IOP LENS
The IOP Lens is a SIOPSA podcast that brings together practitioners, leaders, and scholars in Industrial and Organisational Psychology to explore the issues shaping the future of work. Our aim is to make IOP thinking accessible, relevant, and impactful for both practitioners and decision-makers. Each episode contributes to SIOPSA’s broader professional dialogue.
IOP LENS
S1E10: Building Better Workplaces in the Age of AI: A POP 2.0 Perspective ft. Mr Siphiwe Moyo
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Building Better Workplaces in the Age of AI: A POP 2.0 Perspective | The IOP Lens
In this episode of The IOP Lens, Dr Sane Ngidi is joined by Mr Siphiwe Moyo, representing Conference Gold Sponsor the Organisational Behaviour Institute, for a thought-provoking conversation on the future of work in the age of AI.
The discussion explores how organisations can build healthy, ethical, and high-performing workplaces by responsibly integrating AI into people practices. Siphiwe introduces Positive Organisational Psychology (POP 2.0), an emerging perspective that combines positive psychology with intelligent technologies to support thriving individuals, teams, and organisations.
This episode offers practical and strategic insight for leaders, practitioners, and IOPs navigating the intersection of technology and humanity.
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Welcome to the IOP lens, where we explore real stories behind industrial and organizational psychology. This platform is about real stories, real people, real journeys that shape our community. In today's episode, we are joined by Sipiwe Moyo, and today we're going to talk about how do we really build better workplaces in the age of artificial intelligence. Now, to get us started, let me read you a little bit about Sipiwe. This is a very impressive bio. So, Sipiwe is an organizational behavior specialist and executive director at the Organizational Behavior Institute. We're going to delve a little bit more into that today. He's a sought-after and highly rated international keynote speaker, author, and OD facilitator. He's a Southern African speaker, Hall of Fame, and a Southern Africa educator, Hall of Fame inductee. And he's worked as an adjunct faculty member teaching primarily organizational behavior at Gibbs, Henley Business School Africa, Witz Business School, and Johannesburg Business School. It pains me to read this next line, but I will. More importantly, he supports Manchester United, which is why he has learned to be resilient. Sibyl, welcome. It is such an honor to have you here. Sunny, thank you so much for having me. Why does it pain you? I know I'm not a I'm not a football fan. I almost said something. I'm not a football fan, but I know this Manchester United thing is a tense thing. Have you guys won anything recently? No. Oh not recently. Resilience.
SPEAKER_03Exactly.
SPEAKER_00See, people in my own career, you're somebody I've always seen and be like, yo, that guy's fire. Like you are on the stages that you're at, it's the energy with which you bring. But I always find that when you land um a talk or when you when your voice is heard, it's always grounded in behavioral science, right? So you make us think as well. Absolutely. Tell us a little bit more about yourself.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so thank you so much, Sunny. By the way, I've always, every time I listen to you as well, and this is not just for the podcast, I want to articulate behavioral science like you do. I want to articulate our HR and people profession um things like you do. So I'm really, really passionate about uh making sure that everything that we do is grounded in behavioral science, it's grounded in in some theory, but you make it then accessible to people. I think, especially in the world that we're living in now, we have a nice window for things that are grounded in deep research in uh because people are looking forward to are looking for help, right? I think when you look at what is happening in the around the techno technological revolution and so on, people are really looking to us to give them grounded people stuff so that they are able to navigate these challenging times. So I'm really passionate about that. Um my background is is the broader HR. So I'm I always call myself a friend of IOPs because I actually studied HR and specialized in organizational behavior and then got to teach organizational behavior at the few business schools, as you were saying. But I don't want to say anything that is not grounded in research, and that is that has always been a differentiator for me that even when I keynote everywhere else, just you know, there's so much noise in the world right now that people want to know that whatever you are saying has been tested somewhere, and I'm very passionate about that.
SPEAKER_00I love that word that you used, accessibility. Um, I think behavioral science can feel like it's foreign, and I think at times it can feel like there's behavioral science and there's HR, these things are different, but it there is a universe where these things are together, right? And so you can't separate them. So I love the the the term accessibility that you use. Um, what first drew you to the field?
