The Future of Leadership: How to Thrive in a Changing World with Steve Cadigan

Steve Cadigan (00:01.646)

Well first I’d like to tell all leaders, I’m sorry. I am sorry you have not been equipped as much as you should have been. I’m really sorry, that’s not fair for you. You’re thrown into an impossible situation where you have more new challenges than any time in history.

Blake Schofield

Real leadership, real life, real impact. No more choosing between your career and your life. Here you’ll find honest conversations, science-backed strategies, and inspiring stories to help you thrive at work and truly enjoy your life outside of it. I’m your host Blake and I’m honored to help you create more impact with ease.

Blake Schofield (00:53.548)

Wow is all I have to say. What an incredible interview you’re about to listen to. Steve Cade again is my guest today. He’s a globally sought after advisor on talent strategy and the future of work. He’s LinkedIn’s first CHRO and helped scale the company from 400 to 4,000 employees, shaping a culture that inspired a graduate level course at Stanford University. He’s been named a top 100 global thought leader in people and talent since 2021 and is the author of the acclaimed book WorkQuake.

Steve and I had such a powerful and broad-based conversation about the future of leadership and how it demands more human skills, not more speed. We dug into so many of the critical things that leaders experience through their own journey, as well as what’s really happening in work today. Steve has an incredible career, and in this interview, he shares the leadership principles that shaped his career across six different industries. There are a few leaders with the level of breadth and depth of experience that Steve has, that you get the opportunity to learn from. I’m grateful that he joined me on the podcast and I hope that you leave just as inspired and with some real key insights to take forward to level up your leadership and your life.

Blake Schofield (02:21.29)

Steve, thank you so much for joining me today on Impact with Ease. Like I said, I’ve been really looking forward to our conversation and I am just really appreciative of you taking the time today to share your knowledge, experience and perspective with my audience.

Great. Well, it’s great to be here. I’ve been looking forward to it too.

Thank you. So for those who don’t know you, could you just give a little quick background about who you are and how did you end up on the path that you are on today?

Steve Cadigan

Sure. Let’s see, I accidentally discovered human resources as a career path about a year into my journey. I graduated as history major with no plans, no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I started school with no idea and I finished school with no idea. And then I found a job in the fashion industry pretty quickly in a company that was going to rotate me around. And the second rotation was recruiting and I just fell in love with it. And I fell in love with it because so much of what I love about athletics and competition and sport and trying to find the best combination of people to win.

is so much of what human resources is about. And I am an athlete, but I’m also a big sports fan. And that just, you know, it was a magic moment for me, sort of an origin story, like, whoa, you’re going to, you pay people to do this stuff? This is great. Over the, you know, probably 30 working years in a job, I worked in six different industries, fashion, insurance, and then I got into high tech semiconductor. And then it was love at first sight for me with high tech because of the dynamism of decision making and the really fluidity of the cultures. And I hit Silicon Valley at a really big inflection point of massive growth. So I hit it at the right time, sort of the early nineties, if you will. I had probably the biggest adventure for me was working for a company called Cisco Systems where we were doing lots of &A and we worked on, I worked on a team that did about in four years, 50 acquisitions in four years. And one year we did 23 and had 13 going on at the same time, which was just.

So amazing and you know that kind of &A work is really fraught with lots of emotion and lots of complexity and I found myself operating really well in that environment and really liking the craziness of it. I’m a bit of a change junkie.

I had a chance when I was at Cisco to be offered a position to run human resources for all of Asia. So I moved to Singapore, lived there for a couple of years. And from there, after being at Cisco for six years, I was recruited to be a head of HR for a company in Canada. So went to British Columbia for four years, amazing years. I love Canada, love Western Canada. And then got back to the U.S., working for a video game company, Electronic Arts. And then the sort of the big break moment for me was I was offered to be the first chief HR officer for LinkedIn.

in the very early years. And as I assumed the helm of that role on the leadership team, we went from 400 to 4,000 people from two offices to 26 and for two countries to 17. And it was four years that felt like 20. And so I had a great run there and was ready for a change. Four years is kind of a magic number for me. The only place I worked longer was Cisco for six, but I was after four, I went to Asia for two. So that doesn’t really count as six, it’s more like four and two. But I left LinkedIn 12 years ago and I have been

Working, coaching, mentoring, advising, collaborating with leaders, organizations, and in some cases, countries and cities around the world, helping build better talent strategies. I published a book in 2021, right after the pandemic, around what’s called Workwake, building a better future work and leveraging the aftershocks of COVID-19. And most of my time today is spent helping these organizations, but also speaking at conferences and universities around the world. So love what I do, just love what I do.

Blake Schofield (05:50.766)

I can feel that passion and what diversity of experience that you’ve had. I also just reflect and love the self-awareness of your own patterns. I had a mentor that often talked about this, understand your own patterns and don’t fight them. He talked about it in terms of the ability to understand your level of change. For example, right, if you’re a person that needs a high level of change,

Don’t beat yourself up that you don’t get a 30 year mortgage on a house. That is not who you are meant to be except and own that that’s what that is and then build your life around it. I too am somebody who for me it was about every two, two and a half years when I was in corporate something new. And as an entrepreneur for the last eight and a half constantly have evolved what I do because I like you am constantly looking at how do you continue to improve, innovate, move things forward and.

I think there’s a true gift in being able to see and understand those things about yourself and plan your life and your career accordingly.

Yeah, you know what’s really interesting, you know, speaking about change and why some people move and one of the biggest trends that concerns a lot of my clients today is the fluidity of the workforce. The median tenure for Americans in professional jobs today is about four years and it used to be 10 years ago, it used to be five. So it’s coming down. But the most dramatic stat is if you break down the age range, people from 20 to 35, the median tenure right now is about 2.4 years.

