People First, AI Second: The Leadership Formula Driving Innovation | Alvin Pereira | AI Accelerator Podcast

AI is transforming every industry, but according to Alvin Pereira, the organizations that win won't be the ones with the most AI tools. They'll be the ones that combine innovation, empathy, and execution to solve real problems for real people.

In this episode of the AI Accelerator Podcast, host Matt Zembruski sits down with Alvin Pereira, Senior Director and Head of Strategy & Operations for Global Workforce Management Products at ADP, former product leader at Google and Disney, and founder of The Pereira Foundation, to discuss how leaders can embrace AI while keeping people at the center of every decision.

Drawing from his experience leading products, building teams, and driving innovation across some of the world's most recognized organizations, Alvin shares practical insights on AI adoption, organizational transformation, product leadership, and creating cultures where innovation thrives.

From Disney's MagicBand platform to enterprise workforce technology, Alvin explains how AI is accelerating product development, reducing barriers to innovation, and enabling organizations to move from idea to execution faster than ever before.

At the heart of Alvin's philosophy is one powerful idea:

"AI should enhance the human."

In this episode, Alvin reveals:

◼️ Why AI should amplify people rather than replace them

◼️ How leaders can reduce fear and resistance around AI adoption

◼️ Why experimentation beats perfection in today's rapidly changing world

◼️ How AI is accelerating product development and innovation cycles

◼️ The importance of empathy in leadership and product design

◼️ Lessons learned from building products at Disney, Google, and ADP

◼️ Why culture matters more than process when driving transformation

◼️ How small teams can achieve extraordinary results

◼️ The role of change management in successful AI adoption

◼️ Why leaders must stay connected to customers and frontline employees

◼️ How AI can help organizations move from idea to prototype faster

◼️ The importance of servant leadership in modern organizations

◼️ Why adaptability is becoming the most valuable business skill

◼️ How leaders can create environments where innovation flourishes

◼️ What the future of AI-powered organizations may look like

Chapters

00:00 Welcome to the AI Accelerator Podcast

00:29 Introducing Alvin Pereira

01:22 Alvin's Career Journey Across Technology, Hospitality & Product Leadership

03:04 Lessons from Google, Disney, Hilton & ADP

03:31 Product Management, Design & Customer-Centric Innovation

06:07 The AI Revolution and Product Development

07:00 Why AI Should Enhance Humans, Not Replace Them

09:04 Managing Organizational Change in the AI Era

12:05 Helping Teams Embrace AI Through Experimentation

14:21 Building a Growth Mindset Culture

15:32 Empowering Teams to Solve Bigger Problems

20:32 Leadership Lessons for Driving Innovation

21:22 Building Disney's MagicBand Experience

24:36 Culture, Trust & Organizational Success

26:26 The Biggest Opportunities Leaders Should Focus On

29:14 Accelerating Innovation with AI

31:42 Leadership, Legacy & The Pereira Foundation

33:24 Final Thoughts

Key Learnings

✔ AI is most powerful when it enhances human capability

✔ Organizations that embrace experimentation adapt faster

✔ Change management is often harder than technology adoption

✔ Great leaders focus on removing obstacles for their teams

✔ Empathy remains a critical competitive advantage

✔ Culture drives innovation more effectively than process alone

✔ AI enables faster prototyping, testing, and iteration

✔ Small, empowered teams can create outsized impact

✔ Customer-focused innovation produces better outcomes

✔ The future belongs to leaders who combine technology with humanity

💬 Alvin's Most Powerful Quotes

"AI should enhance the human."

"You don't build products for yourself. You build them for the people who use them."

"It's not impossible. We just haven't figured out how to do it yet."

"The best framework is the one that helps your team get things done."

"Culture exists for the people inside the organization."

"Leadership is about serving your team."

"The faster you can move from idea to prototype, the faster you can learn."

"Technology changes. Human needs don't."

About Alvin Pereira

Alvin Pereira is a product and strategy executive with leadership experience spanning ADP, Google, Disney, Hilton, and Workforce Software. Throughout his career, he has led product innovation, digital transformation initiatives, and organizational growth efforts focused on creating exceptional customer experiences.

