What Effective Leadership Looks Like in an AI-Driven Workplace with Maren Perry

Speaker A: This is Talent in the Age of AI, the podcast, helping leaders navigate what AI means for their people, their culture and their future. We talk with the thinkers and practitioners shaping how we work, learn and lead and what it takes to keep talent growing in a world that's constantly changing. We create, curate, and connect the insights and the community that helps leaders build AI confidence in themselves and in their teams. Let's dive in. Hello and welcome to the Talent in the Age of AI podcast, the fastest growing resource in our industry today. What we provide is access to real world, real time examples of what's working now to help talent be productive and succeed with AI on board. And we all know AI is here to stay. It's a speeding train and it's just time to hop on. And if there's anyone out there who's reticent to do so. The reason I bring you the guest I do is to give you confidence and, uh, steps to take to incorporate AI into your everyday processes, to change out processes and policies to bring AI on board for your talent. I'm, um, so pleased to be working with Brianna Jovan, who owns what's Good Production. She's our producer of this podcast and she keeps me me going and makes us look good for this. So thank you to our sponsor, what's Good Productions and Brianna Jovan. And now I'm so pleased to introduce you to our special guest today, Maren Perry. She is the founder and CEO of Arden Coaching. She can tell us why it's named that in a minute, but I love that name. And they're a leadership development and executive coaching firm. She has 45 or more coaches around the globe, hub cities in the United States. And I'm just so happy for her success as a fellow female owned business person. And so she's going to tell us how she's finding that AI is actually adopted and working out there today. That's exactly why she's on our show. So, Maren, welcome and thank you so much for spending your valuable time with us today.

Speaker B: Oh, uh, thank you, Wendy. I'm pleased to be here.

Speaker A: Tell me about Arden. Why did you name it that?

Speaker B: Oh, gosh. Well, 20 years ago, I named it Arden because it comes from the Forest of Arden in Shakespeare's as yous Like It. It's one of my favorite Shakespeare plays. Everyone goes into the Forest of Arden and comes out transformed in, uh, one way or another over the course of the play. And I thought it was an apt metaphor for what we expect out of coaching and development.

Speaker A: I really like that. I'm a marketer by trade and a writer, a communicator, so just. I love the meaning as opposed to. Well, I kind of like the sound of the word, you know, it's pretty cool. And wow. Transformation. How could you have seen 20 years ago that here we would be today in one of the greatest times of transformation in all of our human being, but most particularly in this land of talent development, human resources, etcetera, Executive coaching. It's just time for everyone to tap into their, uh, courage to accept transformation as necessary to move on to the next state of being. In this day and age,

Speaker B: indeed. I think it is incredible, the precipice that we find ourselves on. You know, my. My grandmother lived to be 106, nearly 106, and I asked her one time what the greatest invention was of her lifetime. And I was sure she was going to say, you know, the television, the car, uh, the computer. And she actually said, the refrigerator. I thought, of course she did, because having fresh food is important. But I think that the, the precipice that we're on now will be what we probably say if someone asks us, you know, 50 years from now, what was the most significant turning point in terms of inventions in our lifetime. I really think that this is a remarkable time.

Speaker A: Yes. My grandfather lived to 103, born in 1900, and I used to, when he was, like, 90, we said, grandpa, you should get a computer. He goes, oh, no, I'm too old. And then lived beyond that. But like, as your grandmother, we can only imagine the changes. They were slower coming. Things are barreling at us faster and faster and faster. And so that's why I have guests on the podcast that talk about their clients who are waiting to see. I just don't think there's any waiting. And again, I use that old Western movie analogy, that train coming by, and there's one train car with the door open. You know, just. You gotta hop on it and hope for the best. But it's time. Get on board. Everyone out there has the ability to be working with AI by their cell phones. The smartest computers we carry around in our pockets. And there are still organizations that are having people stand down on using AI at work, which is inane, right? Because they are. One of our guests were women who own, uh, Maven Collective, and they work with women who are statistically slower to adopt AI than men in the workplace because women think it's cheating. And there are a lot of impressions, ideas that I think we have to bust to say, you can't be intimidated by it. Even if you start slow with a grocery list or something like that, it's just time. And so how long have your best clients been involved and had the courage to take that step across the chasm of change?

