My Mexico City Recs
This has absolutely nothing to do with the world of work or trust! “And here’s what it taught me about talent…” is not incoming.
But I want a spot to share this list in the future. And when you have your own website, you can put whatever you want on it!
So, allow me to present my top spots in Mexico City that you won’t find on the big Top 10 lists (yet).
These are in no particular order:
MUX (Roma)
What it is: Mexican food with a deep explanation of the regional cuisines and a respect for ingredients. This spot caters a bit more to locals so the service is a bit more casual. We loved the cocktails (spicy mezcal old fashioned, please), the chorizo tacos (both kinds) and the tomatoes in honor of salt.
Choza (Roma)
What it is: Part Thai. Part Mexican. Part listening lounge. Part rooftop bar. No reservations, no sign. Get in the line at the corner of Monterrey & San Luis Potosi. They have an Instagram so it’s not like a total secret. Plan to hang out in the bar floor for awhile before you get upstairs. There are snacks.
Entonces Entonces (Roma)
What it is: Japanese (no sushi - think ramen, gyoza). 4 tables. Very causal. Exceptional food and very lovely service.
La Vista (Roma Norte)
What it is: Cocktail bar. Order the elote cocktail. Kindly dismiss their warnings about how spicy it is. Enjoy 2+. Then go back again. Favorite drink of my life.
Temezcal (get Maria’s What’sApp from me to book - they offer English and Spanish sessions and pick you up in Condesa)
What it is: Curative ceremony. Engage with nature and then confront your fears and yourself in a hot handmade cavern with an expert guide. If you have 2 days in CDMX, this might not be for you because you will sweat. And if you’re like me, you will cry. This will also be the FIRST thing I re-book when we return next year.
Hule (Condesa)
What it is: The coffee here is good. The music here is great. They have a record player and an ideal vibe blend of cool meets comfy if you’re working remotely. There are too many great coffee shops to list in full but honorable mentions also go to: Buna (Condesa spot) and Quasimo (Condesa) - one of the few with estados unidos hours opening at 6:30 am. Most start 8ish. And say 8 but mean maybe 8:15 am.
Castizo (Condesa):
What it is: Spanish food. The Spanish influences in Mexico are (of course) strong and this food was end to end stellar. 10/10 charcuterie. The beef tenderloin will be high on my try to recreate at home list.
Em (Roma Norte):
What is it: Given that it has a Michelin star, this can’t be called a hidden gem. But you also cannot come to Mexico City and miss their world class fine dining. The food at Em (Mexican) is phenomenal but the wine/cocktail pairings are next level. They also scooted our group out so stunningly by offering a picture in the kitchen. Was a total move and we loved it. Kids would call it riz maybe. Honorable mention to Pargot (French/Mexican) with 4 tables outside of half of a taco shop. Very unique and also not really a hidden gem given their Michelin recognition. Rosetta was beautiful too. I have been to Pujol (the heavy hitter who put fine dining in Mexico City on the map) and it was lovely … but I would go back to Em first.
Huerto Roma Verde (Roma):
What is it: A community garden made out of what was previously garbage. Very cool to just walk around in there but if you head there on a Saturday - a lil mercado will treat you to mezcal samples, beautiful jewelry and other goods.
Casa Franca (Roma Norte):
What is it: Jazz/Bar Club. We got in without reservations but it was a close call and required a bit of a wait. Enjoy amazing drinks in different rooms and make your way to the core room with a lovely jazz band playing. Get the Paper Plane cocktail. Paper Plane + Jazz = heaven.
Cayetana Panadería (Condesa):
What is it: The bread in Mexico City is (…searches for word beyond incredible/amazing/great that I’ve already overused in this…) indescribable. Hit any panadería and it will be enjoyable. We were actively sad on Monday/Tuesdays when Cayetana wasn’t open and that says something in a city of incredible bakeries.
Coyocan Mercado (Coyocan):
What is it: This one isn’t quite a hidden gem either but deserves a call out. Pretty sure Vogue has been there. But this a true mercado in a lovely neighborhood worth exploring if you’re sick of sleek coffee shops and high end cocktails in Roma Norte/Condesa. Look for other cultural events in Coyocan while you’re in town. We caught a cirdo del Dia de Los Muertos that was a delight. If you’re short on time, Mercado Medellin is closer to the Roma options above and also fun to explore!
FAQ:
Why aren’t there street food options listed here?
Candidly, most are great and very similar. Look for a line of locals. Look for tortillas azul (blue but look almost black sometimes). If you see either of those things, stop and eat. Bring pesos for that. Do not skip the salsa verde. Ever. The corner of Obregon & Insurgentes in Roma Norte offers a fun lil section of options. The alley serving tacos next to 240 Calle Queretaro is a delight.
What about things that are all over the major lists? Would you skip those?
There are incredible things that just happen to be well known.
Those include:
Masala y Maiz (and their lesser known sister restaurant Mari Gold) - both are worth every ounce of hype. Get the watermelon salad and pollotito (lil chicken). At Mari Gold don’t skip dessert.
Contramar - yep, yummy.
Hot air balloon ride over the pyramids - loved this peaceful experience and the break from the city.
Zocalo/Templo Mayor - this is stunning and worth a wander.
Frida Kahlo Museum - well preserved and busy. Get tickets in advance.
Chapultapec Castle & Park - stunning and huge. Contemporary and modern art museums are exceptional if you’re into that & the castle shows you such a rich view of the city and its history
Take a cooking class. Homemade tortillas incoming for life.
What about online reviews?
Any food under a 4.5 in CDMX is a pass. The bar here is SO HIGH. Will a 4 be terrible? Probably not. But will you wander into a better spot within a block or two? Yes. CAVEAT: read the low reviews! Sometimes it’s just tourists complaining about the wait or something else obnoxious. Time moves at its own pace here and that’s something to be embraced.
What else about dining in Mexico City?
The food is exceptional and the reputation is well deserved.