SPEAKER_03Uh first of all, I was thinking about this. So when I was growing up in Sowetu, I I didn't know much about uh this entire field. And I remember going to a place called Funda Center, uh, which was supposed to be a place that helps people with career guidance, and everybody I feel I I remember saying to the people who worked there, I love people, and they're like, okay, there's this thing called called HR, maybe you might go into it. And and for me, that is I really there was no science behind it. And then when I arrived at adversity, that's where things started becoming clearer for me that that when I looked at the entire HR value chain, I was just fascinated about behavior change. I was just fascinated the fact that there is some science behind change, behavioral science, and and that drew me in. Um, because I did find that many, many people were really, really struggling to articulate uh things that help help us make sense of the world. Why why is CPU motivated and Sane is not? Why how can I unleash discretionary effort from from Amanda? We're looking at Amanda some somewhere in the studio, you don't have to know how uh what makes her tick? How can I unleash discretionary effort for me? So that was very fascinating for me, and I I leaned in a little bit more.
SPEAKER_00So, what's your elevator pitch for what you do?
SPEAKER_03It it changes a lot. Uh it changes a lot, and and I don't have uh it articulated at the moment is that we we ensure that we build better workplaces by using things that are grounded in research but are practically applicable.
SPEAKER_00Awesome. Um, as we enter the phase of the Psyopsa conference, your the Organizational Behavior Institute and yourselves have come on board um as sponsors, and so we're really happy about that partnership, but want to hear more about it. Tell us what is the Organizational Behavior Institute?
SPEAKER_03So the OBI is an um is is a is a vehicle that we use. So I run a company called Paradigm People Solutions, which is a consulting business. And for the past few years, we've used the OBI as an institute as a learning platform. So it's a learning platform we design customized leadership development programs and also the customized leadership development programs that we design, we made sure that there's academic regor, there's soundness of research, anything that has human behavior at work element to it, we design those customized journeys. So in the last while, we've designed all these journeys for many, many clients to just ensure that when we design something, it's not a generic leadership thing. It's really grounded on human behavior at work, it's really grounded on what makes people change and so on. So we've been designing those journeys for the last few years for our clients. And sometimes we get other IOPs on board, for example, people who will do uh pre-assessments, developmental assessment. We partner with people and then we create journeys, we have coaches in the entire broad HR and and IOP value chain work with a lot of people to design these customized journeys to make sure that we create behavioral change.
SPEAKER_00That sounds incredible, and it takes me a little bit back. Um I think I'm not sure if we overlapped at Netbank or not, but I definitely remember you in that context. But outside of just net bank, thinking about your corporate career, yes, what made you transition from corporate to entrepreneur?
SPEAKER_03So so the the story for me is it's such a weird story, Sonny, because when I was when I was in corporate, I enjoyed doing ODN learning, right? Um, but once you grow, so I used to facilitate a lot, but once I I grew and I became a learning manager and then I became head of learning, I then missed facilitation. So the way we've designed OG structures, unfortunately, is the fact that you do a bit of facilitation, but when you grow, you must manage other facilitators. And I remember just managing people in my team. There were like 12 people, half of them were designers, so instructional designers, and half facilitation. And I remember just approving their petrol claims, and they were like, I was in Lukwane, I was there, and remembering that this is actually what I love. And for me, there's an interesting story on how we designed because the senior you become in LD and OD, the less you do the facilitation. So I actually left because I wanted to facilitate, because I wanted to go back to doing the facilitation. And at that time, NetBank was also thinking about uh creating two leadership pipelines. For example, when people who might have read Steven Drott's book um called The Leadership Pipeline, uh they were advocating for the fact that sometimes in an organization you need to create both leadership and specialist uh pipeline because there are people who really want to be specialists uh, but for some reason they can't. And and I I think if that was done uh earlier in the organization, I probably would have not left or would have left much, much earlier. So it's I think it's it's one of those things where we really need to think about design because I'm also very convinced right now that some of the problems we now have in organizations is because we have so many leaders who actually didn't want to do this leadership thing. But unfortunately, the only way to progress at the moment is to be a leader.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think that resonates with me. I always joke that in my career I vacillate between being an organizational development specialist and being an HR leader or an HR manager because I want the best of both. When I'm an HR manager, I'm like the specialist is not designing it the way I want, you know? And then when I'm a specialist, I design it and I'm like, these people are not implementing it the way I want it to be implemented. So I I resonate with that, like wanting to be there in the in the fight, like in the nitty-gritty, designing, creating, but also wanting to implement.