Currently serving as Senior Director and Head of Strategy & Operations for Global Workforce Management Products at ADP, Alvin helps organizations navigate change while building products that improve how people work.

Beyond his corporate leadership roles, Alvin is also the founder of The Pereira Foundation, focused on expanding opportunities and supporting communities through education and service.

Follow Alvin Pereira
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alvinpereira/

Follow Matt Zembruski
Website: https://leadingaiagility.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattzembruski/

Email: matt@leadingaiagility.com

Phone Text WhatsApp: +1 978-618-5778

#AI #ArtificialIntelligence #Leadership #ProductManagement #Innovation #DigitalTransformation #FutureOfWork #AIAdoption #ProductLeadership #ADP #Disney #Google #AIAcceleratorPodcast #MattZembruski #AlvinPereira

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome back to the AI Accelerator Podcast, where we are exploring the simple equation that's changing how leaders are building the future. People plus AI equals superhuman. And I'm your host, Matt Zembrotsky, founder and CEO of AI Agility. And every episode we're sitting down with the leaders and builders and visionaries who are putting that equation to work in the real world. Today's conversation is one I'm looking forward to because our guest has a very unique background that talks about the tools that workforces are using every single day. Our guest today is Alvin Pereira, who leads product management and design at Workforce Software, where he builds at a workforce software company where he's building the systems that frontline and operational teams rely on to get their work done. He lives by a Walt Disney line that is also uh near and dear to my heart. That you don't build it for yourself, you build it for the people. It's that human-first philosophy that's exactly the lens we need on AI right now in today's world. Alvin, welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_01 1:08

Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

Alvin, I got that quote from your uh email signature, actually. And um, you don't build it for yourself, you build it for the people. Let's just do a brief introduction for our audience. You know, um, how did you get here? Uh the company you're working with right now, your role, what you're passionate about. Like, how are how are you and your your company or team, you know, how are you uh leading a new impact in the marketplace?

SPEAKER_01 1:35

Uh if we were to go through everything, we run out of time. So I'm gonna try to like give you the the cliff notes here. But I I've been very privileged where I got my career started in tech quite early. I was around 18 or 19, and I've done a little bit of everything. I started in data analysis, which then opened the door to like customer support and customer success, which then just kind of made me fall in love with at the time business analysis, which later led to product management and the art of that. And once I got there, like I felt like all my passions aligned. I I've always been very much into business and solving real problems, and those challenges that are harder to solve are always kind of like appeal to me in a way. But the most important thing that I've always found fulfilling in my life was helping others. I feel like that intersection of being able to help someone solve their problems with technology, which I was already passionate about anyway, and still accomplish something great for the business was like the perfect job for me. And I've been doing it for almost 20 years plus now. And since then, I've been very privileged to kind of land at companies that don't have a good product management practice, be able to establish it and build it with right processes, you know, go faster to market, faster to value, and then from there strategize the bigger picture and kind of go somewhere else and do it all over again. Which took me from Google to Disney consulting for a while. Uh at Hilton, I built a product management practice there, went back to Disney for a number of years, and then in the last few years, I moved over to a company called Workforce Software that was recently acquired by ADP in the last two years or so. And now at ADP, I lead the practice around product strategy and operations for the workforce management portfolio.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

Wow, it's fantastic. Yeah, it's just uh such a storied career there in your uh in your your in your your youthful uh your your youthful ideas there. I've been it's that that's that's absolutely fantastic. Let's talk more about that because there are a lot of product people who listen to the podcast, right? There's a lot of um uh overlap uh for the folks and a lot of business leaders as well uh at companies similar to like the like like you mentioned, right? So for people who don't live in the product world, what does it actually mean to lead both product and design? How do those uh how do those two disciplines work together? Uh what's something you can, what I guess maybe provide an example of something that you're building uh for the people, right? You're building you're building for the people. So explain it sort of how does product and design fit together? How does it work? And like how do you think about that? How do you bring it bring it to that's it's a great question?