Two key notes on what to expect:
If you order street food or at a cafe para aquí (for here), you will eat first and pay after. In the US, you’d typically order + pay then eat. Here you eat standing at the stand then pay unless you specify para llevar (to go).
It would be considered highly rude here for them to bring you the check prior to your request for it. So, you need to explicitly ask for the check when you’re ready for it.
Anyhoo, is my love of Mexico City clear yet?
Love, love, love.
2024 Predictions. How did I do?
I love looking back at predictions to see what hit and what missed.
Let’s check out my 2024 hiring predictions and see if I’m psychic or not. (Join here to be the first to hear my 2025 trends!)
Technology
B: Robot reviewed resumes move from myth to reality
We’ve been hearing for years about the ATS screening out resumes. At the same time, recruiters spending hours reviewing those resumes were rolling their eyes.
Enter: AI.
The situation today:
Most resumes are still reviewed by a recruiter.
AI can and does do more screening. See: Paradox.AI which can conduct a whole text based interview and do early requirements screening.
Using AI to hire is evolving from a regulatory and compliance standpoint.
A: ChatGPT playing around to work product
One study in September 2024 by AWS estimated that 57% of the content on the internet is AI generated or AI translated.
A friend just told me she used Gemini to write a letter to the sellers of a house she wanted. I use Paradox and/or Gemini and/or ChatGPT daily. And am now on Lindy.AI for custom builds.
So, maybe I should have included more options beyond “ChatGPT” but think this one is only getting started.
D: Annual & Seasonal Shifts ---> Monthly & Weekly
I stand by the idea that sentiment shifts more readily but this year was consistent with leverage sitting squarely with employers. So, this was a dud in real shifts. It was true in emotional noise and clickbait.
B: AI enabled jobs vs. AI replaced. Jobs stable-ish. Wages flat to down-ish.
Some jobs were AI replaced but overall more markets saw flattening or sluggish markets.
Technically wages overall did outpace inflation this year on the whole.
Specific to those industries most impacted by AI though:
Software engineer salaries averaged $111,193, reflecting a slight decrease from the previous year's average of $111,348 (DICE jobs report)
Customer Service wages rose only .1% (BLS)
Overall, we added an average of 200k jobs/month in 2024. Compare that to 2021 in which the average was 550k/month. The jobs we added were heavily weighted in government and healthcare jobs.
Work Culture
A: Companies keep “right sizing” even if they’re financially stable.
While layoffs slowed down, plenty of companies continued cutting into 2024 including but not limited to Meta. The name of the game continues to be efficiency and output.
D: New hires leaving despite short tenures
Departures overall slowed but I don’t read that as a signal of loyalty so much as a tough market. I stand by this one especially in a future strong job market. We certainly saw more trends like #QuitTok than #GirlBoss hustle content.
B: Pay Per Use ↑
Pay per use continued surging across SaaS this year from Salesforce to early stage startups. Gig and fractional work continued to grow from firms reticent to spend on full time salaries. I still anticipate the idea of “pay for performance” or “pay by the project” growing but it will up against collective action and evolving legislation around gig work.
A: Gen Z outnumber Boomers for the first time
Current US workforce:
Millennials - 36%
Gen X - 31%
Gen Z - 18%
Baby Boomers - 15%
A: More Transparency as the Norm
5 more states passed legislation for pay transparency in 2024: Minnesota, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, Vermont. That means over 30% of US workers live somewhere that requires companies to disclose salaries. That inevitably leads to the expectation even for workers who live elsewhere.
At the employee level, employees continued to video their layoffs and share their demands publicly formally through unions and informally through petitions.
A: Collective Action ↑
Huge strikes hit this year including Boeing, SAG-AFTRA, Port Workers and more.
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) reported a significant surge in union election petitions, with over 2,600 filed during the fiscal year ending September 30, 2024—a 32% increase from the previous year.
Full numbers on any membership changes will be released Jan 2025.
A: Attention Spans ↓
Well, if you made it this far in reading this - you’re the exception - congratulations!
A goldfish now has a longer attention span than a human according to this stat that I can’t verify elsewhere but is fun to include here. Not sure that it’s literally so much as figuratively true.
Either way, election stress + TikTok brain + economic pressure = a lot of distractions.
The good news is that the solutions don’t need to be new! See: meditation which has been around for thousands of years. We can choose another path.
2025: What’s coming?
Will be sharing my 2025 predictions (virtually) on January 14th! Join us here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/2025-hiring-trends-tickets-1077472422019
You need a hiring mood board.
A recent chat with a CEO coming up on major growth mode reminded me of something that I personally do but haven’t shared yet!
Drumroll… a mood board for future hiring.
This comes before your job description and probably even before any formal planning. It’s a quick and casual spot to make sure fleeting (but important) thoughts don’t get lost in the shuffle for a role that might be six months or a year or more into the future.
What goes on a hiring mood board?
Sample Candidates - links, resumes or even just names. Maybe you want to recruit one of these stellar finance pros someday but don’t have a spot yet. Add them on your mood board (and come to that free and virtual event to level up your accounting & finance practices now!)
Relevant insights like this GTM episode on scaling hiring
Companies you want to steal talent from someday
Tasks or work that you’re doing but won’t be doing forever
Quotes or other inspiration that captures the essence of this role or the problem to be solved
Job description inspiration. For example, I love the direct clarity of this announcement. I think the *right person* for her role will love it too. Just as importantly, the wrong person for this team will detest it. And that’s great too.
Why talented people still get declined for jobs.
The number one misunderstanding that I see from candidates is that people are interviewing you to decide if you can or cannot do the job.
Hiring is actually about picking the best puzzle piece fit across a variety of factors. It typically looks like this but usually with more than three people:
Pictured: A radar chart showing three candidate's skills compared to one another.
Which candidate will be selected here isn’t about one being more “talented” than another. It’s about which one will best fit the context of the business and job.
A company struggling without designers or who needs devs to fill that role will probably pick Omar. Another one whose devs are typically customer facing might pick Jane. If the team is likely to scale, that company could select Nadene.