SPEAKER_03And and the nice thing about now being an entrepreneur is that I get to do exactly that. So there are certain projects where I will design and someone implements, and I feel like the design element of my my life is catered for, but I make sure that I am in front of audiences as well for the things that I really want to do. And and I wonder if there's someone else watching this and thinking, it could there be a place where I could be able to do that if you are that inclined as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I love it. So, from your corporate experience, having created this other space for yourself, what are you getting to do and design in that work that you might not have had the opportunity to incorporate?
SPEAKER_03Oh man, it's it's it's fascinating for me because firstly, I I you you know, you appoint yourself your own chief learning officer because you can I can change my title next week uh as well. So the the ability to be able to say, um, I'll design whatever program I want to design is incredible for me. So, for example, last week I was busy develop designing a leadership development journey and and then storyboarding it and deciding how how much how many blocks we're going to have, how much coaching are we going to include, how much assessments are we going to include, how much team effectiveness uh sessions are we going to include, and that ability to be the one who thinks about the architecture of this thing and think about how do we find the golden threads that that I need and I want to see in those golden threads is very important to me. And and I get to do that now. I get to look at a program and and decide and and recommend which specialist can be plugged in in which program and where do I want to feature in those programs. And I think that kind of uh space and that kind of uh space to be able to do that is incredible for me because I, as I say again, there is an element of designing that I love and uh and I'm able to do that. Then I can go to an instructional designer, I can go to an OD person and say, this is what I would love to do, this is what I would love to have, and and plug in people to do their best as well.
SPEAKER_00And is there a particular philosophy or lens that the OBI brings to work?
SPEAKER_03Yes, there is. So if, for example, we have to design anything, for us, if something is not grounded on science, we're not going to do. And and and the beautiful thing about it is that uh we we we get to say yes or no, right? Because clients, clients, for example, sometimes have these limitations, and they say we want to do a proper learning program. It needs to be NQF aligned, we want it accredited or not, and we're able to say, okay, if you want a strictly accredited program, we work with business schools, we work with universities, maybe it's time you go to that one. Because what we want is that if if, for example, we can't find the thread uh to bring the human behavior at work element to it, we don't we don't want to do it. And our stance um maybe it's it leans to my own passions. My own real passion is positive organizational behavior. So so if you if you look at the element of positive psychology, my speciality, what I was teaching at business school, is is applying positive psychology principles at work. So I'm really, really passionate about that. So we'd see that there'll always go to be an element of meaning at work. There's always going to be a flourishing element there. There's always going to be the science of happiness, there's always going to be um things around people just understanding their own authentic happiness, their own subjective career success. Uh and I think uh I'm strict about that as a founder to say there has to be an element of this because I just think that many people have existential questions around what am I doing here? Is it adding value? And so if you add a certain element where people you force them to reflect, because I think on a normal Tuesday, people don't reflect. There's too much, too much, too much happening at work. We give space for people to to reflect, to think about their own subjective career, happiness, and so on. And that's that's an element, that's a that's that's something that you see in everything that we design at the moment.
SPEAKER_00I felt that, you know, I felt that I felt the energy as you spoke about it. And I'm like, yeah, I felt that positive psychology energy, like this is something that lights you.
SPEAKER_03It does, it really, really does.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we're gonna get to that. Um, so the partnership between OBI and Psyopsa, um, what does it mean to you? And and and I guess what opportunities do you see in these types of partnerships?
SPEAKER_03So it means a lot to me. Um, so I I was I was chairman of the board at the South African Board for People Practices for a very long time, SAPPP. I've done six years, and I'm still involved in the SAPPP quite a lot. And for me, I've always thought there has to be a way that people in the people profession, so uh I Psyopsa, SAPPP, IPM, and so on, were able to work together. Because there's a certain lens that the I the Psyopsa has, for example, that I lean towards, that I love. And and uh, but because my passion, my my skill actually, my gift is translating deep work into accessible things, as I said, um, I always think like long-term, the partnership between Psyopsa and the OBI is really great because firstly, it can match some some of the IOPs who are working for Psyopsa with some of the opportunities that we see in the broader chain uh that we that we have in the people profession.
SPEAKER_00So taking that lens of the IOP space in the people profession, I want to fuse that with the AI piece, right? We're in an era now where the world of the future is now. We're here, and I don't think a day goes by where I don't use AI and technology. I it's not possible, right? Like Chat GPT, Chat Gemini, those are just those are my everyday bread and butter things, right? So, what should the HR profession be thinking about at this time?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think I think many of us are thinking really deeply about what we do. For me, the thing I I always think about is just the ability to embrace new technologies. And one of my favorite models by Savikas, who talks about uh the forces of adaptability, if I forget the fourth, we stop.
