HIII,

I’m riding high this AM. I had the perfect weekend. The weather was great, I caught up with a friend from out of town and ended the weekend with the most perfect concert adventure.

I love weekends that are filled with my favorite things and people. When I get time to unwind during the weekends, I genuinely walk into work in such a better place!

Another thing that fills my cup? Being in community with people who get it!!

A few places where you can connect with likeminded folks:

📺 HR Therapy: Where does all your time go in HR? Genuinely asking! I’m bringing together a panel of a few fave folks to break this down. RSVP and be prepared to find out more and even get some tips on how to manage all the things on your plate. 

🎧 The pod this week is all about personal finance and what advice you need now that the world looks a lil different. AJ Ayers to discuss one of my fave topics! We also hatch a plan to start a bookshop. BRB living out my small town fantasy.

📣 Are org charts dead? Kayshia Kruger dropped that line at Safe Space Summit then proceeded to talk about work charts and the future of how we organize work between humans and AI. She was kind enough to demo what she had built for me, to which I instantly said, we have to build this live. Soooo, Claude baddies assemble! We’re taking our tasks and turning them into work charts and showing you how to do it as well.

🖥️ Safe Space Summit VIRTUAL is coming in March of 2027. RSVP so you can get all the deets on speakers, topics and more! Interested in being a speaker??? Drop a note here and I’ll be in touch. I’m pumped to get new and fresh voices on every stage.

And FINALLLLLYYY something fun you can partake in:

🫶🏽 HR is somehow responsible for making everyone feel appreciated, but rarely gets a thank-you in return?? MAKE IT MAKE SENSE. This November, we’re changing that!! Safe Space launched Pass the Thanks so we can give some love to the HR people who have kept us sane this year. Think of your favorite HR person, write them a quick note, and Safe Space will deliver it for you. Go make someones day!

Nowww onto today, the regret of laying people off for AI.

ACCOUNTABILITY

The regret is real:Copy anchor linkCopied

Let's start with the number I teased last week...

🚨 Forrester's Future of Work predictions found that 55% of employers regret laying people off because of AI. Forrester also predicts half of AI-attributed layoffs will be quietly reversed, often offshore or at significantly lower pay.

Now, that second part is a prediction. Not proof. So, I went looking for receipts (what can I say I love a theme).

Careerminds surveyed 600 HR pros in February who'd made layoffs in the past year.

Here's what they found:

• Only 8.4% said their AI restructure delivered what was promised and they'd do it the same way again.
• 35.6% had already rehired more than half of the roles they cut.
• More than half rehired within six months. Almost 1 in 5 started within three.
• 30.9% said rehiring cost more than the layoffs saved. Another 42% roughly broke even.

🤯 Read that last one again!!! the "efficiency" either cost money or was a wash. GAHHHH.

And the most common reason it didn't work? 54.6% said the AI needed way more human oversight than anyone planned for.

YOU DON’T SAY!!!!!

Klarna is the poster child here. In early 2024, it said its AI assistant was doing the work of 700 customer service agents. By May 2025, its CEO was admitting that a cost-first approach led to "lower quality," and the company started hiring humans for customer service again, through a freelance, "Uber-type" setup.

I remember being surprised that they were willing to admit they were wrong whereas many orgs are being much more quiet about what they’re learning and who they are holding accountable.

So... who's owning it?Copy anchor linkCopied

Here's the pattern that I've been seeing:

The layoff gets a beautifully worded press release, an all-hands, and def a mention at the next board meeting.

The rehire gets... a job posting. New title. Probably a lower salary. And it's quieter?

We haven’t seen many companies publicly saying “we got that wrong.” But I talk to HR people all day long about this topic and trust me, some orgs are deffff feeling this way.

And when things unravel, the cleanup usually rolls downhill: to managers whose teams got gutted, to the people left behind doing three jobs, and DUN DUN DUN to HR, who now gets to rehire the roles everyone was told weren’t needed and AI would replace. Woof.

When the cut "works," leadership owns the efficiency story. YAY.