Does that mean any of these three made up people would be unable to do the job or are not good professionals? No!
It means that from the company perspective, they’re going to pick who they think is the best puzzle piece from the slate of candidates.
Here are just a few of the many reasons why very talented people still get declined:
Business planning: what will the company look like in 18 months and does this person’s trajectory fit that?
Example: today the team is 5 people and we anticipate it growing to 30 people and for this role to soon lead both HR and Finance. Do we see enough signals that this person will be able to scale with the team to that point?
Team rounding: what’s missing from the current team that’s less about this job and more about the full team dynamic?
Example: the broader team is all highly tactical. We believe that someone with a high level of strategic vision could be very helpful.
Timing or goal misalignment: their goal is very different than yours.
Example: you want to build out a new product suite and become a Chief Product Officer. They want someone to remove a lot of their existing product suite and refocus on their core business as a long term Product Owner.
The role changed or went away entirely: change is the only constant and that’s never been more true. Frustrating but true.
Example: we wanted a head of sales to take our new product to market but now that we’re into the search, we’ve since heard loud and clear from our customers that this product is not at PMF the way we thought. So, now we don’t need a head of sales, we need to think about shoring up product leadership.
Someone else just crushed it: you were amazing but someone else brought something un-pass-upable (invented word) to this situation.
Example: you’re awesome and we know that. But we have one spot and someone who worked for us for years and we know well wants to come back. We’re going to move on what feels like a sure thing but it’s not that you’re not great.
Example: we’re building a GTM team and someone else has both 10 years of being the buyer then 5 years of incredible momentum in sales in our industry. It’s not about you being bad but that mix is super appealing to us for *this spot*.
They think you will be bored or outraged: they know their environment better than you do.
Example: they think you’re used to solving problems that are 10x more complicated than theirs. They are concerned you’ll take the job and leave in a few months.
Example: everything you’ve described as being unsatisfactory about your current environment or manager is an exact match to their environment or manager.
But why don’t more employers “give people a chance?”.
In this do more with less market, the hiring teams are also short staffed and burned out. They don’t see waiting for someone to get up to speed and/or the very real cost of training someone to be viable. They are nervous. And thus they don’t usually want to take risks.
They believe there are people available or recruitable who can have been there/done that. So, in comparison that just makes more sense to them.
They’ve been burned by this in the past. When people get a chance and fail, 99% of the time in my experience they hate you and hate the company and make that very clear. Sometimes that’s very valid frustration and sometimes it’s just misplaced grief about the whole situation.
It’s very easy (especially for teams with less hiring experience) to hire the best candidate over the best prospective employee. Is that ideal? No. And not for them either! But it does happen.
The reality of the situation is not “can someone learn this?” and employers are saying no. The truth is “As a company, we need a business problem solved. What’s our best solution to do that?”
Does that mean employers don’t think about potential?
Of course not!
Ways to showcase your potential in an interview process include:
Sharing an example of a time you solved a problem that no one was asking you to. It’s even better if you had to learn a new skill to do that. Example: I noticed we were spending a lot of time Y for reporting so I learned SQL and was able to build reports that showed Z and saved A.
Coming in excessively prepared for your interview. Do not ask any questions that can be easily answered by a company’s website. Reference recent news and your interviewers background (LinkedIn background, not credit score or home address level creeping).
When you don’t know the right answer to a technical question, lay out exactly how you would quickly find the answer if you were working on that problem in real life.
Yeah but… rejection is still awful.
I’m not here to say rejection isn’t terrible. It is. And this market is an especially hard one for professional/corporate type roles. Job seekers are very tired.
Am sharing this context in the hopes that with more context, more job seekers can see the decline as a redirection and not a personal indictment of their skills.
Talented people get rejected in every search. And then they find their way to the next adventure.
If you’re struggling with your job search journey, Newance can help:
Without AI… it could be worse.
If AI wasn’t “taking jobs”, these other factors might really hurt.
What if it could be worse without AI?
First, a disclaimer. The fear over dystopian outcomes and the need for safeguards is real and warranted. Some smart regulation, yes please!
But what about the other waves happening around the world of work right now? From productivity flatlining to generational shifts, a jobless AI run world isn’t the only possibility for what’s next.
There’s real potential that this all converges at (roughly) the right time. Here’s why.
Productivity. Are we getting enough output now?
What is “productivity”?
In general terms, productivity is the amount of output produced per hour worked.
For example: a single hour worked in 1920 would produce less than a single hour worked in 2024 due to technology, process, and other improvements.
What’s going on with it?
Over the last completed business cycle (from 2007–2019), productivity growth averaged roughly 1.5% and has continued to slow. The prior cycle was over 2% with some time in the 1990s reaching 2.7%.
Consider cases like in the UK. From the 1970s to today, workers are 2x productive. You can see the slow down dramatically when you consider that in 2024 workers are only 1% more productive than in 2007. That’s a long time to only scoot up 1%.
It’s not just employers squeezing workers for more output.
When productivity stops or declines, the expansion of the economic “pie” also stops.
That can ultimately lead to falls in standards of living for everyone. We all know what it feels like in a “boom” vs. a “bust”. Does the word “stagnation” imply anything good to you? Yeah, because it’s bad! Slow or flat growth doesn’t mean that things stop being expensive. In many cases, it means that things get or stay more expensive. For example, without productivity gains a TV wouldn’t be cheap. A TV today is 99% less expensive than in 1950 in equivalent dollars. But thanks to productivity (through technology) gains, we get significantly better tv’s for way less.
Productivity is not the only measure of well being. But we should notice when it starts stalling.
AI exposed industries have thus far seen 4.8x higher growth in labor productivity.
All leaders care about is “efficiency”, right?
OMG if productivity is falling employers must be freaking out because all employers care about is efficiency right? They must be totally ready to wipe out teams in favor of AI.
Efficiency is having a moment with layoffs in the news. Expensive capital (see: high rates) and many orgs have an over-hiring hangover from 2021/2022’s hiring bonanza. It’s also a very tempting time to trim down a team when “everyone else” is doing it.