And so you talk to more senior executives and they’re like, Hey, this is a really disloyal sugar high, you know, know, kind of generation that’s entering the workforce. And I, and I couldn’t disagree more. said, no, this is a workforce that has more choice and opportunity and more new industries to paralyze their decision-making and more fear. But also I think many of the architect pieces of architecture work are broken such as

Steve Cadigan (07:45.762)

Wall Street Journal published an article recently that says if you stay in the same company more than two years, your salary growth trajectory is almost 50 % less. And most people have figured out if I move, you know, I can make more. But more than that, if you ask, and I ran a poll on LinkedIn a few months ago and I asked, hey, where did you find the biggest leap in your career journey? Was it staying in the same company? Was it moving to another company or was it starting your own business? And 70 %

of the people said either starting my own business or going to another organization. And I think we all see people in sort of static ways. And if we go somewhere else, someone may see more in us. And it’s just sort of a weird human nature thing that’s breaking, you know, how corporations have built models of compensation and retention. just, it’s not working today because people can see if I go somewhere else, I’m probably gonna make more money and probably people are gonna think more of me if I go somewhere else versus, you know, the companies see

I see the grass is greener at new company, but the company also sees me as more green opportunity. And it’s just an interesting dynamic that is being exposed today in this greater fluid world of work that we live in.

So fascinating. know, I found that to be true decades ago. I worked at five different retailers across 18 years. And so I don’t think it’s a new phenomenon, but I do think to your point, there’s so much more knowledge and sharing of knowledge than there ever used to be. And what I also see is often organizations, don’t really take the time or understand how to develop their internal talent.

So there becomes a complacency for that individual that that individual must learn how to develop themselves and develop those opportunities. And that’s a huge part is I end up working with so many of my clients, helping them better understand the scope of their skills and how they can create their own growth development inside their organization, which ultimately, right, either helps propel them into new roles or they do find something different. But

Blake Schofield (09:47.842)

I believe those skills are more important than ever. It’s interesting you mentioned Gen Z. One of the things I read is they actually have more anxiety as a generation than almost all the others coming up with that. And so you have all of these choices and all of this anxiety coupled with a deep desire to be more developed, have more feedback. These are things that organizations, historically, you either are strong in that or you aren’t. But the level of development and feedback that Gen Z wants is much higher than prior generations.

And how in a world where there’s so much change, are we able to do the tops down change and also the bottoms up development? To me, that is the opportunity that I see, but I’m interested in your perspective on that. Is that something that you see as a challenge or an opportunity too?

Steve Cadigan

Well, I think here, I think that one of the pure facts in the world of work right now is that most organizations need newer skills faster than any time in history. We just need newer skills. So you have three pathways to realize that outcome. First, do you agree, you know, if you’re a business leader that I need newer skills faster than ever before? And the answer is usually yes. Okay. So do you want to recruit your way into those new skills? Do you want to develop your way into those new skills with your, with your team? Or do you want to do both?

You know, and that’s sort of the dilemma. And the truth is what I find really interesting is that if there’s ever a downturn in most organizations, and this is in my wheelhouse of human resources, if there’s ever a downturn, the first team that usually gets let go is the training and development team. You know, that’s, that’s like a nice to have. And today, if you, if that’s how you’re thinking about it, I think you’re really missing out. Now, do you need a training and development team to develop people? No, not necessarily.

If you have developed your leaders and managers to be coaches, mentors and growth counselors, fine. But the truth is, I feel like traditional educational institutions and businesses are both ill equipped to handle the growing skill gap that we have right now. And, you know, so that’s an issue, right? It’s a big issue. And I think the only way through this is we’re going to start to see in the next few years. And this is a bit radical, but I do believe this and the schools that are thriving and the businesses that are thriving are starting to figure this out. We’re going to start to see universities and enterprises start to merge. We’re going to start to see those boundaries become more permeable. And when I’ve been working for big organizations, it’s always been helpful if you’re recruiting a lot of new grads to go deep in there and have some of your, you know, managers teaching classes and your leaders teaching classes and vice versa, giving the school some projects to do so you can sort of see who the sharp talent is and try to recruit them and so forth. But

That’s the only way I see through this because you are not gonna recruit your way through this problem. It’s just an endless loop that you’ll be chasing all the time. And by the way, as you mentioned, I 100 % agree around the need and the thirst to learn growing, not just in the Gen Z, but in the entire workforce because things are changing really fast. I don’t want job security. I want something bigger. want career security. Make me better for an uncertain future. And don’t promise me a job. If you did, I don’t believe you, but promise you’re gonna make me better so that when the inevitable

Big order from the customer gets canceled. Some competitor comes out of nowhere. We got to cut staff. I’m okay because I’m doing that. And I agree with you. I’m not going to wait for my company to do that, but I’m more inclined to go work somewhere where they’re going to move me around. They’re going to give me new challenges. And that’s something that’s really top of mind for me right now. And if we go up a step on this whole notion of development, leadership development is sort of a disappearing function right now. It’s just not happening.

And that’s leading to lots of really bad outcomes, unfortunately, but most organizations are not building to be around in a hundred years today. Think about that Blake. Like if you ask all your friends the next time you have a dinner party, Hey, what companies are developing clearly people because they know they’re to be around in a hundred years. Usually can cue the crickets music because there’s not a lot of answers to that. And I’m not blaming anyone or not sort of casting sort of like

Hey, blame on someone because you’re not thinking wisely or smart about the future. I think it’s a reality that technology is moving so fast. How dare I think that my company could be around in a hundred years. Someone’s probably going to acquire me or take me out and I don’t know that I can be around. So why would I develop my leaders? I’m trying to survive for 10 years here. And I think that’s where a lot of organizations are really struggling or they’re dealing with lots of new competitive threats and it’s taking their eye off of, Hey, the way we build value is through people.

Steve Cadigan (14:20.63)

Is that really the most important investment of our time and resources, right?

Yeah, I could not agree with you more. was at an amazing event earlier this week with a gentleman who’s a second generation CEO of a leading of Linn products. So they make like the most high end music and stereo systems. And what I heard from this CEO were proven principles that I know to be true. He really understood the importance of people.

He understood the importance of simplicity and clarity behind the goals of the organization and how to really look at his team and understand the frustrations they were experiencing and reorient the operations around enabling them to be empowered to create and innovate and move things forward.

