in strategy consulting, made the leap into tech and entrepreneurship. Our goal is to help you shape a meaningful career and lead a purposeful life. So let's get the show started. We've heard your feedback, and for our listeners, thank you for engaging on the topics and primarily the topics around layoffs, uncertainty, and preparing for the future. So here's the deal for today. We'll dive deeper on five of your questions and share our perspectives with you. And welcome. Sujat. How are you doing?

Speaker B: I am good. Glad to be here and looking forward to diving into these questions. So what's the first question, Giselle?

Speaker A: Excellent. So here's our first question. Uh, today's job market is changing rapidly. What should people do to stay ahead?

Speaker B: So we're seeing multiple changes. Right? There's. There's a reason for these changes. There's the, uh, volatility, macroeconomically. Right. That we're seeing. I think it's projected to be, uh, be ready for a roller coaster ride, which is 2025. And it's not just random. There are specific interventions from the government, from the private sector that are happening that are leading to this. It has led to. We already had a volatile job market. It has become even more volatile. I think in such a changing job market, the people who necessarily succeed aren't the ones who are mostly necessarily the smartest or the most talented. These are the ones who've adapted the fastest. And we've seen that in the 2008 recession. We've seen that even during the pandemic as well. We're seeing this now as well. So I think if you spot a shift early and take action, we're already ahead of the game. Uh, if you're using an ice hockey reference, not necessarily where the puck is, but where the puck is going to be. I'm a cricket nerd. So where to go? So I am Canadian, and Wayne Gretzky, uh, growing up as a kid, used to watch these shows back home in Pakistan, and they had a Wayne Gretzky cartoon show. And next thing I know, never expected myself to be in Canada, but when I got there, I'm m like, oh, Wayne Gretzky said that. Remember his cartoon show? And then as a cricket nerd as well, you know, you anticipate, uh, before that whole game is about anticipation of uh, what is likely to happen when you do X and where the ball is going to be and where the player is going to make a certain play and you get there before uh, the other person. So sounds good. How do you actually do it? Practically right. In such a job market, I think you have to look at uh, you have to make some calls that are very deep to you that uh, you have very strong held beliefs about. They come either from your own experience, lived experiences. Not necessarily not either. It's lived experiences. And then what have you researched and what intelligence have you gathered? What wisdom have you gathered from others? We live in a time where podcasts, articles like tons of opinions out there and you also have AI to synthesize this information for you that you have a lot of intelligence available to you to make an informed bet. This wasn't used to be the case. Take many years back. It used to be the reasons why the richer and uh, those who have the most resources were able to do this or because they were hired smart consultants who would gather all this intelligence, synthesize it and give them a better chance than an average person. So we have all of these resources and I'll share how I, you know, just for my own self, how my journey has been. I probably shared this in one of our previous episodes and if not, I think there's. I've published few articles and interviews around this. In 2020, I, uh, put three venture bets in front of me. I said there are three forces at play. If they uh, my belief is if they come into action, uh, we will see a shift. And where do I want to be in this shift? Both from a passion perspective, but also from an opportunity perspective. And then strategic foresight is about taking those things and trying to gather data, see if this is how they're playing. So in 2020, we had the uh, right of the pandemic. People were forced to go remote and we knew that it's going to be before a year or two years before we can have some form of normalcy. But by that time people would have had a taste of living a different way of working. And then also during the pandemic, having different meaning to life as well. It's more about more than just work. So flexibility will be really key. The civic activism that was happening post George Floyd, not just in the U.S. but globally, it led to certain employee activism that forced companies to make bold commitments that was like, okay, they are not going to be able to live up to these. This is just Performative. But by the time they make a U turn on culture and on diversity and on flexibility, employees, you know that they would have already been engaged and agitated. So we're going to go to a different, uh, dynamic of what the talent market wants when the market is healthy. So those are two ways. And, uh, the third was that something's got to happen that's going to make this go really fast or give people the opportunity that they don't really need to rely on the job market in the employer. They can be entrepreneurs themselves, which was AI. So when in like November 2022, like when ChatGPT came in, I was like, okay, I now have enough data and also just my intuition that these three waves are going to collide now, which we've seen happen. So based on that, now, again, I could be completely wrong. But what I'm trying to share is like how my mental model was and living this through and taking that as okay, now take this. What would I want to be in? Will it be. Will this riskiest thing be being employed in a very cushy job, but losing my skills, my credentials, my value in the market, or going out there and taking a risk and playing this out and building something around this? Because the worst case, if I don't succeed, I would have skills that will make me eligible more for the job market. So I think that. So that's where what I mean is like looking at, ah, what's the place where the ball and the puck is going to be? You won't have perfect data, get some initial insights or gather intelligence, gather wisdom through other people, through your own testing, and then say, okay, I gotta make a decision. And that lived experience through that decision is going to teach you a lot more and make you eligible and in a highly volatile market. Sorry, very long answer to a question, but I would love to hear. Giselle, what's your take on this?