But this sentiment makes it seem like efficiency is all people at work think about.
And yet, there are thousands of hours in every organization that could have been automated already without AI. With just regular code. Or plain ole process improvements. And they’re not. Not because it wouldn’t be more efficient. It would be!
Humans at work have other real incentives:
Patterns and habits. “That’s the way we’ve always done it” is a trope because repetition is safe and easy. Our brains are set up to repeat the same patterns and conserve energy.
Personnel real estate. Who gets credit in a corporate environment for crushing it with 5 people? Hardly anyone. Instead, more employees means more important. A VP managing 1000 people is highly incentivized to keep a big team.
Productivity vs. Productivity Theater. How much time is really going to output vs. summarizing, planning for and reporting on “output”?
Consensus > Momentum. Deciding means responsibility. And responsibility means risk. So it’s often easier and safer to make sure that a group of people makes the (usually worse) decision. See: Innovator’s Dilemma.
Stories like this coffee conundrum happen every day:
My company provides coffee machines on every floor but charges 20 cents per cup (except for “meeting coffee,” which is free). There are lists. People on every floor whose responsibility it is to refill coffee, sugar, and milk. Deputy people for this job….
At some time someone made an official “proposal for improvement” to eliminate the charge for coffee, the lists, the cash boxes, and the whole system: Have a single person whose job it is to refill the coffee machines daily and be done with it. There was a short calculation of how much time and effort could be saved. (A lot.) That proposal has gone through the improvements committee (yes, that’s a thing), the sales people, the union, the CEO, and back to the improvements committee. It is still under consideration after 18 months.
Is that to say no one will implement AI because they all want to keep big teams? Of course not.
There will absolutely be adoptions and smaller teams doing the work of previously bigger ones. And smaller companies will gain in competitive potential. But we can’t ignore that there are absolutely more to a decision at work than “Is it more efficient?”.
Consider our other systemic friend, bureaucracy.
In 1980, a report came out with alarming news - the US would soon have a surplus of doctors. The government reacted by limiting financial support for residency programs and thus began our current system in which there are more med school graduates than residency spots. In theory, the idea was to keep medical costs down by not flooding the system with too many doctors. In reality, we’ve created our own shortage resulting in massive salaries. Those already inside of this system are incentivized to keep it.
I once worked at a company where we had a very kind and smart employee whose entire role was to keep us OFCCP compliant. This was a position just to meet the compliance requirements to be a government contractor. Well intended for DEI outcomes. And bonus, a job was created.
“Where once universities, corporations, movie studios, and the like had been governed by a combination of relatively simple chains of command and informal patronage networks, we now have a world of funding proposals, strategic vision documents, and development team pitches—allowing for the endless elaborations of new and ever more pointless levels of managerial hierarchy”
― David Graeber, Bullshit Jobs: A Theory
I haven’t seen many signs of bureaucracy slowing down. Have you?
Frustrating? Yes. True? Yes.
85M reasons the labor market needs AI.
In our lifetime, we’re unlikely to unravel our societal build around the idea of a “job”. Politicians think about jobs. Jobs are how we survive. Jobs are way too often our identity. So, a healthy system has just about enough jobs for enough people with only a few percentage points of difference.
Did you know our current AI-free trajectory is actually kinda scary? WEF and other studies estimate that by 2030 on our current trajectory, global labor shortages will reach 85M people.
How so?
In the United States, the ratio of prime working-age people (25-64) to retirement-age people (65+) is currently around 3 working-age person to every 1 retiree. By 2030, that will be 2.4 working age people to 1 retired one. And by the end of the century, 1.6 workers for every one retired person.
Due to economic challenges and/or longevity gains more workers may continue working beyond 64 but the core issue remains that more workers are leaving the workforce than joining.
At the same time, labor force participation rates are falling. This includes growing challenges for caretakers who can’t find affordable child care or elder care. By 2030, the labor force participation rate is expected to drop 3% to 60.4%. That’s a change of 1.8 million workers over less than a decade. US workers also are working fewer hours than before, reducing the pool of labor even further.
It’s easy to see that this won’t be fixed near-term. Birth rates are falling globally with the US seeing a 23% drop between 2007 and 2022. So, there’s no next big wave of population growth here.
Immigration has been recently buoying the US population with even recently accounting for 65% of the population increase from 2021 to 2022 after a pandemic lull.
But this system is far from perfect. For example, consider the OPT Visa. A student comes here for an advanced degree then can work and gain more skills and experience within the US for 1 year (with some STEM exceptions to a few years). Then they’ll need to find someone to sponsor an H1B (giving them 7 more years at considerable cost to an employer) or leave… taking those skills with them.
Without major structural changes (quite a tall order in a time of increasing bipartisan divide), immigration would not be enough to solve this problem.
At the same time, the jobs themselves are changing.
Ok but what about people who are really struggling now to find work? There’s a silent struggle happening beyond “low unemployment numbers” especially for white collar workers.
The “half-life” of a skill is the amount of time that it takes for a particular skill to lose half of its value. We used to see a half-life for skills of 10+ years. That’s now down to 5 years and declining.
It’s important that we differentiate between skills and talent. When we discuss skills in this context, we mean the tactical knowledge used to perform a job at hand.
The tricky part here is that increasingly employers tend to want to hire people who have been there/done that in a professional environment. But training programs today focus on practicing the skills in a training environment.
When budgets are tight and resources are limited, the fear of hiring the wrong person begins to outweigh the pain of the open role. And so teams begin to invent more and more hoops for candidates including wanting more proof of experience rather than more proof of skill acquisition.
This creates a market tension in which ML engineers have their pick of jobs but other roles might be struggling to find steady employment. But just saying you know machine learning (which you really might!) isn’t always enough for an employer to make the hire. The second job is always 100x easier than the first in a career transition.
These supply and demand differences also create wage compression in which a candidates sees “market compensation” as their last salary and an employer thinks they have equivalent options at lower salaries. Their views of the value being created by a role shift and it takes time to find the new equilibrium.