My experience and what I’ve consistently seen over and over and over again is that organizations today are moving so fast, like what you’re talking about, that there’s panic, there’s fear, there’s anxiety. And what we know is that when you’re in those types of situations, your creative problem solving part of your brain completely shuts down. You can’t innovate, you can’t move things forward. And then your leaders have such a huge gap between the workload that they had

the pressures of AI, the pressures of all of these things that are trying to be implemented, and they’re lacking the skills to deal with that level of uncertainty, that level of having to create and innovate the way of which they and their teams work. And for years, I’ve been teaching how to give yourself career security, just like what you’ve talked about. There are skill sets that are so sorely needed in our teams and our leaders today, because the reality is HR cannot do it all.

Blake Schofield (16:13.89)

There’s no one size, in my opinion, so I’m interested in yours, but from my opinion, there’s no one size fits all to deal with burnout, to deal with employee engagement. Individual leaders need to understand their needs and feel empowered to be able to partner tops down and bottoms up to create that. And in a world that’s moving as fast as it’s moving today, to me, that’s the place I look and say, this is what we need to be able to move organizations forward into the future to succeed.

Yeah. And you know, that takes us down a really interesting conversation road, which is usually if you combine what I said earlier, which is we have the most fluid workforce since we’ve been measuring tenure and turnover. Like we got more people leaving faster. Not only that, we got more people making career pivots and industry changes in their career paths than any time in history. We’ve got more people with multiple jobs than any time in history. And so when you say you got a skill gap, you need to fill it. People are like, why would I do that? Because they’re going to leave anyway.

And you know, the joke is, well, what if you don’t do that and they stay, you know, number one, but number two, you have no choice. You know, you got to do it. And by the way, if they do go and you made them better, won’t they more likely be an angel referring their friends, referring future business to you? Isn’t that just the right thing to do? And one of the things that I’m seeing, I’ve been on two major college campuses in the last month. One was in Portugal and one was in Los Angeles.

The students are shell shocked right now. Internships are drying up. This whole narrative around, AI is eating up entry-level jobs. like, well, if that’s the case, we’re really in for a problem down the road because maybe we’ve undercalled where entry-level people should be coming in. If you’re bringing them in at the baseline, maybe that’s a mistake. Maybe you should be bringing them in higher, using AI to make your entry-level staff come into intermediate levels. mean, that’s the…

That’s the way you solve it. Like, because if you’re saying, oh, let’s get AI to replace entry level work, how’s that going to play out for society? You know, that’s really, really short-sighted thinking and really, really scary. And I really feel for these students right now, they’re just like, Hey, you know, lot of the major consulting firms that have done tons of new grad recruiting have cut way, way back as they’re trying to figure out, Hey, our biggest opportunity is consulting on AI, but we don’t know anything about it. So let’s go figure it out. And you heard the CEO of Accenture a few weeks ago say, Hey,

Steve Cadigan (18:31.106)

We just told our organization if they don’t upskill fast enough, they’re out. I’m like, whoa, that’s a really interesting message for the CEO to send speaking more to investors than they are to recognizing, hey, the employees are listening to what you’re saying too, you know, like that. Is that really the approach? Like you figure it out or you’re out. And it’s just a really interesting, know, getting, taking our conversation now into this sort of this domain of, AI, which as you say, is presenting this whole notion of fear. The narratives all around job loss and replacing people with technology. And it’s just not the environment. Like, why don’t we hear more stories about AI elevating people and making jobs more interesting and impactful and creating more value. And that’s where I’m telling leaders like, Hey, if you’re first beating your chest on investor call and how you’re leveraging AI is that you cut 400 customer service jobs. How’s it going to work for your recruiting and your retention? Like people are just going to ask themselves, when’s my number coming up? I guess I better get in front of that and find a new job for myself if that’s how leadership’s thinking about it, right?

is interesting at the event that I was at. One of the leaders who was there was talking about one of the ways of which society was dealing with what was, you know, the burnout and all of the changes that happened with COVID is like, create boundaries and just go to work, do work and separate that from your life. And to me, I think part of what we’re seeing is a result of that. When people have no passion around their work,

When they feel like I’m just checking in to do what I need to do and leaving, what types of organizations are we actually creating? When we know fulfillment, enjoying the people that you work with, feeling that the work that you do is meaningful is so important to organizations thriving. And so I just am grateful to have this conversation with you because I feel like there’s so much opportunity to speak to maybe some of the narratives that are happening around leadership and how to deal with transformation in AI that are leading in the wrong direction. And the history and the proven principles would show that to be true. Knowing how many transformations that you’ve been in and how much you’ve been exposed to globally. I’m interested in your perspective if you could speak to leaders today that are dealing with all of these rising challenges. What are the perspective shifts that you would give them?

that you think are important to help them move through this and when.

Yeah, well first I’d like to tell all leaders, I’m sorry. I am sorry. You have not been equipped as much as you should have been. I’m really sorry. That’s not fair for you. You’re thrown into an impossible situation where you have more new challenges than any time in history. This leadership generation is facing like an impossible scenario. The future is harder to predict. There’s more change and more challenge. Reid Hoffman, when I was at LinkedIn, said something one time when he was asked, hey, who’s your biggest competitor?

He says, my biggest competitor is the company that hasn’t been invented yet that could come out of nowhere and build a new paradigm. Like that’s just fundamentally paranoia inducing, right? It’s really, really hard. And I guess my advice is go watch what Brene Brown said last week at that conference with I’ve seen, you know, countless videos on, and it was an article about it in fortune magazine, which is going to be something I’m writing an article about. But essentially she said, if you’re managing people today, you know, they’re not okay. And that’s hard.

You know, and you’re taking that on in a world that is filled with polarization more than any time in history. That’s filled with disagreement. We’ve got more, you know, job fluidity and people moving around. you know, the whole model of work is the best teams are the ones that stay together the longest. But you ask any leader, hey, do think people are going to stay in your company longer tomorrow? The answer is probably not. OK, so we’re trying to build this new model, which is how do we create value when people are staying with us for shorter periods?