Speaker A: All good. I'm totally tracking you, except for maybe the puck and the cricket analogy, but I will try to go there with you maybe. So a few things that I heard from you that I wanted to underscore before our listeners is in terms of, you know, how do people stay ahead? And what I heard was, you know, get a read on the market. Where is the puck going? Uh, and you should make informed bets based on how you're seeing the marketplace take a risk. And the biggest downside of any of these would be potentially new learnings, which, from where I sit is a, uh, risk adjusted return and, uh, not really a huge downside, uh, and so when I think about what you shared, I think what I would add is a mental model around turning crisis into an opportunity. And I know you're a big Hollywood, Bollywood and sports geek and as you and now many of our listeners will know, I'm kind of an econ investor geek and you know, turning crisis into an opportunity. And the analogy is we're seeing that in the marketplace there is a lot of volatility that we are seeing and it's reflected in the market and the economy is, uh, not the stock market. But what I wanted to more so say is there's an opportunity for buyers and sellers and the job market is the same way and within volatility. It sounds counterintuitive, but it seems like the right time to actually make a risky bet because one day could be a great day, the other day could be a not so great day. But the fact that you are making a move in the market and ideally you would be taking a temperature on what's happening. And look, it's up to a follow up question you all may have is like, what do I take a temperature on? Right. Uh, well, you know your industry, you understand your role and I know you know this part, you know where you want to go next. And this is the time for you to take stock of that and then make moves or prepare to make the moves. Because as you said, Sujat, there's so many ways to do research now that we're not even available, uh, publicly or in or in a fast way. That was maybe five years ago. Even. So, um, you know, turn the crisis into an opportunity. Yeah, and, and I think the other thing would be you would be living under a rock or very much in denial if you think that we are going to correct. Like there will be a correction in that things will go back to some kind of normalcy. And I think that's the thing with innovation and change. Right. What we will change too, is never what it was before. And so, you know, keep bringing value, keep doing research and keep making bets, especially, especially on yourself.

Speaker B: Uh, so if I play that back, don't wait for correction, go do creation. So it's a creation versus correction. That's the territory that we're in. It is. You talked about resources to do research and gather quick intelligence so that you can make informed decision. Um, and you can, you can inform your intuition as well. Uh, even five weeks ago did not exist. Right. You have the, the deep search models that are coming and the agents that are coming that are publicly available for free. As well, right in your, in the lower, lowest tier, sort of like in all of these AI providers. And you can run it right now. It is. You have all the information available to you. Keeping back and then summarizing it. I think going back to the, the puck analogy, I think what you should be thinking about is look around the market, gather intelligence, see what the puck is happening, then ask yourself, you, what is it that you give a puck about? And then go and see, okay, if what is happening and what you really care about is there an opportunity. And then you know, if you have puck you capital gathered or you have like a Runway, go run with it. I know we are not seeing this from any entitlement. Like we all both have taken risks. Like immigrants that have taken risk. And if you come from an immigrant mentality, right? Everyone around, no, no, just yeah, you don't do that play the safest man is like, no, this is not the safest. We don't. We are. We know that to. You need to in this opportunity create something because else the decline, the situation is such in the market that even if you got like a marginal bump, when a correction happens, it is going to set you really, really way back. Right? What's that data from that we saw that those who are graduating or those who graduate college in a recession could really not catch up with those who were graduating in a very hot market long term. So, uh, there's this gap and I think this right now with what's happening with the job market, with what the AI play is coming into as well. From a productivity lens, you are, when you come back to a connected market, it's going to be completely different. You are better off going and creating something in this that leverages your assets, your knowledge and the situation of the market to leapfrog into something. Because even after that, if a correction happens, you will still be falling back down to a higher level. Uh, so create over correction, right?

Speaker A: I love it. Creation over correction. Speaking of assets, uh, let's talk about that. So how do people assess what they have to offer in a shifting job market?