SPEAKER_01 4:10

And part of me, which is the the purest product leader at heart, will say never ever do what we've done here to some degree, which is combine the two under a single leader. I think part of that is because it creates a conflict of interest in some regards, right? That depending on what like vertical the leader may lean towards, you know, you may have a little bit more over-indexing in one way or the other. But if you are going to do that, which you know we had done at Workforce Software and you know at ADP life is a little bit different here. But if you are going to do that, you have to go for a leader that can understand that those practices are fundamentally different, even if they overlap in some of the behaviors, right? As a product leader, you want your team to go interview customers and get and get in the feel for what pain points are like and go like live a day in their shoes, type of thing, and see what issues really arise and how you make the experience better. And then any other place in that you essentially just kind of pass that forward in the machine, the factory machine of building things to the designers, and a lot of times the designers have to do it again. So there's a lot of these areas that you could just kind of synthesize together if you manage to understand that they're both ultimately different, but can meet somewhere in the middle. You can cut a lot of that noise out, which we were very successful at doing. And you know, if you would have asked me five to ten years ago, like never ever do it. Uh, now that I've been on the other side of it, is you can do it as long as you understand that the outputs are different, but we can meet in the middle and accelerate that process. That's probably the best advice I can give anybody, right? Understand that there are different practices with different results. But ultimately, if you take your product people and your designers and to some degree even your engineers, and you combine them into the traditional product triad or trio, you just kind of let them go influence the process and understand what's necessary, do discovery, prototype and iterate faster. You can almost get away with anything. I feel like, right? But if those functions are being represented correctly and they're moving fast enough to collect feedback and iterate, then you know the world is yours.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Yeah, that's that's uh fascinating. So you said um, you know, uh prototype and iterate faster, and that got me thinking about my agile experience and and lean experience and things like with lean manufacturing and so forth. Speed seems to be a key uh um feature within the whole world of AI today with technology happening. How can it unlock more speed in organizations? And you talk about prototyping and iterating faster, which obviously is a super powerful uh concept for product uh management and product design, uh, because you don't know when it's right. So if you can do fast feedback loops, that would be great. Uh let's talk about um your thoughts on AI and technology and things like that. How does that factor into your world of product, uh if at all, with your current uh role?

SPEAKER_01 6:56

Yeah, it's it's what keeps me up at night for parts good and parts bad. Parts bad is what does the future look like for a baby that I just had? She's one year old, and I'm like, she has all these opportunities, but thank you, thank you. Would AI make her life better or worse? And as a steward to some of that, to some degree, how do I ensure that she has a right future with the right technologies? It's always something that keeps me up at night. It did long before I was a father, and now that I'm a father is like front and center, always. There's that piece of it, the personal life of the impact of AI that can have on us. So for me, it's always I've always been an empathetic human leader first, and whatever products I build, whether they AI or automated or manual, I almost always go back to that fundamental question of what does the user want? And we actually solve that problem. So when I think about AI in general, there's a few key benefits that we're getting from it, which is that idea of prototyping faster has become exponentially faster. So we used to have what I'll call here like a like a big loop system, which may be by the time you're actually exiting your feedback cycle, months could have passed, maybe a year could have passed before you go from zero to one. Now you can go to zero to one in in a weekend, right? Like you could have a functioning prototype which is really close to the real thing in a matter of maybe days, pops, right, with the right group and the right focus. So that's been great. We're using that almost everywhere, right? But we're also planning, at least personally for me, everything that I do is back to the human cycle, right? Whether it's a workforce-driven AI agent, whether it's a personal life AI agent, I'm very blessed as well with my personal life and businesses, and I have a foundation. Anytime that we implement technology in our personal businesses or the foundation or even at work, it goes back to that. Am I removing the human from the loop and am I causing damage with the product that I'm building? If so, then it doesn't matter if it could be a gen pick. I think ultimately the result is a negative one. So, how do I turn that into a positive one and enhance the human? It's kind of the building philosophy that we have here. And so far it's working out pretty great.