Steve Cadigan (22:15.214)

which can happen by the way, there’s a lot of great examples, particularly in technology. That’s not a prerequisite, but we’re not really helping them. So the way I think about it is I think we need to create more space to have conversations for people to say, I’m not okay. This AI stuff’s threatening me. And I’d like to talk about, you know, what’s the company’s position on that? Because most companies are not having an AI philosophy. Like our AI philosophy is make jobs greater, not eliminate jobs. Like everyone’s sort of waiting to see. I think that’s what I would try to do. Try to create a little more space. Don’t put your health and wellness on the side. Find time to exercise. This is something I did not do well when I was running the crazy show at LinkedIn. I put aside healthy eating and healthy exercise and that did not end well for me. You’re not sleeping well and then you wind up, just have another beer to sort of lighten the burden of the stress I’m feeling. It’s not a good path, right? And so I think be mindful of that and tap into some mentors and coaches and get help. There’s no way you can know everything.

how to handle everything today. Like just get some connections. There’s a wonderful organization out there called the Personal Boardroom. It’s completely free. It’s two women in the UK that I’ve done some work with, Zella King and her partner, and they have come up with a great methodology for, every company’s got a boardroom. Every executive, every leader should have their own board. And it should be comprised of like nine or 10 disciplines, like someone to challenge you, someone to, you know, who’s there for you to cry on their shoulder when you’re, when you need it, someone to push you, someone to get you motivated, someone who thinks differently, someone who’s completely out of your industry, who thinks about things differently, someone to brainstorm. Like all these components I think are really healthy and take the time to invest in that. And I know many of you who are feeling that stress are saying, oh, I don’t have time to do that. Yes, you need to make time for that because it’s in those quiet moments. All the research says it’s those quiet moments of downtime when the greatest thinking happens. It’s not after 30 back-to-back Zoom calls the first two days of your week, right? And this is the world that we built for ourselves, right? That’s why I’m saying let’s use AI to buy back some more time, to buy back those moments of deep reflection. When I went to Singapore for two years, one of the most interesting changes for me personally was not one of the ones that I was paying attention to, which was in California, had usually a 30 to 45 minute commute in the morning and the evening. In Singapore, didn’t have a car, took a taxi five minutes in the morning, five minutes the evening. And I missed that moment of taking a breath, listening to the news, thinking about something else or having a phone call with a friend on that drive to sort of take me out of that crazy train, you know, if you will. And I think, you know, we need to try to help our leaders find ways of feeling like that’s a strength, not a weakness, you know, having that time. And I’ve been thinking a lot about that lately. I don’t know, what are you seeing in that regard?

Yeah, well, a huge focus of mine is actually helping people get out of those cycles of being drained and going through burnout because that was my journey. I was the leader that was working 60, 70 hours a week that got caught in that hamster wheel, always believing it will be better when it’d be better when this project will be over. And I had to learn a different way to lead and live. And I believe we’re in that era where leaders, it’s now not nice to have, it’s a necessity.

We have to learn how to show up differently, how to use and actually work with how our brains are naturally wired to work so that we can thrive, so we can perform at our highest level. I feel like we’ve spent decades operationalizing businesses and optimizing businesses and systems, but not optimizing people. My personal journey helped me to be able to see each one of us is uniquely wired to thrive in our own way. And then when you layer on how

our nervous systems, our bodies and our minds work, when you can couple those and really understand that about yourself, you can find your own efficiencies. You can find your own ways of shifting how you’re working, how you’re accomplishing things to optimize. And to me, that’s where I’ve seen leaders really be able to two to three times increase their productivity and create that space, Steve, where it’s like, I actually have space in my day to take a break.

So when I show up to that meeting, I’m present, I’m able to be creative. I’m not thinking about five or six things at one time. I have the skills to disconnect when I go home and enjoy my family. I can look at the stressors happening and I can take a step back and say, does all of this really matter? What really moves the needle? And I think these are skills that so many of us haven’t been taught.

Blake Schofield (26:51.81)

But in a world of uncertainty, in a world of so much information, in a world of the levels of burnout we’re seeing, it now is something that I believe fundamentally every leader needs to understand in order to be able to succeed in today’s world and not end up honestly in a hospital room because of a heart attack or cancer or all these other things I’m seeing.

Right, right. Yeah, you’re, you know, lot of signals in my brain are firing listening to you. And I cannot sit in front of any audience and say, you know, that I figured it out, the magic math. And I was doubly cursed by being a perfectionist and being in a service role. There was no end to the service you could do in human resources. Like there was no end, like you could literally go 24 hours. having started my career pre-internet, pre-mobile phone, there was a joy to that time.

of just like you leave the office and nobody finds you. No one calls you. There is no email coming at you. And that was a, that was a beautiful moment. So I know difference. have an AB test just like, let’s like you probably do. And so I look now and I just go, man, like this is really hard. Like you have to teach people. And the biggest advice I got from a coach was like, you got to say no. Like, what do mean? I got to say no. Like I have that, I have the opportunity to say no, but people are going to be like, I didn’t think I have that right to say no.

You know, and I think that’s, that’s really hard in a, what feels like a relentless reality right now, but that’s so important. And there’s so many other ingredients that I started to learn about myself, such as what kind of work is my wheelhouse and what is out of my wheelhouse. And if it’s not in my wheelhouse, I shouldn’t be doing it because it’s going to take longer for me to get it done. So I’ll give you an example, compensation in the domain of HR, not something that I get wake up in the morning going, can’t wait to solve that complex compensation issue.

So I need to surround myself with people who know how to handle that better than I do. that, you know, plus what kind of boss brings out the best in me, make sure that if I have a choice of bosses or roles that I go into that the attributes I’m looking for or someone who’s more of a coach, not a task master, right? That doesn’t work for me. In fact, if you’re asking me for updates every five minutes, it’s just gonna, I’m, this is not going to work for me. Right? So there’s so many things that contribute to that. Do you like working on short projects? Do you like working on long projects? Do you like working like when I

Steve Cadigan (29:07.764)

started doing &A at Cisco, I realized, my gosh, human resources in its natural form has no end. It’s just constant farming, constant farming, which is great. And you get to improve the crops every year and you get to see how your leaders handle certain situations. next season of performance reviews or next season of recruiting, I know how to coach them better. But what was great about &A is like, we announced it, there’s a beginning, there’s a close, there’s an end, there’s some follow up, and then there’s a new one.