Speaker B: Okay. Boom. It's. It's like a multi tiered answer, right? Depending on who is the person answering this question. But giving our audience. Let's start with, you know, let's say there three tiers. There's people who are. Who've had about 15 to 20 years of experience, uh, work experience under their belt. There are people who are somewhere in the middle, right? Like between 6 and I would say 10. And then the people who are early in their career, from like zero to living up to five. Right. Uh, so let's start with, like, if you are established as a leader in some domain, right? And you may have been, if you spent 10 or 20 years, probably in multiple domains, what your asset is, okay? Look, uh, at the experience of wisdom you've gained, right? The tenure that you've gained, that's a massive asset. AI can't beat that. The tenure that you have, what you've seen, what conversations you've been part of, what rooms you've been part of as well, right? So that's one. There's something around tenure. That's your asset. Uh, then there's the asset. Okay, what perspective have you gathered as a result of that tenure and what you did in that tenure? So not necessarily skills, but your perspective. And that perspective then, uh, applies to. Okay, uh, what are the skills right now? What skills, uh, translate into, from that perspective? Right? So we keep hearing this report from everywhere that it's about empathy and critical thinking and strategic foresight. Yeah, that comes from mileage. That comes from perspective. Built in that mileage, a, uh, lot of stuff learned the hard way. And then it's packaged into a model saying, here's my playbook, my model of how if I got a new situation and is, I would quickly convert my experience, my perspective into how should we go from X to Y? That's everyone's individual model. And then the fourth aspect, which is ignored upon and it'll head to the other tiers, is we know from data. Rob Cross is someone who's researched a lot around networks in my space of organizational network analytics, and tried to figure out, like, what, what. What's a common driver of leaders and people who grow fast in companies and keep growing, is that it's not what they know, it is who they know. And who they know is like the breadth and the strength of a network, because that defines the information you have, the intelligence you have, the wisdom that you have. So I think those are your four. If you come down to a lower tier and lower, not again from like, any priority perspective, but a tier in terms of tenure, where you are between, let's say five, five, six to 10 years of experience, you're sort of like, you've either become like a frontline manager or you're just good in your craft that you've done it enough that you now can just guide and teach others and get some money off from it. Uh, so you have less experience. Right? But, uh, are you building strong perspectives? And then are you Networking with people who are way ahead of you, maybe 10 to 20 years and trying to figure out that where would the market be if uh, I was in their stage, career stage and what would I need to learn from them right now so that I don't have to learn that same lesson. So I think again it's the mileage, the perspective built from that mileage and how do you convert that into a playbook. And then lastly the network and a lot of people who are in that five to 10 years, six to 10 years because the market was so bullish last couple of years, they have not had the need to network. They've networked to build connections but not see relationships and like networks that help you carry forward. Right. Paying it forward to that network as well. And then lastly is the early um, in career they may think they may not have the mileage. I think they have the life mileage right now because remember we did an episode on the class graduating in 2024. They have seen some of the most interesting times. Right. Those who graduated before 2024, just recently and those in 2024 they've had some unique life experiences and what they've witnessed in the world, that counts for something. You have had that perspective that probably a lot of others did not. The other tiers can't even relate to. And that is where this market is headed. You guys are going to be the dominant force in the workforce. Figure out how do you convert that into a sellable skill. What perspective do you have about the market that is that no one else does. And then lastly we know loneliness is a pandemic in Gen Z especially. It is like that's why we're seeing so many products coming out around building community Network is not only your savior, right. It is your ultimate weapon as well. So form communities, engage in communities, uh, you're going to thrive in communities as well. Those I think are those four assets uh different tiers and different career stages.

Speaker A: Mhm. It's really smart to look at the different tiers of experiences and uh, and as you share there they each have a unique way to think about career assets. And so essentially I think that the kind of the underscore is you're not starting with nothing if you're even if you're uh. I will add one practical thing around how do you know and how do you assess your, what you have to offer which is ask people. So it might be come in the form if Your company does 360 reviews, take advantage of that. But look, you don't need a fancy assessment system or to work in a big company. What you can do is, um, write this down, find one person to five people that you have worked for. So basically that have managed you, and find another one to five that you have managed. And then, so that's one and two and then three is find people that you've worked with, like, that you've partnered with, whether in your current role or in different. Maybe you spoke at an event or like Shujat wrote a book, which, congratulations, by the way.

Speaker B: Uh, and I contributed to a book. I was interviewed for a book. I've been interviewed for a few, but I was interviewed for a book.

Speaker A: So humble. So humble. Well, congratulations. Still huge. So those three types of people, someone who managed you, someone whom you manage, and someone that you worked with and partnered in a different capacity, and ask them this one question. What am I good at? And if you want something more fancy, it could be, you know, what are the three skills that you believe I am strong in? What are one to three things that you believe I can work on? And it could be as simple as a text message. Uh, and I know because I've done that before and so ask people.

Speaker B: Yeah. And you and I have done it for each other. Right. Long before when we started our entrepreneurship journey. I think just find people who can be honest and candid with you and then you trust them, respect them. Uh, and they also know that, uh, there's no two way judgment. There's two way learning. Right. From that exchange. There is, uh, I think I love what you said about like 360 and then asking people, texting. One thing is, as we're learning in our entrepreneurship journeys, that the audience tells you what your brand is. Right. The audience tells you what your offer is. So I would say look at what in your different networks. Right. Again, network being an asset. So all these assets talk to each other. Right. These assets are like, uh, I don't want to say the MBR M term, um, symbiotic and synergetic. But yeah, they have. There's a spillover effect across all these four aspects in your networks at work. Personal networks. Right. Even if, like, for a hobby, like sports. Right. Or if you do something for a hobby, you catch up with people. Just ask yourself why? What do people reach out to you for and why? And do they come repeatedly for it? And that will start to give you an idea that there's, uh, unknown skills and perspectives that you have, uh, that is probably coming out either because you thought about something and, or you spend enough time in rooms and in experiences that others have not had that you form that perspective. Uh, right. Unconsciously.

Speaker A: Agreed. So speaking of assets, uh, let's shift gears a little bit and get quite tactical. How important is reskilling? And maybe define that for us a little bit too. What is your definition on that and how important is it?