Speaker B: Oh, gosh, I think that that really varies. It certainly has sped up over the past year. I think those who were experimenting with grocery lists, you know, two plus years ago didn't talk about it as much. I think in the last 18 months, it is the only thing anyone can talk about and the only thing appearing in my inbox is, you know, workshops on AI, uh, integrating AI. And I think that that's common for all of us. It is the topic, it is what people are working with and it touches everything. And so of course we're getting inundated with it, you know, from the grocery list to work to, you know, our social circles, because it is the thing that's happening. By the time this airs, even if that is five minutes from now, something else will have changed.

Speaker A: I hear you. When we talked, we were briefing about this, you said, you know, your spare of clients is afraid and they're really in the game. Will you give us a couple examples of that? Because I love that that's your experience. I will tell you from other guests and our audience, it's not. And so I think to highlight those with that courage and conviction and confidence is, is exactly why we're here today. So what is it about them that made them do it and how are they using it in the workplace today, especially in leadership development?

Speaker B: Yes, I think that the leadership development space specifically is perhaps slower than, uh, some of our clients operationally. I would say that in coaching and leadership development, there is a reticence to replace the human aspect and the creativity and the connection that comes with human to human contact. Now, I would say that in leadership development, we are all using it behind the scenes, right? It is great for research. It is great for, you know, sending out hundreds of surveys to our clients or getting feedback or aggregating data that is incredibly useful. But we still sit across from our clients and especially our senior clients one on one. There is no CEO who wants an AI coach. But, uh, in terms of people who are, well, yes, I think that there are, there are some coaching products out there that are helpful. This is a whole other conversation. But there are definitely organizations that are integrating it at some level. It's typically at a lower level in the organization. You know, for just in time, like, how do I write this email better? Can you revise this phrasing or something at a really basic level, sometimes that's great on the spot available help. But in terms of how our clients are using it across the board, I think it's primarily operationally. You know, how are they revising their core offerings, their interactions with their clients, their data collection, their research, their administrative functions to incorporate AI? I think those at the forefront are incorporating programs and experimenting because what you're using today will not be what you're using six months from now or two years from now. I don't think that that train is one train. I think it's about 75 trains. And you know, you have to hop on a train, but you're going to change trains, you're going to do that crazy, you know, stuntman between us.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So I think those that are courageous and at the forefront are implementing it now with the understanding that they have to be nimble, that they have to be able to change trains midstream and be willing to say, you know what, there's a better one or a faster one or a more specific one coming along.

Speaker A: Well, I really appreciate that. It's just that this start, right?

Speaker B: Ah, the start.

Speaker A: Mhm. One of the things, and the truth

Speaker B: is that the talent is using it anyway.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Even if you don't have something that you have rolled out that has gone through compliance and legal and approval, even if you don't have that, your people are using it anyway. And so the question is, can the leaders keep up with what their talent wants to use and how they want to use it? And can they consolidate, regulate, keep tabs on and make sure that the confidentiality and the compliance is in place so that people aren't going rogue and using 75 different programs and putting their clients data at risk.

Speaker A: I hear you. And you know, they're inadvertently maybe entering a database or something out there in two cloud. And then the train is. Oh my God, the train.

Speaker B: 100%. The train is up the stage, absolutely happening.

Speaker A: Uh, and even when we've talked with other guests before, so people rely on agents through AI and even boards of directors. So you talk about an executive maybe not wanting an AI coach. Maybe some are fine. They build a really cool board of directors that includes Warren Buffett and all the people that they admire. What would you do? What would you help me do? But my question of you, it gets down to ethics policy, the handbook. Uh, poor HR has so many things to modify. So when I have a good.

