Description

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The HRBP model is 30 years old. Most organizations changed the title without changing the work — service logic stayed, compliance logic stayed. PwC research shows only 60% of CEOs call their CHRO highly effective, despite years of transformation investment. The capability problem is real. But it's downstream of a design problem most organizations keep skipping.

This episode names what's actually broken and builds a frame for what fixes it. Jackson, Scott, and guest Phil Kirshner make the case for the Chief of Work — designed to own what no current role does: the combined output of how work is actually designed and experienced.

What You'll Learn

• You can put excellent people in a broken role and still get broken outcomes.
• HR has two fundamentally different jobs — run the business and change the business — and giving both to the same function guarantees one never gets done.
• IT, HR, and real estate each optimize their own lane; the combined output of all three has no owner, and that accountability gap has a measurable cost.
• Freeing up calendar time through AI doesn't produce strategic capability — it produces more of the same kind of work without design changes.
• The Chief of Work only works if it sits outside the functions it's reading — independence isn't a preference, it's the design requirement.

Key Quotes

"You can put excellent people into a role structurally designed to produce a service outcome, and they will produce a service outcome."

"I want to do it with you, not to you."

Sources for Statistics Cited

• 60% of CEOs describe their CHRO as highly effective — PwC Pulse Survey, 2024
• Employee engagement cited as dropping,  — Gallup Global Workplace 
• 41% of CHROs want greater depth in data analytics — Mercer 2024
• 39% of HR functions have adopted AI — SHRM 2026
• Workers using AI tools report 346% increase in time on certain tasks — NBER/Duke

Connect with Phil Kirschner

• LinkedIn
• Walk the Work Line

Because Jackson Would Want You to Have This

• "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." — The Princess Bride (1987)

Support the show

If this episode landed, the next move is yours. 

Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, Private Coaching, Mandate Protocol, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too. 

All at mytalentsherpa.com.

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In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale. 

All at getpropulsion.ai.

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CHRO podcast, CEO Podcast, Business, Management

CHRO strategy, HR strategy, talent management, leadership development, talent management podcast, human capital strategy, mandate clarity, peacetime wartime leadership, talent hat framework, leadership pipeline, senior leadership, people strategy