Speaker B: So I've thought about this word. Since when you ask a question, right? Um, I've been thinking about, like, what's the right word? Is it reskilling? Is it upskilling? Um, when we talked about, uh, our very first episode was about how do leaders embrace the shift in AI? And one of the things we talked about was this is like a year ago, right? So what we've learned playing with AI then as well is that the, uh, learning and unlearning, continuously learning and unlearning, uh, is going to be the skill. So there's no reskill or upskill. It is learning and unlearning. Eight years ago, when I remember grad school, I, uh, learned from a guest speaker saying, are, uh, you a learning and unlearning animal? And I realized that my thirst for, like, knowledge and then apply that knowledge, I'm like, yeah, that is great. And that ended up becoming. I put it up on my LinkedIn profile and I remember recruiters at some point asked me, what does that mean? So to your question, what is reskilling? I think it's not reskill. I think it's every, uh, couple of years you learn and unlearn things continuously, depending on what you're doing, what are you getting paid for and what in that situation, what is hot? You either need to do it very rapidly because things are shifting. So, for instance, let's say you are a, in analytics, you were a data analyst. You started off maybe early in the day, it was about data visualization. So you learned, let's say, visualization tools, power, bi, tableau, and it was basic SQL, right. Database pulls. But then more languages came in, and then more ways came in to do it faster, right? And then you had multiple options to choose from to produce any one output. And each company was playing with all those options, so you had to be good in all of them, right? So the faster it evolves, right, the faster you learn and unlearn. But the thing, the common thing is learning and unlearning. It is not reskilling, it is you. What's the next iteration of that learning and unlearning cycle that happens? And it is, it is crucial and if timing works out that you end up being in a radical shift in the market, right? Such as like AI, right? We go back from like horses moving to automobiles and the uh, you know, assembly, uh, the assembly line. We uh, look at the Internet, right? If you happen to be there and you apply this right there and then your, your potential to create exponential upside for you is amazing, right? A lot of the time people. So that's why I react to reskilling because I feel like it's like um, it has a lagging connotation to it which is that the thing has already happened. You're late to the game, your skills are already obsolete and you need to now go to reskill. That's fine. If that situation then you would call it reskilling. I think where we are right now, there's so much uncertainty of where these things are going to go. It is sort of like a level playing field for everyone. So right now it's just skilling. You need to get skilled. Like the next stage of skilling is here. If you are late to this game then you will have to get reskilled, right? And if you're further late, you may have to get upskilled completely. Where even what you brought to the table, your perspective, your networks are becoming obsolete.

Speaker A: Well, uh, you heard it here. We are coining the term skilling and because we're both ex management consultants, one of our core skill sets is actually new terminology and nomenclature. So just so proud of us for continuing that skill set. Skilling on that skill set. And I think maybe a longer discussion for later but I agree with you on the idea of whatever terminology we use. The idea of learning and iteration is so important and it reminds me of this story when you and I share an alma mater uh, in Deloitte and I did a lot of work in international tax and, and one of the hardest things in some industries at the time, especially for international tax implications for over 200 countries that a multinational company might be doing business in is um, is the literal, just regulations. There are so many of them and depending on the transactions they could just get multi layered complexities. And I remember asking one of the partners that I've worked with, I just, I mentioned, look, I always feel behind how do I get ahead? And also I was earlier on in my career so I was building all the kind of consulting skill sets on, you know, building effective communication skills, client relationship skills, including all the tactical technical skills that I actually you know, had to put on the slides and make a presentation on. And I'LL never forget what he mentioned. He said, look for highly regulated industries and especially for the, for the tax code. And this is for essentially most countries, they change a lot. And I said, I know, well, that's my problem. Like how do I keep up? And he said, actually that's kind of a good thing for you because you might feel like you're the rookie, but actually if you think about it, the tax codes are changing all the time and the regulations are changing all the time. You have an opportunity to learn it first and fast. So I have taken that as a huge learning. Just apply it everywhere. I learn everything first and fast. And so I think, you know, to, in addition to what you're saying, like we're going to call it skilling because we can do that, learn, unlearn and do it first and fast.

