HBS Managing the Future of Work
Episodes
CodePath’s Michael Ellison: How reverse engineering can diversify the tech talent pipeline
12 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
There are no quick fixes when it comes to opening the tech workforce to underrepresented groups, according to CodePath’s co-founder and CEO. The sol...
SAP's Sabine Bendiek on workforce strategy
28 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As businesses struggle with post-Covid workplace models, supply chain snags, and the increasing demand for digital skills, workforce strategy is more ...
Packaging skills: FedEx Services’ flexible work strategy
14 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic and supply chain crisis are reshaping the package delivery business. What are the staffing implications and what does it mean for the log...
Credly's Jonathan Finkelstein on the evolving language of skills
31 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As work is recast in terms of skills and credentials, is the labor market awash in too much information? Credly's founder and CEO argues that more det...
Rolls-Royce: Re-engineering work while retaining institutional knowledge
17 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
As it adapts to a changing talent landscape, Rolls-Royce is experimenting with new modes of hiring, training, and managing while working to safeguard ...
Working poor to upwardly mobile: Merit America’s formula for change
03 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What does it take to move the needle on inequality and promote economic mobility? To help workers stuck in low-wage jobs, build career programs around...
MOOC to graduate degree: What the 2U, edX merger means for higher ed and skills building
20 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Edtech firm 2U's acquisition of edX, the Harvard-MIT nonprofit education venture, has the potential to advance online higher-ed and broaden access. Bu...
Can we automate our way to better decision making?
06 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has forced organizational change and spurred the development of new business models. It’s also prompted workers and the public to reexa...
Reshma Saujani on recoding work for gender equity
22 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
If it’s cool for girls to code, why aren’t more women working in technology? And why are working mothers in all sectors finding it difficult to es...
Dropbox founder Drew Houston on streamlining the digital workspace
08 Jun 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Is work-life balance possible when you’re always connected? The pandemic has forced advances in the digital underpinnings of remote and hybrid work....
Wholesale upskilling: Walmart’s workforce value proposition
26 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Businesses are getting strategic about skills building, focusing on what they and their employees need to reach their respective goals. As the largest...
Virtually present: Meta’s vision for the hybrid workplace
11 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has forced businesses to reassess how, where, and when work gets done. The competition to provision this transformation is intense. Faceb...
Can Handshake’s endless college job fair democratize employment?
04 May 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has underscored the value of distance learning and remote work and bolstered the case for virtualizing the college-to-career connection. ...
Building back a better supported federal workforce
27 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Government work has gotten a bad rap of late, even as it’s arguably more essential than ever. Can a labor-friendly administration jump-start the mod...
Micha Kaufman on the new terms of the talent bargain
13 Apr 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic took remote work mainstream. This gave a boost to online platforms for freelance professionals and highly skilled workers. Micha Kaufman,...
Working with software robots
30 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How far up the white-collar value chain is automation pushing and what's the optimal mix of human and machine intelligence? Bill Kerr interviews Danie...
Iron Mountain's hybrid workforce transformation
09 Mar 2022
Contributed by Lukas
How do you manage a digital transformation while steering a heavily frontline business through a pandemic? Iron Mountain CHRO Edward Greene explains h...
MFW research: Rethinking low-wage work
23 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
What's the business case for upgrading low-wage, high-turnover jobs? Joe Fuller joins his Managing the Future of Work co-chair and podcast co-host, Bi...
Goodwill’s Steve Preston on how to upcycle career prospects
09 Feb 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Goodwill Industries International may be synonymous with thrifting but the 120-year-old nonprofit is a major provider of workforce development and ski...
Josh Bersin on why CHROs are at the center of the action
26 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
HR is reinventing itself on the fly and under increasing pressure. HR expert Josh Bersin explains how the field is adapting to play a more varied and ...
Contingent to career: Kelly Services’ Peter Quigley on reinventing work and creating good jobs
12 Jan 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In its 75 years, Kelly Services has gone from temp agency to skills broker, outsourcing firm, workforce development provider, and source of labor mark...
SHRM’s Johnny C. Taylor Jr. on updating the HR playbook
15 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
How well is HR heeding its own advice to workers and reinventing itself to remain relevant and productive? Society for Human Resource Management presi...
Hubert Joly on humanizing the profit motive
01 Dec 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Can businesses afford to see employees in terms other than unit labor cost? How do you factor the Golden Rule into a profit and loss statement? Former...
Lisa Cook on why inclusion benefits the economy and economics
17 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Economist Lisa Cook discusses her pioneering work on the cost of exclusion—the economic consequences of innovation lost due to racism and sexism. Th...