Speaker B: If they didn't have enough already.

Speaker A: Right, right. If they didn't have enough. I mean, they're regulatory world. So when I have an agency of 10 people helping me and they're all AI agents, when I leave, can I take my agents with me and all their knowledge? You know, there's all kinds of considerations there. And by the way, you can say I can't, but it's there. It's on my laptop or my world. So it is a whole new world. And I think that it's really exciting. Tell me about the psyche of maybe one of your clients that you've talked to and why she said, maren, we're going to adopt this, and it was two years ago or something. And she said, can you help me do it? Or did you have an example like that?

Speaker B: You know, we are not working with our clients on that operational level. You know, we, we work with them more on the fallout of, uh, what happens when they have or have not adopted and how are they going to get their team align behind something that went well or didn't go well. So we're working with them on, on that aspect of it. But in terms of, you know, what they chose or when they chose, those operational decisions are certainly on their plate and not ours. But I will say that what we experience with a lot of our leaders right now is burnout, is just exhaustion from having to keep up with so much or enough of AI. They can't be experts, right? They're subject matter expert. It's something else, right? But what I find is that not enough organizations have an AI expert that is thoroughly integrated into all the operations and all of the departments to knowledgeably assist them on a granular level. That's where I think a lot of organizations are at least currently weak. Again, this could change in five minutes. But I think that so many of our leaders are being tasked with staying enough up to date that they can support their team, that they can make decisions, that they can figure out which agents their team is going to be using, where they do and don't want that. And they have to know enough to make good decisions. And I think that information overload, that decision making fatigue is really tough on our clients currently.

Speaker A: I think that's very insightful. So I own a marketing company and the key to our success was what our clients acknowledged. I think you know our business as well as we do. To which I said, well, how could I possibly market for you if I don't? I, um, am assuming you and your 45 coaches don't just go in and do a cookie cutter leadership development plan for every Business, you get to know that business, what do they need, what are they working on, what's their productivity, KPI, etc. So here's the rub. I have a two sided idea to share with you. I think companies, the job descriptions I've seen out there are for AI managers and they think it's kind of like when social media was new. We all hired someone young, maybe still in college or 22 or something because well, the young ones know how to do it and I'm not. I love your insight that we probably need a more seasoned manager level person that has been around the block. Larry Durham is a guest on a recent podcast and he wrote this digital book called the Coming Judgment Crisis or gap. And you and I briefed about this. But when you haven't had the opportunity to start in an organization and observe and hear how people react in a meeting. I remember when I was a young one starting out, you know, number one, you didn't deem to think that you should open your mouth in a meeting. And I don't think that this generation may be like that as much today. But you listened and I would leave and think how did my boss know what wasn't said? You know, they knew what wasn't said and they knew what was around the corner. And uh, that is only derived from real world experience. I think AI can guess what might happen. But I like your thought that you maybe need someone who understands that her job is to get to know the business really well, all the departments, the divisions, the KPIs, and then say, okay team, here's how we're going to use AI for the next six months and anyway. Or um, well, something like that. Right.

Speaker B: I think we need both. You absolutely need people who are AI natives.

Speaker A: Right, right.

Speaker B: That they, that they just. My son got a watch, he's eight, he got a watch yesterday. It has all kinds of capability, does not have any communicating capability, but he programmed it and figured it out in, you know, 30 minutes, sitting there with it, no instructions, just figuring it out now. It's pretty intuitive setup, but still it required nothing from him. So I think we do need in our organizations the people for whom it is natural, for whom it is native, and who will be the next generation who will use it 10 and 20 years from now in our companies. But the discernment is, I think a really important challenge for AI and how we integrate it in an ethical way and, and in a way that answers the questions that you started to pose. You know, does someone get to take their agent with them? Well, that depends on how we set it up from the beginning. So we have to be thoughtful on the way in. And of course we don't know what we're moving into. We don't know what it holds, just like we didn't know what it held when, you know, all of this personal computing started. So I think the, the skills of leading through uncertainty are being called on to, uh, an enormous degree right now. And if you are, if one is unable to navigate that with flexibility, with resilience, with impeccable communication, then those are the people who will suffer through this ever evolving challenge.