SPEAKER_00I always forget the fourth. Let's go. You're gonna remember. It's true, that's true.
SPEAKER_03So the first one is uh that that anybody who wants to adapt must think about career concern. And and career concern sounds like a weird concept because it sounds like you must always be scared about the changes, but that's not what it means. It means any human being who's not thinking carefully about how their own profession is changing, there could be one innovation away from being redundant. So the argument there is that you should always think about where the profession is going five years from now, ten years from now, but not only the profession, think about your own adaptability because there are certain inevitable shifts that are happening. And if if you're not thinking about it, you could really not benefit from this redundancy. So, what it says for me as an HR person, um, am I thinking about how the world is changing? Am I trying to resist or am I trying to see how I can adapt? So that idea that we must always have that career concern, not concerned as in raise anxiety, but concern as if what are the shifts that are happening. Secondly, it's curiosity. Um, if you are not fiddling with this stuff, learning this stuff, um, by the time you get involved, many people would have, you know, would have progressed. So we really need to be led by curiosity, not by fear, uh, to see how this thing is changing and how we're able to integrate. Because the idea of banning people from using AI is not working. I think some of our colleagues have in many organizations have banned the use of AI, but but you find that people are using it, and what is happening now, people are now using it and they're hiding it, which means they are compromising the data that you are putting in the organization as opposed to why don't we are become so curious? Train people on how to do this, on how to prompt so that we can still protect their data. Because the more you try to stop people, the more they take the data of the organization and put it in AI, not in ways that are helpful to the organization. So curiosity is very, very important right now. What are you curious about? What are you trying? What are you experimenting about when it comes to AI? And I think it's very, very, very important. The third C is control, the idea that uh we should take control uh as much as possible about the the narrative of anything that is happening. So so in in in other words, particularly with your own career, you are in charge of your own career, and therefore, you as a person, you should be thinking long and hard about taking responsibility for your career and making sure that you are upskilled with what is uh what is what is happening. Uh right, I have forgotten the 4C. Um but but the main thing is that we must be adaptable and we have to think about some of those things, what is happening with AI and how we navigate and we make sure that we become adaptable. And I think that's the most important thing. This the second important thing is that you cannot stop people from using AI. So you might as well think about how we co-create and help people navigate this HR, um, this this revolution of AI as as we're thinking about it.
SPEAKER_00I think what you're saying there that's important is also the fact that there is a benefit that we're leveraging by being able to use augmented intelligence, right? So you want to leverage that benefit, but you want to do it in a way that protects the organization as well as protects its people. Absolutely. And I think part of what the apprehension from a human perspective is, is what's the impact on me? Do I become null and void, no longer relevant? And so what are your thoughts around um some of the elements of preserving human dignity and employee well-being whilst leveraging the benefits of AI?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so I think the biggest the biggest uh element of of this AI revolution that we are seeing is is this idea of AI replaceability, that people are very, very concerned that they will be replaced by by AI. Um so AI anxiety is a new field of study. Many people are publishing really interesting pre papers about AI anxiety. But but the main thing that is becoming very clear, Sane, is that there is a very clear inverse relationship between career anxiety and adaptability. So this is important for us because the more adaptable you are, the more and the less anxious you become. And therefore, the idea as an individual is that as you improve the adaptability that I've been talking about, the less anxious you are, and the also the more you're able to navigate this this space. But from an organizational point of view, one of the things that we have to think about is that people are anxious about AI. Not may they are anxious about the implications of AI. And therefore, there has to be some things that we are doing. And and most of it is around the reskilling that we need to help people with. Because the more we pretend that people are not anxious, we're not helping anybody. So we need to lead uh the way and think. Think about how do we reskill people. One of my favorite things to look at is the the World Economic Forum uh jobs report. And you can tell because they always they always put the emerging jobs against the declining jobs. And one of the easiest things that you see in there is that when you look at the declining jobs in any era and the emerging jobs, there's always a 60% or so correlation between those that are declining and those that are emerging. And so we are supposed to lead that reskilling exercise and say, if we can see that these jobs are declining, how can we make sure that we look at the knowledge, the skills, and the abilities in the emerging jobs and help people to navigate this because and help reskill people? And we have to lead that element. Because if we're not doing that, people are anxious and the organization is not benefiting from the institutional memory of the people that we have.
