The Modern People Leader: Forward-Thinking HR

Thomas Forstner, VP of People and Talent at Juro, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about building an AI-native company, why HR should own workflows not just the workforce, and how people teams must evolve from playbook followers to visionary architects of the modern org. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Get yo...

Helen Russell, Chief People Officer at HubSpot, joined us on The Modern People Leader.  We talked about how HubSpot is fostering an AI-first culture, why belonging is so important right now, and what HR leaders can do to move fast without losing their humanity. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Get your free 30-day Synthesia account . 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Request a demo of Ch...

Lenke Taylor joined us on The Modern People Leader to talk about her path from engineering to HR, and what it means to be a true business partner. We discussed how HR can lead alongside CEOs and CFOs, building high-impact teams, and how working in Europe has shaped her leadership approach. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . MPL Li...

We were joined by people leaders from Glassdoor, Asana, and Gusto. We talked about the fragmented burnout and how it’s hitting people differently, how performance expectations have shifted in the last 6-12 months, and more. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . MPL Links: 🔗 Buy your ticket for MPL Live New York . 🔗 Go sign up for M...

Jessica Zwaan joined us again to unpack the metrics that actually matter in HR today. We talked about the three buckets of metrics every People Leader should use, why the RANS test is a better way to measure engagement, and the one metric to rule them all (ELTV:CAC).   ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Re...

Frieda Möcker, Head of People & Culture at Sastrify, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about the first steps she took to treat HR more like a product, how her team does sprint planning, and why she prefers “NCTs” over OKRs. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team ....

Tiffany Stevenson (Former CPO, WeightWatchers), Jennifer Rettig (CPO, Pendo.io), and Kelli Dragovich (4x CHRO & Co-host of HR Heretics), joined us for MPL Live in San Francisco. We talked about the pressure HR leaders are under, what CEOs are really thinking, and how we can reimagine performance with simpler systems, clearer expectations, and more human conversations. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 G...

Jessica Zwaan joined us again on The Modern People Leader to break down how to hire for a people ops as a product team. She shared the 5 core skillsets needed, the importance of t-shaped talent, and how to use case studies to spot product thinking in HR Candidates. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Go book your next offsite wi...

Matt McFarlane and Haris Ikram joined us for a live session to break down everything modern HR leaders need to know about compensation—from philosophy and strategy to pay transparency and AI tools. Together, they shared a forward-thinking playbook for tackling merit cycles, aligning job architecture, and driving better employee experiences through data and design. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Sign up f...

Abby Brennan joined us on The Modern People Leader. We discussed the power of ONA as the “shadow org chart,” how it reveals hidden influencers, and why it may be key to building smarter, more connected teams in the age of AI. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Get in contact with the Career Sandwich team . 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . MPL Links: 🔗 Buy...

Jessica Zwaan joined us again on The Modern People Leader to unpack how to structure a people ops as a product team. She shared four ways to build an HR squad, how to use a spider diagram for squad design, and why it’s smart to pilot just one squad first. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . MPL Links: 🔗 Buy your ticket for MPL...

Bryan Power, Head of People at Nextdoor, joined us on The Modern People Leader.  We talked about how the company is navigating its “third era” under the return of co-founder Nirav Tolia. We explored “The Founders Mentality”, embracing an owner’s mindset, and Nextdoor’s AI bootcamp. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Downloa...

Jessica Zwaan, COO at Talentful and author of Built for People ,  joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about “human ops” versus “people ops”, the sprint planning process for her people team, and how nobody gets people ops as a product 100% right (and that’s ok). ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Download the State of Teams 2025 Report from Atlassian . 🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Expe...

Taylor Bradley, VP of Talent Strategy and Success at Turing, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about why every HR team needs to create an AI “prompt pantry”, how Turing “AI’d” their way out of onboarding 800 employees in five days, and how to build AI workflows for HR. ----  Sponsor Links: 🔗 Download the State of Teams 2025 Report from Atlassian . 🔗 Go book your next offsite with...