SPEAKER_00 9:02

Yeah, I love that. It's the same thinking that I have, and the same thing that we've seen work in industries, even though the news media is still way behind on that talk track, because there's still like AI is replacing the human, it's very black and white. And uh the reality is what you just described is um makes perfect sense to me because when you have the experienced human then leveraging AI to be, you know, more what we call superhuman, right? You know, now now you're really unlocking more of the human potential because you're you're you're not mired in all the busy work, right? Now you can again prototype in a weekend. So, but where does that put? Um, so I agree with with your line of thinking there. So, how is that change behavior as a change management um uh industry uh consultant and so forth? Um, I always think about the change management aspects. And I know the the human-centric is really important to you as well. So, how has so AI and technology comes in, it speeds up the ability to execute on prototypes and iterate on these things, right? Give faster feedback and so forth. But then where does that how does that change the human behavior with like you and your team? Like, are you doing more time on the ideation part of it and uh interacting with uh you know um uh consumers and internal stakeholders, et cetera, on like these on these faster feedback loops? How has that changed your behavior and uh and how does that scale? Like, where do you see that going?

SPEAKER_01 10:24

Yeah, it's a it's a great question. And if you permit me, I'll probably answer that in a number of ways. But maybe look part one is what is the impact back to an actual person, right? When as a leadership team or you know, even as companies at large, we're now saying, Hey, don't don't take six months to build, you know, put your idea into Claude or Bolt or Replet, whatever it is, and build it, and then we're done. There's a certain level of fear that creates depending on how that message is delivered and how you frame the technology, right? Or to your point, the change because change is hard, change is hard for everybody, and it's not I I've been around since like the dot-com days when I first started in my career. So, like the internet was a big problem, and then like I was working at Google Shopping where we were building ads for people when those ads were personalized, and that was too much privacy invasion. So don't do that. So it's like anytime I see a new technology like this, there's a core set of first adopters and early adopters, and those are good, but there's maybe that 40, sometimes 20 percent of folks that are just change at verse and don't want at burst and don't really want to do it, and that's less of the technology and just more the inherent fear of why am I doing this and what does it mean for me? So we spend, I spend a lot of time in general just letting people know that the technology is there as an accelerator and amplifier. Uh no pun intended on the AI accelerator podcast, but truly, right? It accelerates it if you can do it correctly. But ultimately, if your fundamentals are good, if your skill sets are good, if your critical thinking is top-notch, the technology just helps you be better to your point, become that superhuman. So nothing beats hands-on experience, and that's kind of what we always preach, right? Instead of talking about how AI is, you know, all doom and gloom and gonna take your job. Can we run an experiment, whether that's you know, a hackathon, a play, a contest? Uh, you're really passionate about pet project, go build that, bring it back, and see what that looks like. And then tell us how that made you feel. Did it make you feel good? Did it make you feel bad? Was your experience, your lessons learned? Would you do it again? Would you not? What are the pitfalls of this technology so that people can start understanding that it's not all doom and go? Right. Then the other component of that is how is that really changing how how we plan and strategize and look at the world? Uh, same, right? When when you have an idea that could have taken six to seven months in a bigger company like Disney, for example, to plan and and gold fund and pitch and get greenlit on, that now you can do it in a week or so, the entire process of change is up for disruption. So we have to be increasingly faster in how we fund, how we adopt, how we green light, how we do everything. And to some degree, AI helps there too, because it can lead with analysis, it can help you evaluate funding, even like market analysis, we could be done through AI these days. So we've taken a very loose approach on that in general, at every company that I've been since AI started making waves, and we've used a lot of that for business cases and funding on how to move faster. And some degrees, even the pots that we build, instead of being six to seven engineers and one product manager and very traditional scrum master QA. What if three people could do it and with the help of AI, we get to a better build thing? And instead of pitching a business case, we have the product. Go touch the product, go play with the product, does it increase funding? Does it create uh revenue opportunities if so, then let's go for it, right? So that's kind of two pieces: the change of the process, which just requires us to be faster in how we enable the machine, right? If not, we're gonna cross a roadblock there, and the change of people, which I think is equally important, right? But if you let people kind of try it for themselves and build something that they're passionate about instead of mandating the change in the technology, right? I think it'll work out, right? Because if it's good, people realize that it is good and it's better. And all it takes is a little bit of leeway in how you approach age, right? That the whole like boil the frog concept.