Workforce continuity as competitive advantage
03 Nov 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Barak Eilam, CEO of customer-service AI vendor NICE, explains how fostering careers and promoting diversity helps attract tech talent.
Bringing hidden workers into focus
20 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
If workers are in short supply, why do employers continue to use digital gatekeepers that screen out millions of capable individuals? Joe Fuller joins...
Slack’s Brian Elliott: Digital-first elevates output and diversity
06 Oct 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Slack is a mainstay of remote work. But when Covid-19 hit the company behind the software had to pivot from an in-person orientation to digital-first....
Guest appearance: Joe Fuller on Enrollment Growth University
22 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Managing the Future of Work project co-chair and podcast co-host, Joe Fuller joins Eric Olsen on Helix Education's Enrollment Growth University. How c...
Cultivating an organizational growth mindset
08 Sep 2021
Contributed by Lukas
“Tiger” Tyagarajan, CEO of professional services firm Genpact, on post-Covid workforce challenges, how to foster a culture of adaptability, and th...
Coursera: From virtual lecture hall to platform for lifelong learning
25 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Coursera Chief Enterprise Officer, Leah Belsky, on how online education is facilitating workforce development, mitigating Covid job losses, promoting ...
How to make hiring more equitable
11 Aug 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Harvard sociologist David Pedulla unpacks the hiring process. How do race, gender, and work history influence the gatekeepers? What assumptions guide ...
Veeva’s distributed approach to building institutional knowledge and shared culture
28 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Life sciences cloud software company Veeva's origins as a highly decentralized organization and its early adoption of video conferencing paid off when...
People analytics: Getting from data to meaningful impact
14 Jul 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Can social science and big data help organizations have constructive conversations with their employees? People analytics is being put to the test as ...
Infrastructure: Upgrading the US labor statistics system
30 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Former Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner Erica Groshen on how better data gathering can improve careers and the economy and why it’s important...
Taking stock of Eastern Bank’s expansive community banking model
16 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Eastern Bank is betting that bigger is better when it comes to serving small businesses and supporting local communities and philanthropic causes. Unt...
AI-assisted language translation: Context is king
02 Jun 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Translators aren’t headed for obsolescence just yet. Computer-assisted language translation has come a long way, but for many jobs, you’ll still n...
Guest appearance: Joe Fuller on State of Independence
19 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Managing the Future of Work project co-chair and podcast co-host, Joe Fuller joins Aassia Haq on MBO Partners’ State of Independence. What does the ...
US plans for AI primacy
05 May 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As the US vies with global AI rivals for technological and strategic advantage, where will it find the human brainpower and skilled labor to compete? ...
Architect Stefan Behnisch on designing for a changing workforce
21 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Many architects are looking for work these days but the profession as a whole is influencing the future of work writ large. Architecture is shaped by ...
Social Finance: trainers make the grade when students get good jobs
08 Apr 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Social Finance has deftly aligned incentives around skills training. By pooling public and private resources and making job placement a shared goal, t...
Spotify’s talent play: distributed, flexible, and diverse
24 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Going into the pandemic, Spotify was well positioned for the increase in demand for streaming music and podcasts. To accommodate the surge and expand ...
Can AI and analytics deliver efficient, equitable skills markets?
10 Mar 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As employers and job seekers cope with pandemic-induced disruption and uncertainty, the role of intermediary is more crucial than ever. Job platform C...
Factoring high-skills freelancers into the enterprise equation
24 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Digital platforms for highly skilled freelancers are set to broker more strategic engagements for businesses needing extra capacity and flexibility. H...
The value of knowing what you’re about: HR, diversity, and work-life balance
17 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Self-awareness can be a strategic asset for businesses and individuals alike, says Edith Cooper. The former Goldman Sachs partner reflects on the evol...
Parsing 5G’s potential for work and learning
10 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As the realities of 5G wireless networking and the Internet of Things catch up to the hype, the effects are expected to be sweeping, from smart infras...
MIT’s David Autor on engineering more equitable growth
03 Feb 2021
Contributed by Lukas
MIT labor economist David Autor, co-chair of the Institute’s Task Force on the Work of the Future, discusses the initiative’s report, “The Work ...
Reorienting work and learning around skills building
27 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As work life morphs into an expanding series of limited engagements, education and training need to be retooled for the long haul. Workforce training ...
Safely unleashing the power of industrial robots
20 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
The idea of uncaging industrial robots may seem like a Hollywood trope, but it refers to technology that allows manufacturers to choreograph more prec...
Keeping remote workers at the center of the action
13 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
Video conferencing and other communications technologies have been a lifeline for many during the Covid-19 pandemic. But they can exacerbate existing ...