SPEAKER_00I love that because it gives something practical that organizations and leaders can do in the face of the challenge. And I'd be interested to hear, in line with that, what else do you think leaders should be doing to ensure that technology um enhances rather than diminishes human potential?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think that's the main thing, right? The the idea that um technology enhances uh human potential is an important thing. And for and therefore, for me, I think leaders, first of all, we need a bit of transparency. Um, every organization that we work with are working on some digital transformation strategy. But there is a sense of uh secrecy about it. It's it's a weird thing where people are working on this digital transformation strategy, they're not telling people what they're working on, they are not taking people into their confidence around the future that we're creating, what are we working on? And now you have a situation where people are nervous. And remember, when people are nervous, employment engagement goes. They are nervous, they're trying to find jobs elsewhere. And I think one of the main things that we could really do is to involve people in our journey and and creating this digital transformation strategy and tell people that this is where we think we're going, this is the jobs that we think we're gonna want, this is how you can help reskill, and this is can is how you can uh get to to be with us on this journey. Because every human being wants to know that you know I'm I'm still needed here. And and remember, when we think about the STT theory, which is really one of my favorite theories about human motivation, is that we're motivated by three things, right? We're motivated by our sense of competence. The more competent I feel, the more motivated I am. And so one of the things that AI is doing is eroding the sense of competence and my my sense of confidence. So people are really, really nervous about whether I'm I have that or not. The second thing is that we are motivated by relatedness. When I have relationships in the room, I feel good. I feel like I want to go there. And this is also eroding that because as we see other people leaving, we don't understand what's going on. When we have restructures, people have to apply for their jobs. That sense of relatedness is eroded, and people are not sure whether I'll still have the relationships that I have. And lastly, is that sense of autonomy. That I'm motivated by the sense of autonomy that I can do. But if I don't know where we are going, I don't even have that self-determination to say, okay, um, I can take responsibility for my role. So I think the leaders must be as transparent as possible about what they know, about where the organization is going. And where they don't know, be honest about that. But also if they know something and and they can't say because it's not allowed to say yet, also tell people that look, I can't say this uh at the moment, but there is something happening. And I think that sense of transparency, stay close to your people. This is not the time to be aloof. Uh, it's the time to stay as close to people and communicate, communicate, communicate.
SPEAKER_00How do you see AI changing the way in which work is organized, managed, the world of work?
SPEAKER_03I what I think we do know is that there's a lot of things that are going to obviously be automated, and therefore, and therefore, when you have deep specialists who know human behavior at work, so the people who watch this podcast, for example, um, is that this is our opportunity to shine. This is our gap, this is our gap because uh the more people really, really struggle with what is happening with technology, one of the things that they are going to want to have is a human-to-human interaction. I mean, you see this all the time, where at the moment uh people are just uh wanting human interaction, they want to know about what drives human beings, they want to, for example, when you do things like team effectiveness, which are the things that we are doing, you see the excitement with people just seeing each other. So, humaning, uh, I know there's no word like that, is becoming such a big thing because the more AI automates, the more people become uh nervous, is the more we have an opportunity to shape the organization. So, so I do think that uh the way AI is going to change is that we're definitely gonna lose a lot of jobs. But I'm I subscribe to the people who say we're going to have more jobs emerging than the jobs that are declining. And therefore, if we raise our own adaptability, if we raise our skills transfer, if we raise our our our reskilling of people, we're gonna have a better environment than we did before. It's almost like the things that happened during COVID, um, the digital transformation that happened, the flexible work arrangements that happened, it's going to be better. And I think the workplace will be better for it.
SPEAKER_00What will a healthy workplace look like?
SPEAKER_03What do you think?
SPEAKER_00The time has come.
SPEAKER_03I always love hearing you're okay. I'm not gonna do this one meeting.
SPEAKER_00I think it touches very much on what you've said, right? Um, I think the fear is we will design to the benefit of technology, right? To to automate, to augment at the expense of humans. Where I think a healthy organization will look like us designing so that we we optimize on the best parts of our human capability and experience, and technology enables us to be at our best. Um, I do feel like some of the words and some of the cultural elements that we've seen rise over the past few years will become even more important. So things like psychological safety and being able to experience that in the workplace, but also the fact that with technology in the world of COVID, we work harder, we work longer, and so well-being becomes such a critical aspect in that, in that the world is super connected, time doesn't end. So, how do we make sure that we've got space for healthy human beings in the world of work? Otherwise, we can work 24-7, 365. Um, and that is to the detriment of our health. So I think a healthy or a good workplace in the future will look like one where we can use technology to our best, we can play with technology, and it's not a fear, but also our well-being is paramount in that environment.