SPEAKER_00 14:20

I I like that a lot. And I want to I want to um uh comment on a couple of the things you just shared. So you talk about like um sounds like experimenting with some smaller teams and so forth, right? To get the same done. So do you do those as experiments, sort of on the edge? I mean, you have your it you you seem just in our conversation thus far that you're very uh you have you have very much a growth mindset and you're you're always looking for ways to improve uh yourself, your organization. How can we experiment? How can we how can we um you know uh it's it's the professional and personal growth of the individuals and of the systems and what you're doing? So you have that mindset already. So the uh the two questions I have for you is um do um do you um move do you move forward and uh and grow your organization uh through a lot of this rapid experimentation? Um that's like part one. And then part two is what what do you see from leaders? Because um how do leaders who don't have your mindset uh get your mindset and start moving in that direction? That's the the tougher question, is part two.

SPEAKER_01 15:28

But no pressure on those um part one is is what I'll say is you know, it's an interesting question because I I think to some degree, based on my childhood, my experiences, it you have to grow and adapt and keep going. We we came from a very poor family, we struggled. So it was like growth was built into the core of who I am. So everywhere I go, I almost look at every challenge and go, it's not impossible, we just haven't done it. So, what would it take to do it? And in some cases, those are long nights, in some cases that's rethinking our ways of work, in some cases, that's rethinking our technologies or processes or pathways. I almost, as passionate as I am about processes and change and rules and frameworks, I believe that the best framework you can have is the framework that just gets it done. And in some cases, you may have to throw all the books out the door and just grind it out and make it happen. So while I am extremely growth mind oriented, I do think that some of my successes have come from taking one of those impossible challenges, taking two to three people that I think are top-notch or have full potential or are really hungry, and giving them free access to whatever they want and my support. Like this is the best thing I can do as any leader that I represent or I am, is you have my support. When the moment you encounter a roadblock, I am here to remove that. What do you need? How do you need it? Go wild. You're the you're the expert. You're you're hired for a reason, right? Go build the vision. And if we can't do it, then let's figure out how we can. And in those moments when we're just chipping away at an awesome idea, I like to be very involved because I think part of that comes from again, somebody who's been through the struggles of life and and grinding things and the hard hard work. I never want teams or people to see that I just stood in some ivory tower and demanded some impossible idea to be done and then I disappeared. And then when it wasn't up to my code or standards, and I kind of rained on everybody, that's not it. So I'll join the team meetings, I'll join the scrums, and I'll get involved and I ask questions and I'll play with prototypes and provide feedback. Sometimes I'll build things myself and I have design backgrounds, I'll design things myself. And I think that changes the culture and the morale, which I think is really, really important. So if you're able to take a core team of three to five people and you inject them with positivity and energy and height, they can almost accomplish anything. And if you do that, then that's the best case study that you have for success. So if you're not growth mind-oriented, which kind of answers the second one, just give it a try. Pick the most impossible thing that you think you can't do, whether it's funding or time or people or skill set or the market demands, carve three people that are really hungry and pitch them like Nick Fury would pitch the Avengers, right? Like, like I have this initiative that is really important, nobody's able to tackle it. Would you be interested? I have no way to reward you, or maybe I will, I don't know. But just the fact that we can accomplish the impossible is really huge. Then you take that success where they are successful and when they aren't, you kind of wear it on your back as well. It was ultimately your failure as a leader. But if they are successful, showcase them. I've built like hype videos and real videos for people at company meetings, and I've got look at what this team built. And now that we've built it, we're gonna put it on like a main stage. And I've been at conferences demoing what teams have built that were seemingly impossible. That gets them excited, that gets you excited, and that starts to change the culture I have found around we've always done it this way, we're always stagnating or we can't grow, right? When once you prove that little thing that was impossible with a core set of people that are really energized and hyped and positive about this future, it just kind of snowballs. Then another team wants to do it, and then you have some other impossible thing that couldn't be done. Like I meet with sales all the time, they'll tell me, Well, I have this deal that could have happened if you would have brought me this one feature that I asked you for five years ago and you said it couldn't be done because the architecture wasn't there. But what if it was? And now with AI, what if we build it in a number of months? Does that change our financial outlook? If so, then I am gonna pick those three people that are really hungry, pitch them on this thing, give them free access, free reign. Maybe we'll time box it. What can we do in six weeks and come back? And if that was successful, can we do it again? And again and again and again and again. And before you know it, you know, what used to be a 10% innovation allocation to your roadmap is now 20, it's now 30, it's now 40.