And I love that sense of completion and sense of closure. So what did I look for after that &A, I want to make sure that I’ve got pieces in my day to day that have closure because that’s gratifying to me. And also that kind of work comes with a little bit of applause. Like it’s super high stress, but you form bonds with your teammates because you’re working all these crazy hours and it’s not the leave at five o’clock and you don’t really get to know you’re, you know, you’re on a business trip with someone and you’re getting to hear all their personal stuff and you’re sharing your stuff. So now, now,

you know, the glue is stronger, right? And that’s more meaningful to me, you know, and that’s kind of, so I learned that about myself over my journey is we all start with a real lack of awareness of where do do our best work and what are we really good at and what kind of people do we want to be around? We don’t really know. And so hopefully from one role to the next, you’re getting closer and closer to what that looks like. And I think what’s really hard right now is, you know, I was talking to some students about this last week, which is like, hey,

We have more new industries that have been created in last 10 years. I said, do you think it’s going to slow down? I go, no. Okay. So what happens with a new industry? New set of career paths, crypto, Bitcoin, blockchain, air scooters, driverless technology. Do you think it’s going to slow down? No, it’s not. So that’s hard because now you have all these things, all these worries about what should I study? What skills should I build to prepare me for all these new industries? And I say, I know the answer. You’re not going to like it, but the answer is build the capacity to learn new things quickly.

That’s the only super skill that you know for sure is going to help you not chasing. What was the hottest skill demanded five years ago or four years ago was prompt engineer, an AI prompt engineer, how to extract great insights from AI. Well, now the AI has got so smart. You don’t need a prompt engineer. It’s disappeared. There’s no postings for prompt engineers now. So if you were chasing that, well, you’re disappointed, right? You missed out. But if you focused on

Steve Cadigan (31:31.936)

I wanna be the person who’s learning quickly. Well, now that’s a superpower, right? And that’s where the companies, think, and when we talk about bridging the skill gap, people are like, we don’t have time to take classes. I’m like, I’m not talking about classes. I’m talking about give your people new assignments, new challenges, new experience, put them on some virtual teams, give them some things that are gonna continue to grow them so when they do need to flip in something new, it’s not starting from zero, right? And so that, and that’s the new kind of thinking I think that

that leaders we all have to take on, but it’s really hard because there’s no benchmark out there. There is no like, hey, did anyone know anyone during the industrial revolution? Because that was probably the other time in history where things were crazy. And no, no one’s been through a post pandemic world where the workforce is seeing their stock differently. The need and desire to work remotely has never been greater. And there’s a lot of challenges going out there right now. Has anyone been through that before? No. Okay. So we’re all trying to become the benchmark right now. And that’s really hard and scary, right?

And that’s why I think if you’ve got a culture of experimentation, you’re going to have a real advantage. Anyway, you got me going here, Blake.

There’s so much I want to say to what you shared. I believe the things that light us up that we’re passionate about are signs and signals of alignment. And to your point, what lights you up and what you love about the work that you do might be horrible for someone else who doesn’t want that type of circumstance.

And so when you talk about a world of so much globalization, so much data, so many opportunities and choices, I 1,000 % believe becoming a lifelong learner and understanding how to learn and apply new skills and personal development is critical. actually, through many decades of my own personal journey, came to really understand what I call the four levels of learning. And it’s really about fundamentally the way we’ve taught people to learn.

Blake Schofield (33:26.56)

especially when we’re talking about skill or personal development, is very surface level and incomplete. It doesn’t actually help you learn how to engage and embody that level of learning. so becoming a lifelong learner isn’t just consumption. It’s how do you learn how to take that information and that skill and embody it in who you are so that you’re constantly raising the floor.

It’s something that I was incredibly gifted through the mentors that I’ve worked with and have been able to teach people this skill. And I believe that’s part of job security. It’s absolutely how I’ve continued to level up. My clients have continued to level up. But the secondary piece to me is, yeah, how do you become a lifelong learner? How do you engage in uncertainty and build the level of trust that you can continue to up-level and develop your skill every day, every week, every month, every year. But also in a world of so much opportunity and so much chaos and change, how do you create certainty? To me, so much of that is the self-development and understanding of self, because here’s the reality. There can be millions of new industries and roles, but if they’re not aligned with what your skill set is or how you’re naturally, I…describe what I call as your unique fingerprint for success.

I have identified that everyone has a natural pattern behind all of their successes, both personally and at work. When you understand the pattern for how you create success naturally, that’s not job specific, it’s not industry specific. What it does though is help you have a base to come from. I’m like, this is what I’m passionate about. This is how I create results. Now, if an industry changes or my job goes away, I can look at that pattern and say, huh, okay, how do I apply this pattern to that next role or that next industry or that next thing I want to do? And so there is more of a core of stability in yourself where you can then use that to apply in different ways. And I think most of us, to your point, most of us have learned these things about ourselves through changing jobs.

Blake Schofield (35:36.364)

I worked at five different organizations in 18 years. Each job I was learning, I like this kind of boss, I like strategy, I don’t like this. That’s a very slow process to learn these skills. And in a world that’s moving as fast as it is today, I believe people need four to five times faster approach to learn those things about themselves so that they have more stability and safety in themselves. And the ability to understand, here’s how I operate this.

here’s how I can continue to learn. And then whatever chaos is happening around me, I now have some stability to know how to leverage that to my advantage. I think people feel powerless because they don’t have that. And in a world of chaos, we need some form of control to feel safe. And so at least from my vantage point, my experience, that’s the approach I take is if you have those things, it gives you a foundation and a feeling of

the ability to control what you need to control in a world that feels uncontrollable.