SPEAKER_03Well-being is going to be paramount. But I think it's interesting for me that you know, many organizations in the last year or two, with their return to office mandates, they've been really conflicted about whether whether we should go back to the way things were pre-COVID, and many have. And I think we're just losing losing on the momentum we've had in the last few years, and many, and I think it's driven by fear, it's driven by the the idea of control as well. And I think we're missing an opportunity to make sure that why should we do things that we know technology can do now? Um, and and I think going back to that understanding that if technology continues to do the things that it's it can do well, we should probably get from human beings what human beings can do better. And the communication, the heart-to-heart, the empathy, uh, it's going to be very important. So, so for me, the the healthy type of workplace is one that balances uh things like psychological safety with full accountability. One of the pushbacks I have a lot um in the clients that we work with is when they think about concepts like psychological safety, because I don't know how we've communicated them. Because some people think we've now creating an environment where it's some kind of a kumbaya, where people can admit mistakes, when people can, it's soft, we forgive each other, and and so on. And I think uh even as we go into that workplace, the the argument has always been we must be able to balance psychological safety and accountability. We must be able to balance care and candor. Uh, we must be able to have, I think a metaphor that works for me is is one of a sports team. Not uh the workplace is not home. You know, home we we love you is irrespective of whether you perform or not. At the workplace, you still need to perform. There's high accountability. And I think even the way we package uh some of the things that we work on, it's very, very important to understand it's not it's not um wellness for its sake, for example. We also know that healthy people produce better than unhealthy people. We also know that there comes a point where you work yourself so hard that your your capabilities diminish over time that you are not giving us your best by staying in the office and doing work, continuous work for 12 hours, that you might still be there, but you are no longer giving us the output that you have. So, our understanding of the outcomes that we want. Any organization wants outcomes like profitability, uh, productivity, prof um, and so on. But but the way we get into those outcomes is how we need to think about things like wellness and so on. Not only for its sake, and that is also important, by the way, but also because it actually gives us the outcomes we want.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, also when you said kumbaya, I'm like, why do why is there still that association of like the humanistic leadership capabilities and capabilities to relate being seen as soft, unnecessary? Because even in this world that we describe, the ability to be authentic, to have um uh empathy, to be able to lead and manage people that you can't command and control, that requires those capabilities, and we will need more and more of that.
SPEAKER_03You need them. I I had an interesting pushback. I went I went to speak at NetBank, and I think this one I think I've shared it publicly, and I can say, I want to speak about human-centered leadership with NetBank, and and while I was speaking, we did a bit of QA. Um, and someone from the audience said, I think we we we prioritize this human first thing too much, uh, Kumbaya, and all of those pushbacks that we normally get. And fortunately, I had a slide of when uh Tom Bodman came into leading NetBank, uh still at the net at NetBank at the time. And I remember when he introduced the idea of values-driven leadership, and and there was a bit of pushback from many people thinking this culture stuff is solved and whatever. And and there is an interesting slide between when Tom Bodman was CEO and what happened in the next five years. Uh, return on equity went up, the cost to income ratios went down, and all these metrics that people are interested in were better because someone created a human-first environment. So it looks to me that we just need to continue teaching about these things and not get tired of showing people that this is not soft. This is this is the things that get us the the outcomes that we want. And we shouldn't tire to stick to that line and show people that there is actually a correlation, a very clear positive correlation between uh well-being and profits.