Speaker B: Yeah. And then, and, and you know, there is, um, we keep hearing these mantras in entrepreneurship. We're realizing, right, consistency is key. And then the more you do it, quantity leads to quality. Is that you gotta put in a lot more cycles in and you're gonna learn from each cycle, right? And I think, uh, in sitting in a corporate setting, in a job, unless your job, a lot of things have to come into play, like the right team, the right role, the right project that you will be constantly learning and unlearning. But majority of the case it's because corporate structures are designed for predictability that there's little, uh, these cycles happen, like they have a long tail, right. They'll normally happen after a couple of years, right. Maybe, if not at all in one generation. So constantly doing that, right? Asking yourself. I remember I was in a very cushy last recession. I just got lucky. I just built some skill set again from taking a risk that had gone to emerging economies and I'd learned supply chain in a, uh, space where the infrastructure did not exist. In helping a massive global brand like P and G think about global expansion. Came back to North America, uh, layoffs had happened, recession, right? I just got lucky that in a couple of weeks I got a job because I'd done cost and service optimization, right? And that was in demand right there. And then in there it was again a very cushy 8 to 4 job in logistics and distribution. From there I quickly shifted. I said, no, I want to keep learning. I went to one of the biggest retailers, Home Depot, and in there as well, we were doing a massive strategy project and you know, just the uh, dynamics of the industry I was in and just the group I was in. It catered really well to hire immigrants, but the privilege was still kept for people to act a certain way and for certain ethnicity, let's just say that. And nothing. Because from a company perspective, just the group I had to be and just happened to be that, you know, there's skills that I bring in, but there's a lot of skills I don't have, which is, you know, let's say sales and like, you know, communicating a certain way. There's certain, like networking events or hangouts that I just can't participate, being like a Muslim and ah, you know, young family and all of that. So, um, but I wanted to learn. And I had someone who's a junior that I was coaching, and they actually were really good in all of the networking and the social aspects. And they had decided that this is such a big asset for them. They're just going to go. And an opportunity came in that was a level above me. And they were approached for it because whoever sent it, they had a affinity for them. I, at that time was thinking of the longer game and was exploring, where else do I go with this as an immigrant? I can't be safe. I need to go and build something else. And so the person gets a role. And I, at that time, m. Actually consulting had reached out to me and strategy consulting, right? And there I got. I, I did not want to get into consulting, but when I saw like the, the ability to do cases and just the learning from it, I geeked out. I'm like, okay, worst case, I'll learn something. And I started applying those in a matter of weeks. You know, at that time, M, the consulting companies had given me, uh, I'll name it McKinsey. Especially at that time, I didn't get into McKinsey, but McKinsey gave me a coach because they were trying to help me, as an experienced hire, understand this, make it comfortable for me and make it equitable for me. So I started learning something. This is so fun. I started applying it to my actual job. I was doing a supply chain strategy project. And then I remember when I got that job offer and I decided to move to. I was moving to Deloitte. Deloitte is one of the best employers, and this is in Canada. Uh, not only in the US it's really good, but in Canada as one of the best employers. And those who understood what I was getting into, they were like, oh, wow. But the rest who were still thinking old school in a logistics industry, in transportation, this person I know as well just wanted to spend their Entire life just moving a truck from A to point B and that's it. And just be settled and do that for the rest of their life. The they said, oh, so sorry things did not work out for you. I'm like, what do you mean? And they were like, oh, someone junior than you got a role higher than you and seems like things didn't work out for you. And that was just such an energizing point because I was like, I love that you don't know what you're talking about.

Speaker A: Because.

Speaker B: And the question, uh, someone said to me is like, oh, you know, these cases that you solve to get into consulting, like doing M and A, doing like these valuations, you don't even have an MBA and we would not even know where to start. And I was like, neither did I. It was just five weeks ago. Someone taught me and I said, let's learn this skill. And I think this skill is going to be way more important than trying to just be relevant for that time in industry and just be submissive. So I think it's learning and unlearning that goes. And when I look back for a lot of people who, how their careers have played out, good luck. It hasn't played out really well for a lot of people in that industry. And now even more so we're what we're going to see with AI, where logistics and distribution is going to be heavily, heavily impacted.

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker B: So, you know, when I look back at it at that time, when I was making these shifts and radical shifts in my career and for those who were within those companies and thinking, you know what, maybe things are not working out for him, he's trying to move and learn something else and jump from one thing to another. I used to think in that, you know, conventional way how things, how careers were assumed to be, that they have to follow a standard path. They had to be safe. You had to climb up a ladder and stick within one lane and not try to switch many lanes frequently. I thought that the product of Shujak had a bug, that I would always be shifting and it'll be a black spot on me. But I'm thankful that I did that learning and unlearning journey because actually it turned it into a feature. Because now when we look back at it, the ability to navigate different places helped me become better at consulting. And then later on, as we think about the pivots, and even now with AI, you are more attuned to embracing shifts and also redefining yourself. And I think that's what it comes back to that. The skilling is about skilling of learning and unlearning and figuring out, you know, of course what you're passionate about. But what is the latest and where is this ball headed so that you are ahead of it before it gets there?

Speaker A: Good points. Speaking of staying ahead, there's an important topic that has been on people's minds since the, the rise of ChatGPT and its AI or artificial intelligence. And so as uh, we know today, it's reshaping industries. When we're thinking about reskilling, is AI the answer to everything?

Speaker B: Yeah, well, I mean, I'll uh, go back to our term, right? It's not reskilling or upskilling, it is just skilling. Right? Like so I think it comes back to no, AI is not the answer for everything. Do not make the mistake that your entire strategy needs to be an AI strategy. Get back to basics. What is your business strategy? And then as an individual, what is your strategy, career strategy or business strategy as a uh, one person product? And see where AI comes into it. Does it enhance it? Does it give you competitive advantage? Or does it make your, whatever your current assets are that you feel about yourself completely ineligible? So where AI can, it can automate processes, it can automate a lot of routine and stuff that where existing logic that we've put in and how we do work, what it can't replace is leadership. It can't replace empathy, it can't replace strategic thinking, emotional intelligence. End of the day, people need to be not managed, they need to be led. You know, we are under a loneliness epidemic, at least in the US that's officially declared. We see that more and more happening in the workplace. We see that about news reports that we're hearing about. And you are going to imagine the next generation that is going to be AI native people. If they miss out on connecting with other people at the human level, you're going to have even more leaders acquired who are able to tap into that. But imagine the generation that's coming as AI native when they become leaders and they're like, yeah, I don't know how to communicate, I don't know how to write because AI used to write for me. And I don't know how to talk to people when things get tough that I think cannot be replaced. Uh, and the more people become experts at that and make that their thing, it's less of a threat for them. But there's only a handful of careers and positions right, where you can do that. So how do you bring your human side and make that the value prop.