Speaker A: A strategic brain and some creativity in there. And then again, knowing your organization, how does it fit with that, uh, us. I really appreciate what you said about the C level leaders are exhausted. You know, in the past I would go to conferences and one thing that stuck with me again because I'm a marketer, is CEOs have brought problems all day long to solve and what they'd love is an idea. You know, the valuable employee is the one that comes and goes. I don't know if this is out of whack or something, but I have this idea because I'm seeing what's going on on the line or something. So now you, you add exponentially to the burden of making decisions based on AI and leading. And your organization needs you to lead. So just as the personal computer was going to save us a whole bunch of time, right? And all we do, it's like Mercury. We just fill in and we want more emails or we get more things like that and we decide more to do. How can we use AI as a tool in organizations to allow breathing room and strategy ideation to move organizations forward? Mhm.

Speaker B: What a great question. I love that. I think it's a constant challenge with any innovation because I think you're right. We will fill that time. We quote, unquote, work. We say 8, but 10, 12, however many hours a day we work and we will fill that time. And when our tools become more efficient, then that time is even more packed. I don't think that people substitute like, oh, my agent is going, you know, my AI agent is going to take care of that for me. So now I can go read a strategy book, right? I don't think that that is how most people complement the time that AI or any tool is saving them. So how can we do that? I think it's a constant human challenge, but it does take leadership to set that standard. I think that it is too seductive and too seemingly required to spend all of our time with our heads down and I think more of us leaders and throughout all of the talent in an organization, we could spend more time with our heads up and looking towards the future and at the patterns. Ah, you mentioned it for AI previously. It looks at patterns from, albeit everything that has already been done.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: What is coming. It is predictive, but it's predictive based on the past.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: And perhaps that will change in the future. Again like five minutes from now we could have, you know, that does something different. But at uh, least currently the predominant models that people are using are the large language models and those are predictive, but predictive based on the most common previous response.

Speaker A: I want to pick that back up. We're going to stop for a second to infuse an ad here.

Speaker C: AI isn't just coming, it's here. But for HR&L and D leaders, the real challenge isn't the technology. It's translating AI into workforce capability and leadership behavior. At Talent in the age of AI, we center, uh, everything around one question. So what, what does AI actually mean for how you develop people and prepare your organization? Don't just react to change. Lead it. Become a member. Today@talentintheageofai.com thank you very much.

Speaker A: We're back with my very interesting, intriguing guest, Maren Perry, the founder and CEO of Arden Coaching, where they provide learning and development and executive coaching throughout the globe via uh, hub offices in the United States. So Maren, we were talking about, I'm going to say toiling. Okay. That's my theme for this, this part I think we're talking about. There's going to be, there could be the opportunity could be for freed up time. When you use an AI agent, you as a human could have some time to ruminate, to strategize, to actually read a book, that one thing. But will people actually do it in? One of my suppositions is that for years maybe since the industrial revolution, it's not been okay to toil, to be perceived as not working. And you know, I come from a world where we recorded every 15 minutes of time and it scared my employees that they couldn't fill it, you know, and, and sometimes they couldn't because maybe I had a computer programmer, we didn't need him all the time. I wasn't going to fire him because he could only fill 20 hours of a 40 hour week. It informed my talent pool. But what if, do you think with AI organizations could ever go toward quiet time?