SPEAKER_00I love that term, that human-centered. Um and leading on from that, how do organizations ensure that they continue to have strong human-centered cultures whilst embedding and driving technology?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, for me, I think it's it's it's making sure that we don't do technology for technology's sake, and we make sure that we think very carefully about what technology is trying to do. And and and and I and I think about this a lot because you could see, so I I still follow the banking industry a lot, and and you could see that one of the things that uh the banking executives are interested in is is fintech and what fintech can do for them. And and you can tell that even when they go for some of their CEOs now, is people who understand uh fintech, and you can tell there's a strategy behind it. And for me, it's remembering that it is strategy first, think about what what what strategy, um, what our technological technological strategy is helping us achieve, as opposed to just getting technology for its sake. And therefore, once you have that, uh go and recruit people who can give us that. And and it's very interesting that the kind of people are being that are being you know recruited by some of these best financial services companies, uh people who studied humanities, arts, and so on, because they are realizing that when you get technologies to give us the things that it gives us, what you really need now is creativity, is making sure that you have human beings who have divergent thinking. You want to make sure that in your excore you have people who come from all walks of life. Because I think what's going to differentiate the organizations that do well is the ability to tap into human wisdom at the moment and being able to unleash the human wisdom because particularly generative AI, uh, people are starting to get a sense that, oh my goodness, this is a little bit repetitive and so on. So people are looking for that human ingenuity, their human, that human creativity is becoming so important that let's get technology to do what it's supposed to do, but it must make sure that we then get human beings to talk to other human beings. And even some of the advertising campaigns that you are seeing now, you can tell when the human being has done that campaign because it goes straight to your heart. So let technology do what it's supposed to do and then unleash incredible um creativity that you can only get from human beings.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I coming from financial services, I think it does something to you because I still also track what's happening there in the financial services space. But I also think it's really interesting to see the competitors of what of financial services, right? Because it's not out of the traditional industry. So, really, what competition looks like when the market is open. Yeah, it's a very interesting space. And yeah, also what you're speaking about around the human element and and what advertising looks like when it's when it's um human and it's it's not like orchestrated or forced, etc. Really seeing how that in the social media world is really taking off because people want that human connection. I have an obsession at the moment, which is gonna derail us, but you must go look at this. I have an obsession at the moment with the press or rail ads on Instagram. They've made them so human because they've let human beings take us on the journey, and it's completely changed my perception of the brand itself. But going to that, right? And it's human beings taking the train, and it just completely pivots your perspective of the pressurale experience. So, like, I'm obsessed with that at the moment.
SPEAKER_03That is so cool. I'm gonna I'm gonna go check it out because it's actually very interesting. I was at Prasa a few months ago. We're having so they had a top 200 leadership, and they were really thinking about uh this stuff around you know human-centered leadership and so on. So the fact that they've done a campaign that resonates so well is actually. I love it. I'm gonna check it out. Thank you. Awesome, definitely going to check it out.
SPEAKER_00Now you must open up a lens and let us in. Tell us what do you do with technology? What do you use it for? What platforms are you using? How are you playing with it?
SPEAKER_03No, I so I I I definitely use in my own personal life, I use Copilot uh a lot, I use Gemini a lot, I use ChatGPT a bit. Um, but for me, uh is to the way I think about it is in the jobs that I do, what is a high stake um part of my job and what is a low-stake part of my job? And most of most of the things where the stakes are very, very low, I definitely use artificial intelligence to to to to to just get rid of the stuff. So for example, emails and so on. But but because what I do involves a lot of communication, a lot of writing, a lot of speaking, I reserve some of those things and just make sure that they still come from me and come from the heart and and my my writing mostly to uh people I think people still want to hear me as and so on. So I think about it this way. So when I think about my job, uh anything that is not supposed to take my cognitive um and and and bandwidth, I I give it to artificial intelligence to do so that the designs part of my jobs, the thinking, the the speaking, the all of those things, I I still I still get myself um to do them because I think it really, really matters that my clients hear me. It very matters that uh, you know, I still have that that human connection. For example, in my speaking, I don't use uh AI, for example, in my speaking because I think that's a high stake thing for me. But I think each and every person must figure out what are some of the things that are high stake for me and how can I make sure that I keep those things for myself and allow everything else for technology to take control. So so I have friends, for example, who are testing all kinds of things. I I haven't gone into that level. So one of my friends, for example, is has gone into proper uh creating a digital twin, and and they have a digital twin dishing up all kinds of content for them. I'm still not there, but it it's it's freeing them up to do all kinds of incredible things. They have a digital tweam. Some some of them are already creating uh boards and and so on to do most of their coaching. So there's a lot of stuff that I still need to fiddle with as well that I haven't started.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, when I have these chats, I just realize how behind I am.
SPEAKER_03Me too. I'm behind, but at least I know I'm behind.
SPEAKER_00Awareness is the first thing there's a problem.
SPEAKER_03Yes, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Oh my goodness. Okay, let's get back into your happy place. Positive organizational psychology 2.0, pop 2.0. Yeah, how would you describe that to somebody who doesn't know what that is?