Yeah, that’s so comforting and so true. And I think the more you can invest the time to sort of become aware of that and get feedback from people. Like I’ve been in certain situations where I thought this doesn’t really suit me. And then I would talk to someone else and they go, but you’re really crushing. You really do like this. like, but what you’re saying is it’s really hard, you know? Yeah, it’s really hard, but I do like that level of so, you know, and challenge yourself and surround people to do that. I was on campus yesterday teaching a bunch of classes.

at Chapman University, where one of my boys is a freshman and just talking about job search and so forth like that and how impossible, know, fielding a bunch of questions. Anyway, someone asked a wonderful question. We were talking, was the subject was interviewing. He goes, are there any good questions to ask to know what the culture is like? Right there. And I paused for a second and said, you know, if you’re in an interview,

Steve Cadigan (37:31.476)

and you’re asking what the culture is, said, I don’t know that I would, that’s where I would go to find out what the culture is. said, I wouldn’t do that. Like I would go on a whole bunch of different places. I talked to people who aren’t, who you’re not interviewing with, or talk to people who used to work there, who are in different departments and try to find someone who’s a similar sensibility to you and how they’re doing there and what it’s like, cause that’s, so they’re going to give you the blah, blah, blah, right? You’re not, and by the way, what they think’s a great culture.

It might not be what you think is a great culture. You just don’t know. And so I think don’t waste time trying to come up with that really cool question on culture. Just observe and ask things like who gets promoted around here or when’s the last time someone screwed up and what happened to them? And just ask some sort of like if there’s moments that you want to like, is this a real experimentation culture? Cause I think those are the companies that or how often do people move around and change roles? Because that’s going to be a tell around. Are they really interested in developing you?

Right. Or not. And if they say something like, after, you know, 17 years, Susan finally got promoted. I’m like, 17 years. Whoa. Okay. Well, thank you for telling me. Right. Like now I know. And then the other thing that sort of came up is like, I was telling, and this is really, I love engaging with students. said, they were like, well, what’s, what’s the most important thing in an interview? said, the most important thing for you to know is that most people don’t know how to interview. That’s the most important thing for you to know. Come in there with your four or five points.

And if you get stuck in that awful interview where the person wants to be your friend and you’re sitting there going, wow, this is so easy. They haven’t asked me any hard questions. That should be a flag to you. They don’t know anything about you now. Do not finish that conversation by landing something. And it’s not their fault. They’re really busy. They’re behind and they didn’t get training or they missed it because they were too busy to attend the interview training. Only interview. I said, that’s the greatest advice I could give you. And they’re just not ready for that. They’re like, give me the great killer question or the great answer.

I’m like, yeah, no, the right answer is that person probably doesn’t know what they’re doing. So come in ready, just like, you know, if you’re interviewed on TV or radio, like no matter what they ask you, this is what you’re going to say. Right? Like a good politician will always take a question that they don’t want to answer or that it’s not helpful for their agenda. They’ll pivot and say something like,

Steve Cadigan (39:46.094)

Well, you know, what I think about when I hear that question is this and they just go with it, right? So just quickly going 90 degrees to the side, but that’s sort of the, you know, the reality that I think we’re in is that a lot of people are in roles trying to do the best that they can. And they’ve probably not been super equipped with it. And I think the macro point you made is a, is a really great one, which is that moment of trying to make sure you know where you do your best work, where you just are firing away and you have something the company needs and they’ve got something you want.

That’s the place that you want to be, you know? And careers are really experiments. Like we just don’t, like there’s so many places that you would think, and having this argument with my son, one of my sons recently, he’s like, I was like, Hey, there’s this company over here and they do medical equipment and they’re really phenomenally great at developing. He was like, Dan, medical equipment just doesn’t do it for me. And I go, women’s fashion didn’t do it for me, but that was one of the coolest places I’ve ever worked. You know, it’s like really, is that really important to you? Or is the importance of growth and development and new challenges?

And that was just really hard to take his head off of. That’s not sexy. I don’t know why I don’t want to go work there. said, but the work could be really sexy. You know, it’s like super interesting, right?

There’s so much in what you’re saying I fundamentally agree with that you really have to understand what is the type of environment, how is the work come together, what does my day to day look like, that really is what crafts a fulfilling career. And when we don’t know those things, we can often focus on things that don’t make a real difference. mean, right, the data has shown for years, companies, organizations put in all these perks, pay people more.

The satisfaction from that for the employee is very short-lived because how we really feel on a day-to-day basis is what matters. And if you don’t understand what those things are for you, it makes your job search very difficult. It makes leadership difficult. The reality is leaders are more stretched than ever before for themselves, for their team. You’re right. Leaders know their team is not okay.

Blake Schofield (41:49.9)

That is added pressure for the leader, because not just this leader not okay, but they want to make sure their team’s okay. Your leader can only see so much about who you are and what you need. so personal investment and understanding and learning those things about yourself ensures that you can weather any storm, that you can develop yourself, that you can ask for what you need, that you can innovate if…

the ways projects or operations are going don’t work. And I know it’s in some ways maybe a radical thought, right? Because employees and leaders think that the development should be tops down. And I’m not saying that it shouldn’t be. I’m just saying it’s not working anymore. That old process and system has too large of a gap. So how can we then take over and say,

I’m responsible for my career in life. I’m responsible for the trajectory of what I do. Let me develop what I need so that no matter what new leadership comes in, no matter what changes come, I know what I need and I can ask for that and I can continue to develop my skillset no matter what. And I think that’s what students need, but I think that’s really what all of us need in a society and environment that is changing as fast as it is.

100 % and you just reminded me of the second part of my answer to his question, is, listen, I would invest. know you want to know what the culture is and that’s a really smart question and you probably hit their business majors, you know, so that’s really smart. But I said, I would invest more time in understanding who my boss is because my boss is going to shape my culture experience more than any company culture slide deck or any sort of set of company values. It’s like your daily experience is going to be shaped by that person. So.

invest more in understanding their sensibilities and what matters to them. And if you will, if that is something that might work for you and if you don’t, if you’re not sure, just keep poking, keep poking until you have sort of your instincts are telling you, okay, I think this is something I could work. Cause I’ve worked in places where people told me, that company, you don’t want to go work over them. That boss, he’s a monster. Like don’t do it. And I walked in and was like, couldn’t, completely different experience. Nope. Yes. The culture was struggling, but my boss was struggling too. And he was miserable. And

Steve Cadigan (44:04.576)

Once he admitted to me like, this isn’t going the way I wanted to, can you help me? I was like, okay, yes, you want my help? Yes, let’s go. Like, let’s do this. And it’s gonna be hard and people are not gonna be happy because this was right after the dot-com bubble burst and many of the employees on paper had been worth millions of dollars and the stock dropped and then it’s gone. You know, and they’re just suffering the stock option hangover. So once we formed that bond, it was great, but all these people gave me all this advice and like, I was worried, you know, walking in there, but it was a great opportunity.