When it doesn't, who takes the fall? Bueller???? Bueller!!!

The uncomfortable part? Forrester's read is that a lot of these cuts were made for AI capabilities that didn't exist yet. Companies were betting on the roadmap of capabilities, not the actual product. In plenty of cases, a financially driven layoff got an AI reason because it's the most investor-friendly.

Was it ever really about AI? Sometimes. But Careerminds found 53.8% of HR leaders said a clearer understanding of what the AI could actually do would have changed their decisions.

HR needs to ask these questions:Copy anchor linkCopied

I know, I know, you don't get the final call on layoffs!

A lot of the time you get looped in once the decision has already been made. :/

Here are three questions to ask BEFORE anyone cuts a role "because of AI":

1. Show me the AI doing this job today. Not the roadmap, not the demo, not the idea that it can do it BUT in production, right now. And who's responsible for it? If the answer is "the people who are left," that's not an actual cut because that work and oversight has to be reassigned. Too often I hear people saying oh AI can do that and they forget someone still has to supervise the process.

2. What's our rehire trigger, and who signs off? Name a metric, ANY METRIC (quality, backlog, customer satisfaction whatever fits) and name the owner before the layoff. If the cut doesn’t work (which it’s looking like a lot didn’t) this is your backup plan. This is what you anchor to ahead of time! You point to that metric and say it didn't improve or GASP it got worse and therefore there's a case for a rehire to be made.

3. Did we look at redeployment? In the Careerminds data, 55.1% said reskilling or redeployment wasn't even formally discussed. If a role is truly changing, the person who already knows the work is your cheapest, fastest option aka YOUR EMPLOYEES. Your talent is already onboarded into the org and has knowledge of the players and policies, why not redeploy them in a different capacity? I know a lot of employees who would rather this than be on the job market right now.

Will asking these questions make you popular in that meeting? Maybe not.

Will it make you the person with the receipts when it goes sideways? YUPPP.

Closing thoughts:Copy anchor linkCopied

As much as we may want to and have good reason for it, AI isn't the only villain here.

Unowned decisions also have an impact.

So the next time someone says a role is going away because of AI, make sure you know:

• Where the work is going to go
• Who is supervising the AI portion
• Who is held responsible for this decision
• Who is held responsible for the outcomes

✨ I have sooo much more to say, so next week is a part two! ✨

If AI as the excuse is bad, AI as the decision-maker is worse…

I’m getting into the Workday hiring lawsuit, and what happens when the tool makes a decision and nobody wants to own it. ⚖️

(HUMAN) RESOURCES

• Candidates are asking ChatGPT what employees think of your company
• Recognize asks on Nov 18: who supports HR after everyone’s BS?*
• Nvidia CEO admits to affair and things get wilder from there
• Heated Rivalry gets a theatre release

*This one is brought to you by one of my amazing brand partners

WORK-LIFE BALANCE

• 📚 What I’m reading: Creative Money by AJ Ayers. This is who I interviewed on the pod this week! This book is a must read for anyone interested in personal financial as it’s anchored in how people actually work and live TODAY. Stop getting outdated advice that isn’t relevant to you.
• 📺 What I’m watching: The Testaments. I watched the entire first season in 2 days. I watched The Handmaid's Tale as it was airing so naturally this was on my list. I’m glad I finally gave it a watch. It follows Hannah who is June’s daughter that she left behind in Gilead.
• 👀 What I’m obsessing over: Apple spiced flavored things. I’M GETTING CREATIVE with my coffee, and I fear I have leaned very hard into my fall flavors. Despite it being in the 70s this week. I’m ready for more crisp weather.

SONG OF THE WEEK

🎧 Love Ruins Everything, Tiny HabitsCopy anchor linkCopied

IF YOU WANT TO FEEL JOY YOU NEED TO IMMEDIATELY GO LISTEN TO THIS.

JUST GO LISTEN TO THIS!!!!

It's Monday, you can do this! And don't ever doubt it. <3