But what if AI could hold a solution to that tension? What if someone could learn in a way that was built for them and more easily replicate the real world experience that employers are focused on? What if we could more readily truly understand someone’s capabilities beyond a conversation packed with human bias and room for error?
But people can’t possibly handle change can they?
Are you less busy now than you were 10 years ago?
But don’t you use more technology?
Technology changes, advancements and incorporation into our work are not new.
Changes to skills, duties and the kinds of jobs we have are not new. By 1980, the majority of jobs were ones that didn't exist in 1940.
Fear isn’t new either.
Consider that theater owners were once quite upset about bicycles:
The word "Luddite" comes from British textile workers in the 1800s who worried new machines would take their jobs. And they did. But it also created new jobs. And the new jobs were year round instead of seasonal. Those new job workers banded together and early versions of unions came together ultimately ushering in (hard fought) better working conditions and improved economic productivity.
We’re already making adjustments within the system. Enrollment in schools for the skilled trades are at their highest peak since 2018. Why? Demand and job prospects.
75% of knowledge workers are already using AI at work.
We’re acting as though this is a far off dystopia when the reality is that it’s already in motion and we’re already making adjustments.
Yeah, but change hurts.
Am I saying an efficient AI enabled/run startup couldn’t or won’t displace a “safe” Fortune 100?
No. That could certainly happen. There is a destructive quality to any evolution. Jobs will be lost. And job loss sucks. Job has health implications. Job loss has mental health implications.
But we also can’t avoid it by pretending this isn’t happening. We have agency to take action now. We have time to rethink reskilling now. We can face our own demons around change starting now.
Because the choice was never between the good ole days of back-then and the horrors of what’s next.
Thanks to slowing population growth and productivity, without AI we could have easily found ourselves with an overburdened working population, an underserved elderly population and a real tumble in overall economic growth. All converging at the same time. That doesn’t sound idyllic to me.
All this to say, what if it could have been worse without AI?
2024 Predictions
Thanks to those who joined us to chat live on this. View the conversation here!
We used to talk strategy for the *year*. Now it’s more like the quarter (or the month). I don’t anticipate this reversing—timelines will keep on getting faster as we go.
So, with that in mind, what can we expect to see in the world of hiring this year?
Technology - How will our tools evolve this year?
Do I think we will see AI eat a bunch of jobs this year? No. But we will see integration and jobs that are AI Enabled vs. Replaced. Overall, that means that jobs will likely be stable~ish but wages will begin to flatten.
Culture - What will ‘normal’ look like this year?
2024 promises more transactional work. Profitable companies are right sizing and employees are moving on from jobs at a quick pace. Might be a gig, might be a task, could be a smart contract. Flexibility is key.
With Gen Z outnumbering Boomers, expect increased expectations of transparency and group action. See: Tech workers recording their layoffs.
Compliance - What laws and policies are we watching this year?
Pro-worker and pro-transparency rulings will continue through the election. The FTC non-compete decision will land in April (they are likely to remove them entirely or narrow their use) and court decisions have been trending pro-union and pro-worker. 2024 will also see more demands for transparency around compensation and use of AI in hiring.
Keeping - What’s staying the same?
Humans still buy from and work with other humans. A huge component of most businesses is relationship based, and I don’t see this changing! Many things that are automatable haven’t been automated. Just because a computer can do something doesn’t mean that’s the most effective way. We’re human and we can adapt!
Remember: These are overall trends—there will always be exceptions!
First jobs. Uh oh.
What did I learn at my first job?
Well, quite a bit about tools because I worked at an Ace Hardware.
Other key lessons for 15 year old me included…
You will regret sobbing in the break room over a boy. (And no, he wasn’t worth it. At all.)
Actual follow through is rare and will get you noticed
Working with the public is wild and the customer is not always right. So don’t be an asshole.
How to apply, interview & advocate for myself even if awkward
Since 1980, the percentage of teens working summer jobs has fallen from 51.7% to 30.8% (BLS).
And I am NOT SAYING that no one wants to work anymore.
Many of these kids are taking extra classes and gearing for college. They are stressed out. This isn't laziness.
They are learning about how to check boxes and follow a path. A path that’s tiring and pandemic interrupted. They can leverage AI for a paper. They might be in 10 clubs to shape the right existence for a 4 year school they're skeptical about anyway. They’re learning about career tips in 30 punchy seconds on TikTok rather than long nuanced discussions.
All of this means that becomes more and more about the answer instead of the thought process. About the impression more than the reality.
Before we get all “kids these days" - as a millennial I can confirm that I never gave myself a participation trophy. Neither did my peers.
And these new grads didn’t create the systems they’re coming up in.
New and recent grads largely came up in a hot hiring market (exception only early 2023) where they could find another role seemingly with a Tinder-like swipe. There’s another one around the corner. There’s another “we’re hiring” sign down the street.
Add:
+ that stress to show achievement
+ an unending stream of seemingly glamorous career options like influencer
+ underlying sense of depression under "humor" in #worktok
+ grand expectations to find meaning and full alignment with their work and employer
It’s easy to see how ideas about what “work” means can take a life of their own.
Bad managers and soulless leaders become the enemy (rightfully so). But if you’ve never had a manager, you’re not quite equipped to gauge managers from "just ok" to truly terrible.
If you’ve never worked with a lot of adults - it’s so dang easy to attribute mistakes to malice. With experience comes awareness of good ole incompetence. Even worse, I’m worried about early workers finding themselves naive to more insidiously subtle abuse or harassment.
On this new path, early workers are not learning how to muddle through unclear expectations. Or (horrified gasp) talk on the phone to a stranger. They’re not getting to cry in the break room at 15. Some of these lessons don’t arrive at 15 or 18. They’re showing up at 23+ when the stakes are higher and the work is more complex.
So am I saying I was ready for the workplace because I spent 4 years at an Ace Hardware?
Ummmm NO. But that kernel of experience paved the way for my internships to be more about polishing. And it made every subsequent step an easier one.