Speaker A: Mm. Uh-huh.

Speaker B: What do you think?

Speaker A: Well, I agree, I don't think that AI is the answer to everything. And to your point, on the human side, if I take a look at this from like 30,000 foot view and when I think about all of the digital transformations I've worked on in my career, uh, digital transformations meaning, you know, applying a technology to uh, the broad based businesses so that you can work smarter and more efficiently. And when uh, you think about the construct of what does it take to make that happen. Generally you're changing technology, you're changing the people aspect of it, how people work with the technology and who does what workload and scope of work. And then there's the processes, right? So the technology, people and processes. And in all of my experience, and there's data that shows uh, and reflects this, that the hardest part is around people, leadership and uh, defining roles and responsibilities. Which is why there's that statistic of 70 to 90% of Ah, these large scale investments in technology transformation, they fail in their objectives. Uh, it's not because the technology is bad, it's not because the people don't know how to use it or that we can't document processes. It's simply because it's complex to work in that system. Number one and number to the human element of applying a technology and in this case the artificial intelligence, that's always so important and should be a guiding principle. And I think the kind of key areas where you know, where does it matter most? It matters most around uh, you know, scoping the work. It matters most on making decisions about the strategy and where to go after, you know, implementing your transformation and that those ideas around decision making, strategic thinking and kind of the underlying uh, you know, really important skill around questioning, you know, is this the direction that, you know something that we discussed earlier when we started the podcast is that framework of, you know, should we could we like those are elements that are so core that you know, it's, it's high level, it's the human touch. And I'll bring a very specific example. So I've been learning a lot about you know, coding with AI and trying out different applications from ChatGPT to perplexity and more around the like building blocks like replit and cursor. And an interesting thing that I found as an observation is that super high level, they're really great at expanding the possibilities of being able to either extend your research or maybe look at things from a different lens or increase the Scope of work and, and which I think is a, is a positive thing. Cause it, it, it tells you like oh, these are the different lenses that we can review the analysis or different ways that we can attack or solve a problem. The problem with that is we have a finite time to do things. And uh, with all of those possibilities you always have to make a decision. And I found myself always having to kind of re. Scope and scope work with these products. And so which I found is a really interesting observation because the learning is you really do have to work together. It's kind working with a colleague, right, where it's uh, like you know, the big bold visionary and then, and then you actually have to you know, execute and build results. And then also two, you know, like uh, really kind of also forcing yourself to have like what are the guiding principles of this kind of work and what this, what strategic decisions do I do I need to make? Because how many times have you gone on maybe longer timeframe of chatting with ChatGPT on you know, on a topic, uh, um, and then not really having you know, a concrete outcome or decision, uh, after those, you know, great conversations or viewpoints. Right,

Speaker B: Agree. I just had an example yesterday. I was presenting tending to a class and helping them understand how do a framework on how they could look at jobs, different types of jobs and assess how much potential there is going to be of augmentation versus automation so that they can design what jobs or careers, how do they pursue, how do they design their future plans. And I had this framework. I thought that I'll share the framework slides and people will talk about it. But then I had a thought. I was like, you know what, it would be cool if I can make it interactive and outside of this class, broadly I just publish it. And many people can play with this who did not have the access to this event. So I asked Claude, I uploaded my slides and said can you create an interactive tool? And after two tries, I kid you not, it not only picked up the branding of my slides, it made a tool that does the entire assessment based on what I put in my slides into an interactive tool where you can play around, put a role in. It will tell you whether, how, uh, where would you be impacted, where you won't be impacted, what to think about, how to think about this role. And I was like, wow, now it doesn't replace me. It enhanced the effectiveness of what I could do. It improved the efficiency and it increased the possibilities of uh, how can I use this technology to change the way what I deliver is where to helping people scale, helping people understand how they, you know, can make most out of their lives and careers and stuff. Right. So can it come in and start doing, hey, AI is going to help you figure out what to do with your life and career? No, like you need that leadership. And one thing you mentioned, you mentioned the word complexity. And I was having this chat earlier today. One of my favorite frameworks during the pandemic I landed on to explain to people as we think about distributed work was complex versus complicated. Something complex is what is something that there's high uncertainty, it's completely new. We don't know where it's headed. You can't forecast or plan for it. You can't do forecasting anyways. For a lot of things in life, the best forecasting probably is like 12 months right out. But you can't even forecast anything on complexity. Complicated is something that it's a multi dimensional, multi variable problems, but they have existing solutions. It's just difficult for us to comprehend to how to integrate them. So it's a matter of putting some logic and trying to optimize and try to automate in a way that a human cannot. In the same way can help you take existing problem sets and use it to make it easy to run complicated things. But uncertainty, what is the uncertain stuff that AI can't do? Humans are uncertain, human emotions are uncertain. How do you motivate humans? How do you inspire them? What impact it has on them from a demographic perspective as technology changes their behavior and their behavior changes technology. That's uncertain, right? That's where the human aspect, that strategic thinking, strategic foresight, critical thinking, emotional intelligence, compassion, ability to influence people to move to a certain direction. That's where it comes in.