How we can avoid the robot apocalypse
08 Jan 2021
Contributed by Lukas
As AI and automation take on more and more sophisticated tasks, being human can look like a career liability. But not when you consider inherent advan...
Intermountain Healthcare: How Covid-19 catalyzes change
16 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
While hospitals battle on the frontlines of the Covid-19 pandemic, their business operations are adapting and evolving in ways that will outlast the c...
Udacity’s skills play: Closing the loop on demand and supply
09 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As jobs give way to skills as units of work, training is following suit. Udacity’s relationships with Fortune 500 companies, universities, and natio...
COOP Careers: It’s what you know and who you know
02 Dec 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Underemployment is a common trap among first-in-their-family college grads and those from low-income backgrounds and underserved communities. Kalani L...
PwC: Coaching change in times of crisis
25 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Covid-19 has accelerated many organizational trends, from remote work and digitalization to automation and a growing recognition of inequalities. Cons...
WWT: IT innovation rooted in diversity and employee wellbeing
18 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Corporate social responsibility and commitment to a local workforce can go hand-in-hand with profitability. World Wide Technology in St. Louis is mana...
Is survival on the post-Covid menu for restaurants?
11 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The restaurant industry has been especially hard-hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. Restaurants quickly shifted from indoor dining to a greater reliance on...
IBM P-TECH and SkillsBuild: Narrow the skills gap, broaden opportunity
04 Nov 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Can public-private partnerships do the heavy lifting of workforce development while promoting upward mobility? And can they help underserved groups pa...
Glint-LinkedIn: Worker sentiment informs management
28 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Polling fatigue is normal in the runup to a presidential election. Employers are finding ways to tap into worker sentiment less obtrusively. Glint-Lin...
Community colleges: AACC head Walter Bumphus on adversity and opportunity
21 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How will US community colleges emerge from the coronavirus pandemic and the economic and social disruptions of 2020? Dr. Walter Bumphus, President and...
Chattanooga bridges the digital divide to make online learning more equitable
14 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For some families online learning is a rocky road. For others it’s a dead end. To address the uneven distribution of digital infrastructure, public-...
How US community colleges can bolster the post-Covid recovery
07 Oct 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The US is facing a tsunami of demand for skills training and job placement. Its 1,100 community and technical colleges offer the best institutional in...
How San Antonio’s Project Quest facilitates upward mobility
30 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In confronting the economic and social crises roiling the US in late 2020, it helps to have deep roots in local communities. San Antonio’s Project Q...
MFW guest appearance: Joe Fuller on Braintrust's "The Way Work Should Work"
25 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What's in store for the gig economy and how will Covid-19 change the nature of work? Managing the Future of Work project co-chair and podcast co-host ...
How brain games and AI can improve HR
23 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Can neuroscience and AI improve on traditional approaches to hiring and evaluating workers? Pymetrics’ co-founder and CEO, Frida Polli, argues that ...
MFW guest appearance: Joe Fuller on Behind Bundle
18 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Managing the Future of Work co-chair and podcast co-host, Joe Fuller, is a close observer of the care economy. He recently appeared as a guest on Behi...
How Covid and BLM strengthen the case for shoring up historically Black colleges
16 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Covid-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement have focused attention on disparities in economic opportunity between Black and white America. This has a...
MFW Dispatch: Jeff Ray
09 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has unsurprisingly produced a sustained surge in streaming video, with consumer and enterprise use doubling year-over-year during the sec...
MFW Dispatch: Marissa Andrada
02 Sep 2020
Contributed by Lukas
While adapting to the limitations imposed by the pandemic, fast food chain Chipotle is looking to emerge stronger by maintaining commitments to its wo...
Braintrust takes aim at the gig platform middleman
27 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Braintrust’s gig model gives freelancers the opportunity to keep more of what they earn and to have a say in running the platform. The not-for-profi...
Cybersecurity for the post-Covid new normal of work
25 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Covid-19 and the 2020 election stack up as unprecedented infrastructure challenges. And both raise the stakes for cybersecurity. The skills shortage i...
Tulsa Remote: Live here, work anywhere
20 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Will Covid-19 empty superstar cities? While it’s too soon to say, metros outside the top tier are now in a better position to compete for talent. Th...
Google expands college-alternative tech skills training
18 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the shortage of workers with up-to-date digital skills. Tech titans like Amazon, Google, and Microsoft have r...
How Guild democratizes employer-sponsored education benefits
13 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
For many workers, company-sponsored education benefits are a perk that’s hard to translate from employee handbook to reality. Guild Education bridge...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Todd Oldham
11 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Monroe Community College in Rochester, New York, is a leader in workforce development, combining original economic research, employer partnerships, an...