Molly Sands, Head of the Teamwork Lab at Atlassian, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about Atlassian’s latest research on the three things the best teams do differently, the power of unleashing collective knowledge, and why distributed teams have a headstart on AI adoption. ----  🔗 Go book your next offsite with Marco Experiences . 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Download the S...

Pat Wadors, CHRO at Intuitive, joined us on The Modern People Leader.  We talked about how to find and amplify the golden nuggets of your culture, the three layers of a great employee experience, why you need to “touch the elephant”, and what kids’ stories can teach us about leadership. ----  🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Download the State of Teams 2025 Report from Atlassian . 🔗 Buy your ti...

Jessica Zwaan returned to The Modern People Leader for a deep dive on how her PeopleOps as a Product philosophy came to life. We talked about the early days of the framework, writing her book, and the launch of MPL Build — a new collaboration between MPL and Jessica to bring the methodology to more teams. ----  🔗 Join the MPL Live Session on all-things leave management . 🔗 Request a demo of Char...

Shane Koller joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about adopting a product mindset in HR, how Ancestry’s people team built their “product roadmap”, and why even great HR programs fall short when they’re not connected. ----  🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Buy your ticket for MPL Live San Francisco . 🔗 Be the first to hear when MPL Build launches this month . ----  (07:35) Shane’s j...

Michele Bousquet joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about her career journey, leading with heart, and why HR shouldn’t be so complicated. ----  🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop . 🔗 Buy your ticket for MPL Live San Francisco . ----  (08:41) Michele’s career journey: From temp to Chief People Officer (14:45) Lessons from navigating adversity and leading with heart (21:52) The importance...

Michael Walsh, CEO of Cariloop, joined us on The Modern People Leader.  We discussed the caregiving challenges facing employees today, how companies can better support working caregivers, and the data-backed insights from Cariloop’s Top Needs Report. ----  🔗 Download Cariloop’s 2025 Employee Caregiver Top Needs Report . ----  (7:20) How Michael's personal experience with caregiving sparked the id...

Linda Aiello (CPO, DraftKings), Carmel Galvin (CPO, Klaviyo), and Stacey Richey (Global VP, People, Smartcat), joined us for MPL Live in Boston, Massachusetts. We talked about the current state of HR, how roles are shifting with AI, and how they’re moving beyond traditional engagement metrics. ----  🔗 Get Atlassian’s free guide to AI-powered knowledge management 🔗 Request a demo of Workleap usin...

Shlomit Gruman-Navot joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about her evolution as a people leader and how Miro is making AI learning a priority for employees.  ----  🔗 Join Atlassian’s webinar on March 12th and learn how AI is transforming knowledge management 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop. Let them know we sent you. ----  5:00 - Her career journey: from IBM to SAP, Alpha Bank, OLX, an...

Brandon Carson, Chief Learning Officer at Docebo, joined us on The Modern People Leader. We talked about the one thing holding companies back from adopting AI faster, why AI makes learning “scaled to one”, and why the future of work isn’t about replacing humans - it’s about amplifying them. ----  🔗 Get Atlassian’s free guide to AI-powered knowledge management 🔗 Request a demo of ChartHop. Let th...

Crystal Boysen, Chief People Officer at Sprout Social, joined us for a deep dive into People Debt. We discussed what it is, how to identify it, and specific areas where Sprout Social is focusing its efforts to address it. ----  🔗 Go grab your ticket for Transform 2025 🔗 Get Atlassian’s free guide to AI-powered knowledge management 🔗 Sign up for our upcoming webinar with ChartHop 🔗 Buy tickets...

Brian Elliott, a leading expert on flexible work, joined us on the show. We talked about whether or not remote work is actually dead (looked at the actual data), the questions to ask when your CEO pushes for a RTO, and why a return to office won’t fix bad management. ----  🔗 Sign up for our upcoming webinar with ChartHop 🔗 Get Atlassian’s free guide to AI-powered knowledge management 🔗 Buy tick...