I've been thinking a lot about redundancies lately – not the kind splashed across headlines about corporate downsizing, but the reassuring kind, like knowing there are three backup engines when one fails on your transatlantic flight. This fascination hit me hard during the recent wave of tech layoffs, where I watched companies strip away their … Continue reading Building Resilient Teams Through Strategic Redundancy
Imagine a world where employees, not just the Board of Directors, assign performance ratings to CEOs and determine if they need to be placed on a performance improvement plan. The 2025 edition of Blind's CEO performance review did exactly that. Following the precedent set by the anonymous professional network in 2023-24, when they first enabled … Continue reading Placing CEOs on a PIP
‘What do you want to be when you grow up?’ If you engage in a conversation with me, a version of this question will inevitably surface. And I am willing to bet that you will have an answer – one that will likely not match your current career. The good news is that you aren’t … Continue reading Boring Businesses: Trading Ping Pong Tables for Laundromats
Dwindling start-up investments, relentless headcount pressures (read layoffs), and an obsession with productivity metrics clearly demonstrate that there's no running away from our current 'era of efficiency.' As organizations continue to grapple with their largest expense, it’s time to talk about the silver bullet that is supposedly solving this big bulging bill i.e., Agents and … Continue reading Let’s talk about the cost of AI
If you've been following me for a while, you're likely familiar with my podcast, HR Bandit. For those new to the scene, it's a monthly deep dive into the hottest news from the world of work. Every month, my co-host Apoorva and I begin by curating a list of eye-catching stories, then whittle it down … Continue reading Everything that happened in May 2025
In a significant shift across corporate America, many companies are stepping back from their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) initiatives; but one company is going against the grain having launched a head turning campaign. In February, Elf Cosmetics launched a campaign called So Many Dicks. Turns out, there are more men named Dick (including Richard, … Continue reading Defying Corporate America’s Diversity Retreat
I completed a decade at Amazon on 16th February 2025 and two of the many conversations that followed led to some deep introspection. The first was a discussion with a colleague who joked about now being stuck with the organization for good and being unable to get out (she says she speaks from experience). The … Continue reading Always On interviewing
Recently, I encountered a new term in workforce planning that caught my attention: NNACV (Net New Annual Contract Value). As someone who's been tracking the increasing focus on workforce planning, this shift in headcount accounting intrigued me. In the age of efficiency, it is only natural that the biggest expense on the balance sheet undergo … Continue reading Workforce Planning: HC to NNACV
It’s the season of the internet running amok with predictions for 2025, be it astrology, finance, markets or HR. While I haven’t been consistently publishing my list of trends as I do my word of the year, here are two reasons why this is one set of predictions you shouldn’t miss: I’m not trying to … Continue reading 2025: The trends and non-trends
On’s Cloudboom Strike LS is creating history at the Paris Olympics. Their groundbreaking spray on shoes are a glimpse into the future; a future of individualization. The concept, however, is not new. Once upon a time, long before mass production, tailored clothes and bespoke footwear were the norm. Trusted tailors and cobblers would meticulously measure … Continue reading Customization, personalization and individualization
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