So what happens when we skip the “first job” right to the internship? And wohoo, big perk…it’s remote.
Or we skip the internship and jump into a full-time role at a company?
Or what about the students who work out of necessity but aren’t coming in with a network or professional advice from their personal life?
I shudder to picture 20 year old me working remotely. Not because I was lazy or stupid. But because I didn’t know what I didn’t know. I didn’t know about professional subtext. Or what it means to build or lose credibility or capitol within a company.
In those early jobs, I could see how leaders they carried themselves. I could watch them solve problems in front of me. I *absorbed* the norms rather than having to practice them from a computer.
We’ve already had a shortage of senior level talent available to mentor the next gen of talent. (Note: this is not because they are unwilling! It’s because the shortage means they are too busy and in demand with urgent priorities!) And many of those leaders who are career-positioned to be the best mentors are life-positioned to want to be at home.
So, this problem isn’t going anywhere.
This all means that we need to universally redefine “entry level”.
And what if we don’t? If we just decide that kids these days don’t want to work anymore? What if give it the ole sink or swim?
Something that I’ve seen be a near universal truth is that when you give someone an opportunity (even a fair one) to sink or swim and they don’t swim… they will blame you or blame the company or blame the job. Maybe not forever but it’s certainly easier for humans of all ages and levels to blame the circumstances than to learn the toughest of lessons.
And then what do we get?
Turnover rises and tenure falls.
TikTok sets the expectations instead of you.
We never pace supply to demand as workplace demographics shift and AI eats more of the “entry level” jobs
Not so hot, right?
So what do we do instead?
Accept that we will need to give trust and time first. If MasterLube in Billings, MT can change hundreds of lives, I am sure we can give people some ongoing development.
Focus on onboarding. Assume you’ll need to teach the world of work not just teach the tasks.
Share stories not just to-dos Leaders who share their own journeys build trust and trust breeds productivity.
Jobs of 2033
Do you still do your job in the *exact* same way you did 10 years ago? Do you even do the same job you did 10 years ago?
Probably not…because work is always evolving.
Consider that 60% of today’s jobs didn’t even exist in 1940 according to an MIT Task Force on the future of work. The work force of 1950 didn’t see jobs like nutritionist, drone operator or social media manager on the horizon.
And some jobs may never exist again. For example, the alarm clock replaced the “knocker upper” (human alarm clock, not what we might think in today’s slang…)
So, with the pace AI evolving, what will jobs look like in 2030? Or even in 2025?
Nearly all jobs will be impacted at some level by AI but those that I’m predicting will rise (and/or appear - some of these aren’t quite real jobs yet!).
Product Management and UX: Shaping the go-to-market roadmap and strategy of a product, including how users interact with it.
AI tools shorten the time to build, so more products and product strategy (already critical!) will rise as competition for attention increases.
Workflow Automation and AI Enablement: build and automate workflows and/or look for spaces to integrate AI.
This expertise will become a job in and of itself. This expert will build unique, custom workflows that hack between systems. This won’t replace all out of the box SaaS solutions but will add a new “hack something ourselves” competitor.
Having doubts? Consider agile coaches, organizational development specialists and remote work experts whose careers are already built around helping other people work better.
Prompt Engineering: (definition from ChatGPT for fun) designing and refining prompts or instructions to achieve desired outputs from a language model or natural language processing system. It involves crafting specific instructions, queries, or context to elicit the desired response or behavior from the model.
If you ask 10 people to draw a square, you’ll get 8 different squares in response. But if you ask 10 people to draw a square that’s exactly one inch on each side and give them a ruler, the results will be much closer to what you wanted. Same goes for using an AI system - the quality of response is only as good as the quality of the input.
Change Management: Equip leaders and teams to handle change through expert coaching, detailed communication plans and facilitated process design.
As the pace of change accelerates, so does the fallout. Change experts won’t be reserved for Fortune 500 anymore.
Data Collection Specialists: New jobs around data collection will blend UX, data engineering and compliance.
These jobs won’t be focused on the advanced analysis of data science or the storage of a DBA but instead be a role shaped around how we collect data and when/how to get more of it.
Since AI systems are only powerful as their inputs, data earns an extra degree of importance. “Data is the new oil” has long been a refrain for a reason and we’ll only see this grow.
Mental Health & Healthcare Support : Not new at all! Nurses are heroes.
Mental health and healthcare facilities are woefully understaffed especially looking at an aging population.
AI might enable some of these roles but don’t underestimate the personal touch these roles require. Baby Boomers broadly hold quite a bit of wealth that they are likely to spend on care.
Coaching: Act as a sounding board and resource to help people get from where they are to where they want to be in a specific area for example health or finances.
Doulas, guides, mentors and coaches are not a new idea for humans. But their application and popularity has been growing and my bet is that it will only expand especially around specific spaces -- finances (not an investor for you but a money mindset coach), health including specifics like screen time management, dating and more.
Purveyors of Novelty: Jobs built purely around entertaining, surprising or delighting other people with novel experiences.
Entertainment as an industry is not new. But as we live more online, in person *experience* becomes a more premium novelty. These could range from hosting murder mystery parties, building escape rooms or bringing goats for yoga. There’s a reason malls are becoming amusement parks.
Artisan Crafting: Niche, specialized services usually around physical goods. like watch repair, polaroid camera film sales, fish tank install + maintenance.
With more climate awareness comes more skepticism about our disposable lifestyles. With that comes growing interest in repair over replacement. Some of these spaces are also high on nostalgia (something people LOVE during times of change) and come with a cool factor.
As mega-stores continue to wipe out smaller shops and product discovery remains a core e-commerce challenge, people will look for more ways to express themselves as individuals.
Relationship Building: People buy from people especially when you’re talking about B2B. (see: every startup who tried to build only self serve SaaS) So, success requires community management and business development.
As things get even noisier with AI generated content, the ability to cut through that noise in a personal, relationship driven way will increase in value. Experts in this space like CharismaQ are blending coaching with technology to help teams expand their skills in this area.