Speaker B: You know, globally there are organizations that Do. Right. There are organizations that have nap time, restorative time restoration time where it's built in to the day because the science behind that is clear that it actually does give your brain a fresh start in a lot of ways and allows you to have better decision making capability, et cetera, et cetera. Right. The cognitive science behind it is relatively clear. But I think in the United States we do have a penchant for hard work that we are seen as the hard working, diligent, committed crew. And I think that overall not every company has this culture, but I think it is a dominant culture so much that I think sometimes you were talking about women not adopting AI previously. I think sometimes women are in the trap of believing that their hard work will be recognized for promotion rather than their developmental of their development of others or their strategic thinking. Right. That they become the person who is so good at doing the work that they are too priceless to promote because they do the actual work and that has to get done. So I didn't mean to take us off track.

Speaker A: It's a good track. It's smart work versus hard work and I we had the great fortune to speak to the hear from the head of our publicly held power district here in Omaha, Nebraska and he tries to be very aware of women's work and it we are going on a different bent, but it is about women's adoption in lower numbers than men's adoption of AI he said, you know, they were going to have a birthday celebration. And he. But it was on zoom or something. But he said raise your. Keep your camera on if you know where the cake cutter is in the break room. And it was women who kept their cameras on. And it's so off topic, but I just want to interject that. So then he really made a point of saying let's have everybody kind of know and help out where and when possible. But women make up a good portion of our workforce, 50% of our population, and we make almost all buying decisions in American households. Even cars and trucks were greatly involved. So I think we should really encourage in organizations, not only women's adoption and maybe even working with Maven Collective to understand how do you begin to do that when you're setting all these policies and procedures? Let's not forget people adopt at different levels. Out of myth story back to what you just said, that if I'm perceived as cheating or I leave at 3, I'm not dedicated. But we need to start looking at the product kicked out from every person and that's their Value is the productivity that contributes to business goals. Maybe with a bent for how you got there so that it's true, accurate, real, relevant, but not so much the tool you used.

Speaker B: I don't think they're unrelated. I mean, I think that a lot of the science says that women are wired for relationship. Right. These are huge generalizations. If just we can forgive that incredible bias. But that if that is true, it makes sense that AI is less readily adopted. Right. Because it will never be the same. Even though my AI is sycophantic and thinks I'm the best thing since sliced bread and I have great ideas, it will never be the same for me to hear from my AI that it was a great idea than someone I respect looking me in the eye and saying, I never thought of it that way. That that is really important and insightful. That's going to mean so much more to me as a human being. Because we are human beings, we are having a human experience. And I believe that AI will be a tool that will dominate in a lot of ways and perhaps the pendulum will then swing back to us valuing even more the human relationships. Because you will not get that in the same way from AI. And so to bring it back to women in the workplace and what is valued, I think that the eventual pendulum swing post, everybody's adopted it because you don't have a choice. Right. Well, we'll come back to the value of who is good at the part that isn't AI because AI will be ubiquitous. AI will be available to everybody. It will be a neutralizing factor. So who has something beyond that, who can offer something more than what everyone else can get? Right. On their cell phone.

Speaker A: It's. That's the error. We won't even say the word AI because it will just be life. Right, But I think what you just

Speaker B: said in the same way that we say phone, but it's the last thing we use it for. Right, Right.

Speaker A: And we don't. And we don't dial it. Uh, you know, that's a leaving.

Speaker B: Exactly.

Speaker A: But it kind of goes back to my story of being a young woman in business, watching my boss know what wasn't said or glean from what was said. The real, the real gem. So this human that you're talking about is the one that can take all the agents, all the AI input, but then kind of discern. Okay, here's back to your point. AI is harvesting what's out there already. And it can be predictive, but it prediction needs some human intervention to go. I'VE been down that road before. I know what's around that corner. I don't think that's going to be right. So the good news for people is everybody hasn't lost their job. And I think the sooner organizations help their talent embrace, adopt and use AI confidently within the parameters of how they want them to use it, the better those companies will be. There's no ostriches allowed here, Maren. There just can't be.

Speaker B: You get run over by that train.

Speaker A: Well, and you made me think, will there be a day where a company has no humans?

Speaker B: Oh, they're here.

Speaker A: They are.