And it turned into be one of the most career satisfying moments ever. And so, but your boss shapes your reality more than anything. And I think you’re a hundred percent right. And I give another story to listeners. had a friend of mine call me for a coaching moment and they were at a technology company and said, my boss doesn’t know what she’s doing. She never asked me anything. She’s like giving me bad advice. And I said, well, shame on you for thinking your boss knows what she’s doing. I said, there’s an opportunity there. You can coach her. You can say, Hey,

Here’s what I think I should focus on. Does that make sense? Like take advantage of that moment. You could carve out and they’re just like, my gosh. And they were just sitting there with their arms crossed, waiting for the top down boss to have their stuff together. Shame on you for thinking like she’s been set up for success. She probably isn’t excited to be in that role. She’s doing the best she can. If you make her job easier, that’s gonna be really something that’s gonna benefit you. they just hadn’t thought about that, right? And it was just in a moment of brainstorming, like, wait a second, like,

leaders are really like especially frontline like it’s sort of battlefield promotion like they weren’t really prepared so there’s ways that you can manage that to your advantage right and help her out.

100%, I call that leading the leader and it’s so incredibly powerful. And I think there’s always fear that like, what if I won’t be seen as a team player? And my experience has been the leaders who know how to do that are the ones that actually radically move up because people see the capabilities, they feel supported. I think emotional intelligence is one of the most critical skills for leaders today.

Blake Schofield (46:07.458)

We have to balance the technology and the AI with the human element and being able to see whether it’s your leader or your cross-functional partner or your team, who are they really? What are they great at? What are they struggling with? And have honest, real dialogue about that and meet them where they’re at. That is what changes the game.

It’s when we end up in business and treat people like they’re numbers and they should just act like robots and get work done and ignore the elements of what’s going on in life. That’s where I see organizations and leaders really, really struggle.

Yeah, yeah. And we got to bring to the table an expectation whenever there’s a new technology that’s elevating our humanity, not diminishing it. And that, you if you think all these companies making all these AI tools are thinking about the human experience, I would think again, they’re thinking about how are they going to make a profit with some of these AI tools technologies. And it generally comes at having people do more faster for less money. And so get a hold of it and shape them in ways that you think are meaningful to you.

because we’ve all been dubbed the foster parents of AI technology. They’re not developing it, we are. So let’s shape it in a way that’s gonna benefit us and give them the expectation like, no, all this like grinding, know, products that are just gonna make people go faster, they’re already going faster. It’s not working like Brene Brown was saying, said earlier, like, hey, if you’re managing people, they’re not okay. You you know people are not okay. We’ve got to win back our relationship with technology. It’s up to us. When I was younger, I thought,

when I heard the expression, leave the world a better place for your children. I was like, well, of course we’re gonna do that. And like now I’m like, not so sure we are. Like the climate’s not at a good place right now. Like there’s some things, like we gotta step up and own it. And the more passive we are, I think the more the outcomes are not gonna be in our favor, right? We’ve gotta own this stuff.

Blake Schofield (47:56.814)

And shift from a perspective of faster and more, to a perspective of higher value and simplification. If you look at some of the most innovative things, think about Steve Jobs and what he did at Apple. It wasn’t about doing more. It was about thinking differently. It was about: How do we simplify and move things forward in a more innovative way?

I believe that proven principle has shown over and over and over again. But when we get under stress and anxiety, the first thing we do is think we have to outrun everyone. We have to do more. But the smartest innovators, the ones who actually create the change and the value are the ones that slow down and say, wait a second, in the sea of everything happening, where’s our differentiator? What’s the thing that’s going to make us win? What really matters? And in a world that is

As chaotic as we sit in today, I believe the people that win are the ones that can simplify and the value that they bring is high. It’s not about more. It’s about being able to create something of value. So from my perspective, I think the leaders that are able to really see and understand that and get out of the rat race are the ones that are gonna build the organizations that can compete with whatever’s coming.

Yeah, those of you are not watching this podcast right now, my neck is sore from nodding so aggressively as Blake’s talking. Like, yes, yes, yes, 100%, please, please. And those are the people I want to work for. And those are the people I want to be leading my children and the next generation of the workforce is the ones that saying, hey, we’re going to elevate this work so that it’s so impactful and so interesting. And we’re going to discover new things and you’re going to discover new skills that you have. And this is the, the Holy grail moment for us, I think, which is

finding out how the taxonomy of skills work so that someone who’s really good over in department Z is also really good at department B. We never thought about it that way, but those skills are transferable. We can leverage AI to sort of unlock that so that somebody like this is, you know, one of the interesting things about Silicon Valley, which I think is worth talking about, not because Silicon Valley is the perfect place in the world. It’s a lot broken and I’m not here selling how great it is, but no one can argue.

Steve Cadigan (50:13.164)

that there’s more innovation, creativity, market value creation and new value being created there and that’s small geography compared to any geography in the world. Also, interestingly enough, there’s more people doing things they’ve never done before there than anywhere else in the world. And yet most of our models of work are don’t give someone something new to do. There’s too much risk over there. Make sure that they’re doing it well for three, four years and then maybe they can apply for something new, completely broken. In exhibit B,

If you ask any leader when their biggest breakthrough moment was in their career, it was when they were tapped on the shoulder by someone who really thought highly of them and given a new opportunity that was scary, it was different. They didn’t think they were ready for it. You asked any leader, what’s the biggest breakthrough moment? Was it sitting doing the same thing for a long period of time? No, it’s when someone said, I see something bigger for you and you’re a little nervous and you took it on and you crushed it and you went, my gosh, I can do that.