What am I missing? How might these impact Hiring Leverage?
4 Rare Skills: How to Become a Decider
In the past, most jobs were about “doing” and success was attainable by executing on a list of tasks.
Filing reports, spreadsheets, and following established processes was considered valuable. Reliable execution alone was enough.
But the rise of faster, smarter, and easier-to-use AI is changing how people provide value at work.
The technology is already an exceptional “doer”. And it’s getting better everyday.
There is good news though: success in the next-gen, AI-powered workplace can be achieved by doing what humans do best…
Evolving.
People who evolve from “doers” to “deciders” - capable of setting strategy and direction - will have the leverage at work.
When AI completes the tasks while you set the direction, the technology stops being your competition and becomes your engine.
So, how do you become a decider?
You become exceptional at:
1. General Business + Industry Context
Too many employees can tell you what their company ‘does’ but not how their company makes money. What product lines are important? What shifts are happening in the way your customers buy? Why? When we were just completing tasks, we didn’t necessarily need that info. But smart decisions require context.
These generalist/strategy mindsets were previously reserved for Exec and BizOps teams. But that was when the deciding was reserved for them too.
Role model: Shellye Archambeau
2. Attention Management
When the noise feels endless, winning deciders manage themselves and their attention. They prioritize effectively in and out of the office - including consideration about their health. They bring efficiency to problem solving because they’ve planned ahead.
Role models: John Zeratsky & Jake Knapp of Make Time
3. Creative Thinking
True strategy and problem solving are like tests. But they’re more like the essay section than multiple choice. Options are open-ended and you don’t know whether you made the right call or not without a little experimentation and revision. Deciders explore.
Role model: Rick Rubin & The Creative Act
4. Tech Intuition (Not just for software engineers!)
Broadly, this means you know both when and how to fully leverage technology throughout your day. Does your heart sink when you see someone copy and pasting a bunch of rows instead of building a Zapier? Do you sit down at most new systems and just kinda know how they work at a basic level? Or at least take the initiative to find out? Then you might already have strong “tech intuition.”
Deciders don’t just use technology every day. They leverage technology every day.
Role model: Steph Smith of a16z Podcast
Even today, these skills are more rare than you might expect and highly valued. By evolving from a doer to a decider you get to decide (pun-ish intended) what the future will hold.
AI AT WORK.
The shift from doing to deciding.
The shift from doing to deciding.
So far, we’ve built the bulk of jobs to be about doing. Is the task achieved? Is the feature built? Is the report there?
A much smaller group of people have jobs that are about navigating. What direction are we heading? Who stays and who goes? Why?
Let’s not squabble over how well AI can *do* or *decide* something today. Instead, let's look at how fast it's learning. We'll have AI coworkers in our lives sooner than later.
Your invitation to learn more about this shift in our upcoming (free!) debate:
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/what-to-expect-when-youre-expecting-ai-at-work-tickets-590161748677
Building Trust When Onboarding New Talent
Talent User Manuals Are A Tool For Transparency
One of my favorite parts of onboarding a new team member is seeing their User Manual.
Inspired by this user manual by Pete Vowles, we ask and share:
What are some honest, unfiltered things about you?
What drives you nuts?
What are your quirks?
What are some things that people might misunderstand about you that you should clarify?
What are you working on improving?
We receive candor by giving it first. Here’s the user manual I share on day 1.
2023 Word of the Year - Texture
Managing to energy and soul fulfillment rather than task achievement.
What are some honest, unfiltered things about you?
I am driven by exceeding our client’s expectations and I detest anything that feels “just ok”. I always want to be aiming towards (but I do understand it won’t always happen!) exceptional. I was the client once. We are not always smarter or better than them and that attitude is unproductive.
I care more about the results than the “how” but if the results aren’t there - I will be extremely directive on the “how”.
I know we can’t control everything about our results - I get upset when we’re not owning the parts that we do control. That’s how we win.
I am open and frank, reflective of my own failings. Feedback is a 2 way street and I’m as open to hearing it as I am to giving it.
I can be critical. This is not due to a negative attitude but the fact that when I see problems - I want to fix them right away.
I am comfortable changing direction, shifting and adapting. I think of an established process as intended for “most of the time” with room for good judgment.
I most enjoy working at a really really high pace, with lots going on. Conversely, I lose energy in long-turnaround times/ extended deadlines where there is no sense of urgency.
I get energy from thinking about how we could do things differently. This can make me appear impatient. Sometimes I am just a raging combination of perfectionism & impatience - not a lovely combo and if you feel what I’m asking for is impossible - I definitely want to hear that from you!
What drives you nuts?
People saying they’re going to do something and not doing it. I don’t care much about the intention to do it.
People thinking one thing and saying another. For example, saying they like something and secretly thinking it’s awful. That’s unproductive and annoys me A LOT.
People being territorial, putting their interests over our collective ones.
People thinking only about what’s right in front of them -- I like thinking that includes steps 1, 2 & 3.
Flakiness, tardiness.
Making excuses or blaming others.
Finding problems and not taking responsibility for finding solutions.
People holding back ideas, trying to perfect things on their own, rather than engaging early for thoughts and feedback.
Professional people acting like victims of change and not seeing & using their own power and agency to lead change. (FYI ← I never see this on this team and love that!)
What are your quirks?
I thrive on challenge and discussion and love brainstorming ideas.
I like a clear and simple narrative, based on what things look like in practice. This is the best way to get me to understand things and grasp high-level concepts.
I love trusting people to get on with things, but I do like to be involved at key points and kept up to speed, enabling me to increase my confidence and trust in people.
Equally, I can lose confidence if I don’t hear about progress. When this happens I can start to get into details, which can feel disempowering for people.
I worry about my reputation and brand in the industry. Sometimes too much.
When I am pulled too deep into the weeds on delivery/recruitment, it makes me very cranky. Sometimes it’s very *necessary* for that to happen but it makes me feel stuck on my broader goals for the business and frustrates me.
What are some things that people might misunderstand about you that you should clarify?