Speaker B: I mean, it's not mine, it's not yours, and it's not most companies. But I know someone who single handedly, as a woman business owner, runs three companies alone with only AI agents.

Speaker A: Yes, but she's still the human running it.

Speaker B: She is one person. Yes, but that's true. She is one person running three multi million dollar organizations.

Speaker A: Wow.

Speaker B: With just AI. I mean, I'm not saying she sleeps a lot, but. But it's still only one for three companies, which is insane.

Speaker A: That is, that's great because my. You made me think about that. So humans, we want purpose. And especially when we're in the workforce, we want to be productive. And back to your point, we want to make a difference. And so if there isn't a place to aspire to or a next level job or a lateral level job, where will we be? And so we should continue to aspire to lead in an organization with the value of strategy and AI under our belt.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker B: Well, Maslow's M hierarchy will say that purpose is a high up on the hierarchy, the scale priority. And it is something that people value. And we know from all the happiness research, Right, that is something that lends itself to a higher degree of happiness. I think people will still seek it at work and we're going to need to provide that to the humans that work with us. I think that that will not go away. What that looks like will change how we interact with AI employees and human employees. We will need multiple skill sets. Some people will be good at one, some people will be good at others. Just like some people are now good at, you know, working with the technical and the computer and on the manufacturing line. And some people are better working in sales and communication and marketing. So there will be, I believe, a variety of skill sets needed. But I really do believe, even if it is a pendulum swing that doesn't happen for a while, that the, the human interaction will be key because we are humans. We designed AI.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: But we designed it because it's part of our human journey.

Speaker A: Yeah. And so even if it's not like great purpose, I think people are more satisfied when they at least feel like their time was worth it. And so, you know, showing up Mav's love, that's a good example. But just to don't. You don't want to show up and back to toil and feel like you're just slogging to get a paycheck in the end. So I don't know, I feel, I feel like you want to be valued and your, your time is valuable. You made me think too. You know, we use Emergenetics. It's like DISC and Gallup. I wonder how those models will change or the um, outcome of taking those assessments will change and it change to indicate that you'd be a very good person to work with agents and determine strategy because of your skills.

Speaker B: Well, we'll have to reconvene in five years, have a conversation about that.

Speaker A: We'll reach out to the creator of DISC and say, what do you think? So, well, this has just been such a delightful kind of. We're pondering what ifs here exactly while we apply what is happening. And I love your realism and your optimism and it was so refreshing briefing with you because you have, you have a lot of optimism and examples of people that get it that AI is here to stay. And it's time to, I'll say it one more time, jump on one of your many trains at the train station. So is there anything else you'd like to add today?

Speaker B: Gosh, I think that for me the biggest opportunity we have here is maybe the part that we're not so good at yet, which is using AI to supplement the human experience and read that book or think about the strategy and to use it, not to just toil more. Right. We don't need to take our 10 hour day and make it a 14 hour day. Ultimately, I don't think that that serves any organization because you still have, at least currently most organizations still have human beings in those chairs and they do have needs that are not the same as AI. They cannot work the same way or the same hours and feel valued and purposeful.

Speaker A: I really appreciate that. Uh, and I so appreciate your time today. My guest is Maren Perry. She's the founder and CEO of Arden Coaching and that can be found at ardencoaching.com and you can reach out to Maren on her site and see more about what she's doing across the globe, and I'm just so grateful for your time today. Maren. Thank you for being with us.

Speaker B: Thank you for the great conversation. Wendy, Such a pleasure to be here. Thank you for all your work.

Speaker A: Thanks for listening to Talent in the Age of AI. If this conversation gave you new ways to grow in your own work and to better support your people, follow the show and share it with others in your HR and Talent Network members get even more full episode, uh, transcripts, extended show notes, um, and companion resources to help you put these insights into action. Learn more and join us at talentintheageofai.com we're here to help leaders create, curate, and connect what's needed to build tomorrow's workforce today. See you next time.