unknown 20:00

Right.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

And I think I have found that's the best way to kind of transform organizations that are sort of like, you know, legacy thinking into just can we move faster and can we accelerate the process and just kind of change better?

SPEAKER_00 20:12

I I love that. Love that answer, Alvin. So many good uh examples in there. And I asked it on purpose because there's a lot of leaders who I interact with who don't have the same mindset, but they want to move toward that. And frankly, they need to move toward it today because AI is putting pressure on and technology changes. Uh organizations need to be more nimble, more agile, uh, more adaptive. Uh, if they're not, they're gonna get they're gonna uh go backwards really fast and they're gonna get uh taken um by the competition and so forth. Can you provide a couple um uh an example or two? I love what you talk about with like the hype videos or like just examples of success. Can you just like shine a spotlight on a couple uh you know, maybe one or two uh examples of like where uh your team did something that was really cool, like you said, right? I challenged them to do X and they actually did it or whatever, like just something that you would um that could be inspirational to uh other uh leaders or or product product leaders who are listening to a podcast.

SPEAKER_01 21:14

Uh well thank you. I I hope that I I have many of those to share, but if they're not up to par, then I hope people are still inspired by the fact that you can do this. Um, one of the coolest things that I have ever worked for in my life or on in my life, I would probably say is um if anybody has been a Disney in the last 10 or 15 years, which I imagine it's mostly the audience, if you interacted with one of these devices, which is the magic band or the application, that was uh large involvement with myself and a few others of my team, which was awesome because it was the idea at the time, nobody was kind of doing it. But how do you again, those impossible challenges? How do you take a physical entitlement, which is your your card, your pass, uh fast passes of time? You had to press a button, a little ticket would come out, and don't lose that ticket or else you lose your spot in line, right? So, how do you take that and you digitize that experience? But what if you don't digitize it through a device? And what if you don't digitize it through some other medium? Right? What if we still control the ecosystem of that digitization and make it in a way where you're not thinking about being digital? In some degrees, you know, the company has changed since I've moved on, which I get that philosophy. And why, especially with the newer generations just being so phone dependent, I get it. But at that time, that was like our guiding principle. What if we were to digitize the world without being digitized? Which it creates this conundrum of like, well, how do I remain physical but digital and exist in both spaces? And the magic bands were born, right? And then a lot of creative thinking went into that. Where I mean, I just remember we we built this whole lab where people just slept over the weekends and nights. And if you were bored, I was a lot younger at the time, didn't have a family. So I would go into the office on Saturdays and mess with the lab. And what can we do? Or try to gather feedback from our colleagues. It wasn't a you know external product at that time. It was a you know it was a surprise, it was kind of hidden. But we couldn't just go test people at the right time. And how do you test that at the park? How do you ensure that when you tap, the tap is correct, all that data is feeding back? You can like you know authorize the entitlement, let people in the park. So that whole thing became so impossible and so huge so far that I think it almost broke all of us. But I remember being in a meeting where some I won't say who, but it was somebody very important at the time visited us in the lab and basically just said, kind of what I was saying is like you guys were quick for a reason, and this better F word work. And I was like, All right, noted. That's not motivating enough, and one of the highest people at the company just drops that one. We have to make it work, and that's maybe another way you can motivate people for change and get it making the impossible happen. But yeah, I was so proud of that product because you know we've moved on since in that space, but it was the first time that you didn't have to worry about not carrying your ticket or your card or your wallet or anything, you could just tap everywhere. It was so great of a product that a lot of our competitors at the time ended up adopting it. Like if you go to Universal Studios and SeaWorld and others, you know, even in the California space overseas, everybody was just kind of tapping devices, and then the whole world started doing you know, devices to tap and Fitbits and all these different things. So, very, very cool product. I'm very proud of that. It was very grueling at the time, but in hindsight, such a great experience, and it just kind of polished me a lot more. Um, and that was awesome. And then the the other piece is you know the culture of it, man. Like, you know, you have to just make sure that people are moving in the right direction and you you just motivate them and you make them feel like this is the way to go. If we're gonna do the impossible or if we're gonna try to accomplish anything that can't be done, that that would be the maybe maybe the best piece of advice I can give any leader. Like, continue to be a human about what you do and manage change with the understanding there's a human on the other side of it, right? How would you feel if suddenly you were demanded to do all these things and told to grow and told to do the impossible? Right? Uh, be empathetic, be human, be empathetic. Try that. Once you start building that culture, a lot of people will just almost want to do the impossible for you, right? It kind of going back to that quote, right? You don't build it for yourself, you build it for them. I feel that way about culture too, right? The culture is not something that you build so that you can be proud of it. The culture is something that you build so that your team can be proud of be a part of it. So for me, I I think those probably the two pieces. If there's a product that I could pick that I was really proud of, it'd be that one. If there's a maybe a process or maybe a mantra that I'm really proud of, it's that one. Like build culture first and make sure that happens. Um, yeah, and I hope I answered most of the to some of the great.