Sometimes I’m giving an idea and it comes off as a directive. Sometimes I’m giving a directive and it comes off as just an idea.
Despite seeming like an extrovert, I am an introvert and days of 10 hours of meetings drain me a lot. Sometimes I’m not irritated even though I sound like it - I’m just tired.
When I challenge projects or ideas people can think I am challenging them or saying they’re doing a bad job — I don’t mean to; I am trying to provoke debate and discussion.
I don’t want to hold people back: life and careers are more important than any task we have in front of us today; I will always support people to move upwards and onward.
I genuinely want to know what people think and I can sometimes take silence from people as a sign of a lack of interest.
I thrive off change at all levels. This even applies to even the most basic things like where I sit, how I take notes, my routines etc. Sometimes I need to be told to back down and let things settle in.
What are you working on improving?
Not interrupting you all so much and waiting for the agreed upon touchpoints (ex - checking RF before firing off a slack message). This is a HARD habit to break and one that I really want to! This has nothing to do with you or your work -this is that I’m flying through doing stuff as it occurs to me but it’s disruptive and unhelpful. I must work on this. If I ask for something and you’re in a good state of flow - it’s ok & encouraged to tell me when you’ll follow up on it. You don’t have to stop everything!
Showing you how to own the client/messaging vs. being a filter -- I’m here to support you and it needs to be done well but me checking all of the work all of the time isn’t sustainable or scalable. Since I am not a good trainer I tend to fall back into directing rather than teaching without meaning to. This is typically more about my feelings & habits than your work. CALL ME OUT ON THIS.
TEAM - I want to hear about you! Please reflect & share the following. Your user guide will be shared with the team. We won’t always be perfect about not driving each other nuts -- but we will try!
Use 1-2-4-All To Hear From Everyone In A Large Group.
Try: 1-2-4-All by Keith McCandless and Henri Lipmanowicz.
Try: 1-2-4-All by Keith McCandless and Henri Lipmanowicz.
Ask your team a question, giving time for:
1 min of individual reflection
2 mins to generate ideas in pairs, building on ideas from self-reflection
4 mins of four people looking for similarities and differences
5 min of idea share from each group
Three Elements For Stronger Meetings.
Meetings don’t have to suck.
The 3 elements for meeting that don’t suck:
Novel: At least one part of this meeting is facilitated in a new or interesting way. This could range from a new brainstorming technique to unexpected snacks or just a big announcement.
Useful: The intended outcome of the meeting is clear and easy to understand. This purpose is clearly written for and said out loud. It’s clear that this should be a meeting (and not an email).
Reliable: An agenda is sent in advance including any context or supplemental info.
Align Incentives To Save Money.
The right perk is a thing of beauty.
Aligned incentives are a real thing of beauty.
For roles that don’t require daily coverage, consider what a position could look like at 80% of time, salary, benefits & responsibilities.
Many travelers, parents & side hustlers would gladly trade a 100k job for a 4-day week at 80k with benefits and a commensurate cut in responsibilities.
Is it right for everyone and every job?
Nope.
Is it a huge win/win when it’s right?
Yep.
Yeah, People Aren’t Going To Do That.
Why 70% of goals aren’t met.
Why 70% of goals fail to happen.
Too many excellent goals fail because execution relies on people (aka fallible humans) to:
work harder than they’re working now
remember all of the things that they’ve never remembered before
The most important planning step is to plan for how we’ll make it:
easy for people to do what we want
automate
remove barriers
share information + wins
incentivize + remind
clear ownership + decision making responsibility
hard for people do what we don’t want
See: guide from 1944 CIA Field Guide for sabotaging Nazi organizations:
For organizations and Conferences
Insist on doing everything through “channels.” Never permit short-cuts to be taken to expedite decisions
Make “speeches.” Talk as frequently as possible and at great length.
When possible, refer all matters to committees for “further study." Make the committees as large as possible.
Bring up irrelevant issues as frequently as possible
Haggle over precise wordings of communications, minutes, and resolutions
Re-open matters that were closed at the last meeting
Advocate “caution” and avoid haste which might result in difficulties later
Worry about propriety of any decision. Raise questions about jurisdiction and conflict with other policy
The Gift Of Giving
A semi-unorthodox way to approach to gifts.
A semi-unorthodox way to approach to gifts.
Here’s how to keep it fun and easy:
Give a clear budget ($100+ recommended) and a deadline for purchase. Be clear on parameters like tax implications for gift cards.
Assign people or do a drawing for gift BFFs (Secret Santa isn’t an inclusive term, sorry). It’s important every person only have 1 so that this isn’t overwhelming.
Provide either a corporate card or a point person who will purchase the gifts. Outlaying cash/awaiting reimbursement will really kinda ruin this.
Be clear that it’s totally ok to just ask the gift receiver what they want. Optional but again ease + the joy of giving + personalized gifts are your goals here.
Plan a fun time to exchange!
Cultivate vs. Control
This is a mindset shift for leaders.
This is a mindset shift for leaders.
You can’t control your way to an exceptional team. You can only cultivate, even if it means letting your team make a few mistakes.
Cultivating is a longer but ultimately more rewarding journey.
A Better Question Than "How Are You?"
When you ask your team member “how are you?” a lifetime of habits, conditioning and professionalism will deliver an immediate “Fine/Good/Ok”.
When you ask your team member “how are you?” a lifetime of habits, conditioning and professionalism will deliver an immediate “Fine/Good/Ok”.
Instead try, “How have you been feeling as you wrap up the day lately?”
Listen for signs of fatigue, frustration or fear.
If you hear pride and accomplishment, add fuel to that by reinforcing the good momentum.
Better Reference Check Questions
How to get the real tea from a reference.
How to get the real tea from a reference.
What does this person do that you find remarkable? What do you think they should spend more time bragging about?
Assuming they’re already great, what could this person need to work on to be twice as effective in their role?
What kind of environment would this person find really frustrating?
What job would you never give them? Why is that?
What advice would you give to their next manager?