Unilever’s workforce transformation: hard truths and help with change
06 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Unilever is several years into a company-wide plan to revolutionize its workforce. Faced with the challenge of selling its employees on change as oppo...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Tim Rowe
04 Aug 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The start-stop nature of business during the coronavirus pandemic demands flexibility and innovation. This is especially true for physical places of w...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Louis Gagnon
30 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The Covid-19 pandemic is triggering widespread anxiety, depression, and addiction—deepening what many have identified as a mental health crisis. A r...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Kass Dawson
28 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Covid-19 has made robots a welcome sight for many by hastening the adoption of autonomous cleaner-bots, greeters, personal assistants, burger-flippers...
Tightrope: Working-class despair and the seeds of hope
23 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists Sheryl WuDunn (HBS ‘86) and Nicholas Kristof are widely recognized for their coverage of international humanitari...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Laura Morgan Roberts
21 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
How can businesses move from awareness to action on systemic racial discrimination? In a wide-ranging discussion, Laura Morgan Roberts, an organizat...
Covid-19 Dispatch: John Pepper
16 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Is the triple bottom line a liability in a crisis? The question is anything but theoretical for John Pepper, who co-founded restaurant chain Boloco in...
Special Episode: Tsedal Neeley and Merck CEO Ken Frazier on vaccines, racism, and leadership
14 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Merck Chairman and CEO, Ken Frazier—one of only four Black CEOs in the Fortune 500—joins HBS Professor Tsedal Neeley. Topics include the necessity...
Beyond family leave: How help with caregiving benefits workers and employers
08 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic underscores US workers’ need for help with caregiving obligations. HBS graduate Lindsay Jurist-Rosner founded B2B benefits company Well...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Tsedal Neeley
01 Jul 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The wholesale shift to remote work in response to Covid-19 is a radical change and most organizations are scrambling to adapt to the complex realities...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Noah Smith
24 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
In a wide-ranging conversation, Bloomberg columnist Noah Smith candidly discusses how Covid-19 has exposed many of America’s systemic weaknesses, in...
Dexai: Machine learning in the kitchen
19 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Advances in robotics have opened the way for the ultimate in smart kitchen appliances. Draper Labs spinoff, Dexai, makes the AI brains that coordinate...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Sal Khan
15 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Khan Academy’s polyglot and free online courses seem tailor-made for a pandemic-struck globe. Not surprisingly, the platform has seen massive increa...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Stephen Kramer
11 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Will Covid-19 overwhelm the care industry and rob workers of an essential means of maintaining work-life balance, if not simply working? With the haph...
Covid -19 Dispatch: Dan Springer
09 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
As Covid-19 has made remote work the norm, DocuSign and other e-signature companies have provided the digital architecture within which parties can se...
How the next recovery can revive upward mobility
05 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Will Covid-19 derail ongoing efforts to provide skills training and meaningful career opportunities for the low-income workers who are bearing the bru...
Covid-19 Dispatch: John Barry
03 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What lessons does the 1918 influenza pandemic offer as we respond to the coronavirus crisis? Historian and public health expert John Barry joins Joe F...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Joe DeLoss
01 Jun 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Social entrepreneur Joe DeLoss discusses how his company, Hot Chicken Takeover (HCT), has negotiated the coronavirus pandemic. As a fair-chance employ...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Dan O’Connor
28 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Commerce expert Dan O’Connor rejoins the podcast for a special Dispatch episode. Dan draws on his experience advising leading retailers and his ongo...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Hayden Brown
26 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Hayden Brown has been Upwork’s CEO since January 2020, just before the coronavirus pandemic shifted much of the workforce to working from home. Upwo...
How Catalant helps align workforce and work
22 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Large firms aiming to innovate or achieve a degree of agility increasingly look for outside help. Catalant has placed itself at the crux of this dynam...
Covid-19 Dispatch: People + Work Connect
20 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Covid-19 has brought Great Depression-level unemployment to many economies and triggered imbalances of supply and demand as some businesses have neede...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Craig Malloy
18 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
What happens when a video conferencing company has to rely on its own products for its day-to-day operations? The pandemic turned Austin, Texas-based ...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Barry Schuler
14 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has radically altered the economic landscape and vastly complicated the VC market. Money is in short supply and start-ups need to run lea...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Karen Mills
11 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
Return guest, Harvard Business School senior fellow Karen Mills, is uniquely qualified to assert that the Covid-19 pandemic poses a greater threat to ...
Covid-19 Dispatch: Taso Du Val
06 May 2020
Contributed by Lukas
The pandemic has increased demand for online, remote freelance and contract work. Digital labor platform Toptal provides a market for highly skilled f...