SPEAKER_00 25:42

Yeah, you you did you did a great job, Alvin. I know we need to wind down as well, but that that's uh that's fantastic because there's so much built in there. There's the there's the people in the process, but then you're also talking about the culture. And uh, and again, the way that's why I've asked a lot of questions about the way you think about it, the way you approach it, how you affect change, because it's that's the uh that's the art of it. You can write books about the science of change management and culture and all those product management, everything. Uh, but but the art of it that you've been uh sharing on this particular podcast, I think is is uh is beautiful and very everyone does it differently, right? It's we're all we're all artists. Um, but what you've been sharing has been has been really good. For um as as we wrap up, sort of like final question. What what's the biggest opportunity out there for a business leader? They could be a product leader, they could be a C-suite executive. Um, in today's world with changes and AI and all sorts of stuff happening. You you mentioned a lot of different ideas and approaches that they can take to bring out more in their organization and to achieve more and do more. Um I guess what's what what do you think is the biggest opportunity that's facing um um you know industry leaders today and and um and and what should they do to sort of get after that?

SPEAKER_01 27:02

Yeah, it's a great question. I I feel like there's many different facets of it, right? I think depending on your market and your industry and what you build and what you play in, the market will tell you, right? Like, don't ever pass up an opportunity to understand your market, which is you know, corporate speak for just get involved, right? Like, like talk to people, see what's like their pain points are. If you have customers, if you have a quote unquote market out there, get involved with them, like go sit with them. I've I've done that many times, regardless of whatever position I've held in my life. I I've been to conferences where you know a junior analyst will come to me and be like, Hey, I use your product, and be like, Great, let's exchange emails. Can we have a one-on-one? I'd love to see what you think of it. Like, get involved regardless of level, put ego aside. It's probably one of the first things like anybody at any level has an opportunity to do. You know, on the culture front, you have to serve your people, right? Like, there is no world where you get to be a leader and demand and demand and demand and keep people around. It just doesn't happen. And we see it everywhere. Like, I love video games a lot, and I almost wanted to go into the video game industry when I was younger. And now in hindsight, I'm like, what a great thing that that didn't happen. But that's that that's a industry that continues to get brutalized. You have all these creatives and all these amazing, smart people that are always being demanded more and more and more often, almost never get that reward back. So you have to focus on your people, regardless of what industry you're in. And I feel like that's an opportunity that will always exist no matter what. Because the higher that you climb, your time just disappears. You're going from meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting to meeting and making a thousand decisions, and they all have to be right, or else you get judged for them. So your own empathy levels decrease because of your stress, your you know, your tire levels, your energy levels, and it's very easy to turn into the person you didn't want to be. So always I I if just personal life, professional life, always self-reflect. Am I the leader, the father, the man, the woman, the person that I want to be? If not, opportunity number one, work on that and the rest will follow, right? And then from a technology or product perspective, AI is everywhere and it's not going anywhere anytime soon. So I think if we're going to talk about technology and building, I think I have personally come to the conclusion that the biggest opportunity for any strategic leader right now is how do you go from idea to actual prototype or deliverable, tangible result in the shortest amount of time possible. And what we've done is we've taken our designers and our product managers and our architects and said, Yeah, you're a team of three, you're a good trio, go design it, go come up