And that level of confidence elevates, you grow three inches taller and that’s what we need to design for. And I’m not saying throw people into stuff they’ve never done before, but be thoughtful and appreciate that energy gets unlocked when people are given something new that they’ve never done before. And that’s not how we’ve designed work in the past. In fact, we’ve designed to prevent that from happening. And I think, you know, that’s why I’m not too worried about the future where there’s so many unknowns out there because yeah, I built this new industry.

was on a leadership team at LinkedIn, we had more people doing stuff they’ve never done before. And I saw energy just exploding and people like, oh my gosh, you’re giving me responsibility to do this. Most people would never give me this to me and they far exceeded our expectations. So it’s part of the book that I’m writing right now, which is why I’m so excited about it. But we have got to start recognizing that a good amount of newness in a role has really disproportionately positive consequences.

than just same old routine stuff, right? And that’s why I’m not worried about all the need for new skills. I think we’re gonna figure it out, but we’re gonna have to really lean into it.

Blake Schofield (52:06.958)

I now am in reverse and was just completely head nodding. I agree with you implicitly. Steve, it’s been such a pleasure having you. I would be remiss if I didn’t ask you this next question. What I know to be true is every great leader has principles that they’ve operated under that have made them successful. Somebody with your level of success.

across so many decades, so many different types of industries, so many different places in the world, has probably consistently applied three, four, five principles that you truly believe in that have created innovation, growth, and really moved organizations and people forward. I would love it if you would share with us what those principles are that you operate behind so that those listeners that are listening might learn and take some of that and apply for themselves.

Sure. Me saying this, have to qualify by the, I have made so many mistakes along the way, but my reflections at this point in my journey are that hard work doesn’t build careers, trust does. Hard work is important to build the trust, but hard work isn’t the end. It’s the means towards the end of building trust. I think I’ve been able to navigate some really gnarly stuff because I’ve built the capacity to build trust really quickly.

And the best way to build trust is to have something really a hairball land on your desk and someone’s going to see how you handle it. And if you handle it the right way, you’re going to build that trust. My career has been one where it’s mostly around judgment and credibility. so I, no one cares about your judgment if you’re not credible. And if you don’t have good judgment, you’re not going to build credibility. So those things are really, really important. And I think that’s, you know, when I’m in a situation, I’m always like, okay,

I am super high empathy to like, want to see this situation from the other person’s eyes. Really, really important. Most of my career has been resolving disputes and conflict between teams, organizations, people, and so forth. And another fundamental truth to me is just when you are wrong, like you got to be the first person to say it. Like, yep, missed that one. My bad. I could have done that better. I didn’t appreciate what you were saying or I was not giving you my full attention. You’re a hundred percent right. Let’s move on and focus on the solve, not the person.

Steve Cadigan (54:27.414)

And again, this is really hard and it’s a real challenge. think for this, this new generation in the workforce, which is the people want candid, raw, real commentary feedback. If you will, I’m trying to, I’m trying to develop a better word for feedback. Cause it’s so a lot of people for a lot of people, it’s cringe, but I think if I’m going to help you get better, I want you to know that my feedback is coming from a place of making you better, not from me.

feeling good about putting you down and making me elevate myself at your expense. Like that’s not why we’re doing this. We’re doing this because, and so I think it’s really important for, for leaders to contract early in the relationship. How do you like to receive input and feedback from me? How would you like that? So when that moment comes like, Hey, as you said, when we started this relationship, I’m going to, I want to do this in a way, but remember this is about me committing to you that I want you to be awesome. Okay. And that’s what it’s about. So those are.

I think those are some of the principles. And the last one, and it’s silly and intentionally, when we were building the culture at LinkedIn, we were sitting around saying, are our values? And someone said, well, humor. And then someone else said, well, that’s lame. you have to say humor is important, then yeah, it’s really lame. But I have used humor in my whole career to depressurize really sensitive moments. And that’s a skill my father imparted onto me. He’s a minister who also was no stranger to a curse word here and there.

But whenever a minister throws out a curse word, everyone’s like, whoa, something different’s going on here. Like this person’s not trying to take the high, you know, ethical ground. Like they’re like, what am I in a truck stop or a church here? Like what’s going on? And that was really disarming. And I’ve used that to my advantage in some really, really tense moments that sort of depressurized situations. And I think we need more of that, you know, more levity to sort of shock absorb some of the tense moments that we have. those would be sort of my…

laundry list of things that sort of just spewed out as you asked that really great question.

Blake Schofield (56:24.91)

Thank you. I think there was so much value in what you shared and my reflection from it is as someone who has navigated a lot of change in a world where leaders need to learn how to do that. Not one of the things you talked about was a technical skill. It was a fundamental value system, people first, emotional intelligence, communication strategy, every bit of it. And when we talk about

The pace of change, often I think that’s where leaders shut down because they get too panicked or too stressed or too in a tunnel to see what really matters is to be present in that way. And so thank you for that gift. I hope that if there’s nothing that was taken out of the goodness 40 or 50 great topics and pieces of insight that you gave today.

I hope that the listeners will take that because those are proven principles that we know can navigate any challenge. Large companies, small companies, mergers, acquisitions, different countries, these are the things that drive teams. These are the things that drive growth. These are the things that move us forward. So thank you so much, Steve, for your generosity today.

It’s been a pleasure Blake, really a real pleasure. Thank you for having me.

Absolutely. So with that said, I’m going to round it off. How might listeners who want to learn more about you or follow you, how might they find you?

Steve Cadigan (57:58.392)

On LinkedIn for sure, I hear it’s a pretty good website. You can find me there, Steve Cadigan. I’ve got a website, SteveCadigan.com and my book titled Workquake is available wherever books are sold. And I also have a podcast called the Workquake Weekly, which is just a five to 10 minute snippet every week of just some top of mind topics. Brene Brown’s comments will be the one I’m posting probably tonight. It comes out usually Friday. And I try to do what you’re doing, which is just have a real quick conversation about something so it sparks another conversation somewhere else.

But yeah, again, thank you so much, Blake, for having me.

Blake Schofield
Thank you, it was absolutely my pleasure.

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