Speaker A: Agreed, Agreed. So what's the deal for now? What's our take? We're, we're immigrants, you know, in the uh, professional world, uh, here in the United States. What's the deal for immigrants? How, you know, do we have a different perspective? What's your take?

Speaker B: Uh, first of all, I love that we wrap up with this question and it is so relevant and personal to us and for to a lot of our listeners around. What's the deal for immigrants? There's some, we're in a situation where there are multifaceted disruptive forces are happening. And I'm not using disruption as like a cliche term. There is a imminent recession being triggered right now that we already see in the news. And the way the stock market is performing, we have AI coming in and impacting how we Think about careers. We have a social trend where people are no longer just thinking of a single career, they're thinking of careers as portfolio of multiple things that help them fulfill objectives of their lives. Economically. We know it's going to become difficult and difficult for uh, younger generations. It already is for the millennials and Gen Xers and Gen Z to create wealth unless they inherited wealth. It becomes difficult and difficult for them, at least in the U.S. so you have all of these aspects. So coming from an immigrant mentality, right? The immigrant mentality has always been to play the safe route. Right. I remember I talked about being unconventional. I did not follow that route. But still a part of me was, my conditioning was that I still need to think about playing it safe. Because in the circles I would roam around and they would say, hey, what are you doing? And I want to talk about a risk I'm taking. I would still have to be double guess myself because I know majority's reactions answer will be, well, okay, hopefully it works out. But like you should take the safer route. And then when it's not working out, they will remind you that. And that just generally happens if the mentality is to be safe. And what does safety mean? Right. In a, uh, probably a previous world it was be a doctor, be an engineer, accountant, go do something in business, don't do something else which is like arts related and go get a degree. Doesn't matter if that degree if, that, if college. If the world is telling you the college doesn't lead to jobs, no, you have to go to college and you have to go to a good college. We're seeing all of those things being questioned. The college may not have that much value from a job perspective. The jobs that we think hold a lot of value other than I would say medicine, like uh, where there's some hands on work, they may not hold a lot of value. Whereas being more arts oriented, liberal arts oriented, makes you more powerful in the world that's coming. So the deal for immigrants is to actually step back and say, okay, we've been following a set pattern of playing it safe and we've been passing that on to our next generation. It's not going to work out for us as well as for the next generation because the rules are changing very fast and the benefit we have right now thanks to social media, there's so much information out there that we did not have access to in previous generations. Watch, listen, read up. There's so many podcasts out there, right, where a lot of people who, people of privilege are Sharing their wisdom for free to people. Learn from that and realize, okay, where should we be headed? And from there, do I need to have a change in direction? Because the set old path of college and specific degrees in college, specific career paths is not going to work out. How do I enable my kids, right, and myself to take a risk and pursue something different? Because guess what? When the deception happens, those in the privileged networks get the benefit of it. It's those who don't have those networks, which is mostly immigrants are part of those networks, uh, are going to be left behind.

Speaker A: You know, this hits so close to home because like you said, the immigrant story is our story. And there's something that you mentioned that really struck a chord in that, um, you know, I would say, like, on average, the advice that we get from our parents, our elders, is that you, you know, you play the safe route, which I have found always to be very intriguing, because as immigrants, and particularly for, you know, our story, we left our country not by choice to pursue a better life. And what that meant is for my parents in particular, leaving their family, leaving their culture, leaving their jobs and leaving a country that they love. I mean, we love as a family so much. And if, if there isn't, uh, I just don't know any larger risk than that. And, But I understand why, you know, once we, you know, kind of settle down, why the kind of. The safe path is, excuse me, is attractive because. Because that's why we come to America, right? Or places like America where you, where you have the freedom, where you have safety, and then you just want to, like, live a, uh, live a great, decent life. So I, I understand the position. I also think it is, it's intriguing for that sheer fact of, you know, most of us come here by great, taking the greatest risk of, is to leave everything that we know and that we love behind for, uh, an undefined and unknown path. Um, and so what?

Speaker B: Absolutely.