with requirements, do it all quickly and just as fast as possible. And now let's go back to point one. When can you meet a customer and get their feedback? And that's been great. It's been really, really good because we we've kind of just really like just cut through the noise on the ideation to prototype and design cycles, which I mean, 10 years ago, that was unheard of, right? And to some degree, our development partners are moving even faster than us because there's technologies that can code for them now, so they can build equally as fast. And now I'm seeing the roadblock is the strategic side of the house, which wasn't the case before, right? You could probably plan a strategy in a few weeks if you're like really diligent and have good sessions and good analysis, and then it'll take you a year or two or three to go build. So the roles are kind of reversing when it comes to time frames. And I think it's probably that. Figure out what your own cycle looks like, conduct your own analysis, like almost a business process map of what your cycle is and where your gaps are on timing and time boxing and what's actually delaying the process and see what you can cut out. We talked about lean earlier, it's lean 101, right? Cut out the waste from the process. And for us, I mean, it could change per company, per place, but it we found that the design, the ideation discovery design cycle could be extremely reduced by just applying the right folks and the right kind of AI technologies to it.

SPEAKER_00 31:09

I love that. That's excellent. Very well said, Alvin. And for people who want to uh find you, follow more about what you're up to next, they're curious about where you're going, where your company's going, uh, where your uh your vision for the future is, you know, where where's the best way for people to uh to follow you and reach out to you?

SPEAKER_01 31:30

Uh yeah, listen, I'm on just like every possible like work-related channel ever, but probably mainly on LinkedIn. Uh again, the name's Alvin Perra. I welcome anybody, send me a message, regardless of like where you're at in your career. If you want to reach out to me and teach me things, please do. I'd love to learn anything from everyone, or vice versa. If you feel like you need career advice or coaching or life, anything at all. Just want to talk about kids and how hard parenting is, please let me know. I need advice there too. But yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn. Um, I again again we're doing really cool things over here at ADP. Uh, from a workforce perspective, some really cool products are coming out. We're very excited about that. Uh, on a personal level, I'm really proud of the foundation that we built. Just last year, we launched our scholarship for children that are underprivileged and it did really well. We'll do another one this year. So if you're listening to this podcast and you want to donate, come find me on LinkedIn. We'll become friends, and then I'll send you a donation link. Uh, you can change your life, which is something that helped me a lot when I was growing up.

SPEAKER_00 32:27

Wow, that's beautiful, Alan. So, so great. We'll we'll include that in our show notes so that people who are not driving and they're on YouTube or or what have you, they'll be able to uh uh to see you. And that's that's great. It's always great when you have a cause-based focus on uh on sharing some of the goodness that uh that you that you had growing up and now you're paying it back. So that's absolutely absolutely wonderful. Amen. Yeah, amen. Thank you so much for your for your time, Alan, for all your insights, your your guidance here. There was a lot of good. I I threw some some curveball questions at you on purpose because I I could tell you were ready for them, but I really wanted you to uh uh to share that. And your your insights are really valuable to me. I know they will be to our audience and really appreciate your time and um and and everything today. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 33:14

Ditto, I'm happy to help. And again, if anybody wants to connect, let me know. Uh, and thank you. Thank you for the questions, thank you for the time. Uh love to see the shows and everything you got going on. Much success, my friend.

SPEAKER_00 33:24

And thank you all for joining the AI Accelerator Podcast. We'll be back uh soon next week for a new episode. So thank you, and until then, keep accelerating.