Speaker A: So I, Yeah, I wanted to kind of share that because that really kind of struck a chord. And. And then the second thing that I thought was interesting that you mentioned is, yeah, just this idea that what happened historically and where we are today will, Will effectively be the same in the future. And, and I know in history there's like, there's lots of changes. I think we even covered it in one of our, our podcasts around like, change and uncertainty. Like on, like, you should, um, you should expect uncertainty. But I think when I think about like, the particularly, like, workforce and professional development, like the statistic that 20% of jobs in you know, the next two years will change. That is not only an economic trend, that is a, it's a leadership signal. It is a professional life signal. And it feels like a doomsday scenario in many ways. Right. I think if you couple it with, you know, like, at least here in the United States, it's taking uh, a longer time to land new roles. Uh, there aren't, you know, much kind of hiring or restructuring in different ways. People are not leaving their jobs. And so now I often kind of find, you know, in, in my line of work, like coaching, you know, other leaders and aspiring leaders, there is a question that people often ask, which is, with all of this happenings, how can I make sure to continue to stay relevant and to always be in a position of strength? And which I want to pose as a question for you. And I also want to. I've been thinking about that a lot and not only for you know, my clients and for uh, like, you know, individual clients, companies, but also for myself. It completely makes sense. Right? Because you and I just. Because we do a podcast on you know, kind of assessing and synthesizing things that are happening. We are also experience it. So I wanted to, to share like three things that uh, I hope and what I've observed that kind of test that it's like, stands a test of time in terms of professional development. And I think that the first one is you move with intention, meaning whether it's a, it's an up year or a down year, whether you are looking for your next move or getting promoted or whatever that case may be, you should always be looking for a job or always be, you know, kind of looking for that next thing. Uh, and then the second thing is with respect to career and professional goals, you treat it like it's a strategic play. So what does that mean? You want to be thinking about core questions around where do I see myself, where do I aim to go, what do I need to believe in order to get there and how do I position myself to make that belief come true? And I think the third thing is to build career changing relationships. For instance, like mine and yours. Who would have, who would have known that, you know, two people from completely different worlds at LinkedIn meet in an AI class and then fast forward, I think like over six years later now we've helped each other in so many career changing and life changing ways. And um, and so I think that is the, and I think the myth is, you know, that careers are like moving up is a solo effort. And so I think to all our listeners, specifically for those of us who are immigrants, who are so used to striving, so used to problem solving, uh, on our own or maybe in our nuclear friends and family circles. Professional development is a team sport. And so go out there and find your teammates.

Speaker B: Wow, I love those three. Um, I can relate to them. Uh, and I would tweak mine. I would tweak. Add some words to tweak mine to make like. But this will remain within the same three umbrella that you said. The first one. You said, move with intention. Good year or bad year, you should be looking for a job. I remember in the last recession came, I moved. I just gotten married, had to file my wife's visa paperwork. I just moved back to Canada and the recession had happened. I was, you know, squatting a place with friends who had also lost their jobs. Some of them were doing valet parking. They were like, you know, highly CFAs, MBAs, and also trying to make sure that they can, you know, apply for jobs. Parallel. And here's I am. I show up and I'm sort of living in their living room on a mattress, and I'm like, all right, I don't know if I'm going to get a job. And I got lucky just because of the work I'd done in emerging economies around cost optimization and service optimization. I got a job within few weeks of like, hey, we need someone to reduce cost because we have a recession. So that skill set helped and I settled in. Good job, helped me get, move my, uh, weight and build up some wealth so that, um, when, uh, my wife moves in, it's settled. But I shifted a job after a year. And people are like, listen, people don't have a job, there's a session. Canada is highly, highly immigrant mentality of like, you should be just grateful and not be applying for the jobs. I'm like, I've just been there. I just got lucky that I got this job and I know my skill got me this job. I need to make sure I keep on improving these skills because the, um, market M is moving really fast, right? So I shifted jobs. And that built a muscle, which you said, you know, doesn't matter if it's a good year or a bad year, especially on a bad year. One of the mentors had told me, he said, you know, I used to make sure that I used to have an offer available every quarter. Not because I'm going to take that offer, but because I want to make sure that I know what my value is. And if I'm becoming irrelevant because especially as immigrants, right. We don't have access to a lot of networks, especially if there's new to a country who will tell you where the market forces are headed now you do with so much available on YouTube and like social media. So I love the move and intention. What I would tweak it is move with intention and move with intention. Move for meaning. So move with intention, with purpose and try to make sure that whatever adds meaning to your life, whether there is better skills financially. Right. Maybe you're now you have some privilege, you want to do something for a better work life balance, do that. Second, you said strategic play, right? Always have a strategic play. I would say only add to that is your strategy is making a choice what you're going to say yes to and what you're going to say no to. And a lot of the times, you know, we see that in companies as well. They will make us a strategy that will not be clear that hey, what are we? Not anymore. It'll just say what are we? But then it includes everything else as well. And the strategic play involves every year asking, hey, what am I not going to be doing? So that I actually stay focused on what I want to be adding. I Naval Ravikant, right. I uh, had a recent interview and he shared something about happiness, seeing what you don't desire. So being, knowing what you do not desire is also a part of happiness, not just trying to attain what you do desire. And then lastly you said career changing relationships. I would say life changing relationships, embrace relationship. This is a life changing relationship that we built. Careers, uh, are part of it. But go for life changing relationships. They are career changing transactions. They should always be thankful and always be great, but they're short lived. Make sure if you find a life changing relationship, never let go of it.

Speaker A: Mhm.

Speaker B: And do a podcast with them.

Speaker A: Yes indeed.

Speaker B: On that note, on that note, I would say just an update to our, uh, listeners as well. Right. This was like an episode we did where we looked at, you know, questions that we got, feedback that we got. And we're headed into a very interesting time now in 2025. So there's a lot, uh, you know, interesting changes coming from our side as well. Uh, based on your feedback, based on the demand for us to do more and do different formats around this as well. There are more exciting news coming up from our end, so stay tuned till then. Goodbye and keep uh, listening.

Speaker A: All right, till next time.

Speaker B: All till next time.

Speaker A: Sam.