SPEAKER_03Um, so first of all, I think positive psychology had an incredible start, right? Because mainly, mainly in 1998, uh Dr. Martin Seligman proposed this idea that you know there there could be a diff a different lens at you at looking at human beings. And already the way authors were thinking about the positive side of psychology, but I think he popularized it, and many other people popularized the idea that we don't have to only uh study pathology, not study anxiety and so on, that we can really study things like human flourishing and thriving, that we can literally take people. His main argument what the absence of the negative is not only the the absence of the negative does not mean the presence of the positive, right? And so they started studying that. But what happens is that until in 1998, most of the study of psychology, of positive psychology, started to to sound like uh toxic posity. It sounded like it is wrong to be said, it sounded like you should always be happy. It's almost like I remember listening to people who were very frustrated, you know. Someone wants them to tell you how they feel, and then mid-sentence they stop and say, Oh, no, no, no, sorry, I must always look at the bright side of life, I must fight. And it and it was that was not the idea. And so the 2.0 comes from both elements where it's it's also about embracing the dark side of human life and understanding that there's still some benefits in studying sadness and studying negative emotions and understanding that you can create space where people need to be honest about what they are feeling and then take them to a different level, right? So, out of that, um, the there's a slant in positive psychology that and positive organizational behavior at work, where it means that sometimes people are not feeling good and that's okay. And we have to create a space for people to decompress, to people to acknowledge their feelings. And so all the interventions around that stuff has has now gotten to a point where it becomes a little bit mainstream. So the first the first piece around uh positive psychology 2.0 is around that that negative emotions are okay and we need to start knowing how to deal with it. And then the other part is what we've been having conversations about the the understanding of um I guess mixing technology and embracing technology and understanding that we do not have to feel so defeated by technology. I remember being in a conference where there was a strong push against, for example, using coaching in positive psychology and using some of these coaching boards and using some of these many people who have been doing therapy, thinking about therapy boards and so on. So there's an element now where many people in the space are thinking about what can we leverage from technology and what can we still make sure we keep as authentic. So there are those two slants to positive psychology 2.0.
SPEAKER_00I have so many questions. The first is I think what I've seen, and very much from the human flourishing, that positive psychology perspective, is I've seen HR leaders position themselves as hope dealers. What's your thoughts on that?
SPEAKER_03I love it. I I really, really love it because the idea of hope and cultivating hope is actually a great thing because it does acknowledge that um things could be tough. So if you just think about so the person who popularized the hope theory is called Snyder. So we proposed Snyder hope theory. And the big part of the hope theory was never to dismiss that people feel negative emotions. It's about uh it most of it actually comes uh from the idea of cognitive behavioral therapy, that you acknowledge where people are, just you just nudge people uh towards towards hope. So the idea that you must still be able to listen to people, you must face uh whatever the the brutal, you must be brutally honest about what you are feeling, you can name what you are feeling, but you don't end there. The idea of of hope then is that you can imagine multiple pathways towards what you are feeling. The the idea really of hopefulness is to help someone imagine other multiple pathways when they are feeling blogged in one area. Because a big part of hope, of hopelessness, is just having this dream or having this goal, and you think there's one pathway towards the goal. And so any practitioner that can help someone imagine multiple pathways, it's absolutely brilliant to do. So I am for all our HR leaders who have positioned themselves as that, and it's I think it's a good thing because you're able to contain, but you also understand the pragmatic um type of cultivating hope.
SPEAKER_00On that second pillar of positive psychology, there's something for me that speaks around uh democratizing access, right? Like because coaching was something that was for a special few at work, right? It wasn't for everyone, and there's something about being able to leverage technology so that coaching is not for the five executives, but is is broader than that, and that's just one pillar. This could talk to multiple pillars of HR. What are your thoughts on that?
SPEAKER_03One of the biggest, biggest debates about any field really is about whether whether when we scale something, we lose out on the credentialing and making sure that there's still rigor in the people that do it. I think any profession struggles so much with how do we make sure that the people who do stuff are trained to do, they they have some ethical code that they subscribe to, and we know that if this person is not doing the right things, we have avenues to be able to have conversation with that person. So that this democratization is such a tension, you know, in many professions because you understand that in order to really have impact, you have to democratize, you have to open. But you just want to make sure that as we democratize, people must still learn stuff. I think the the only challenging part with democratization is that many people just do stuff that they are not interested in learning, not interested in being credentialed for it, not interested in even learning and and and applying a bit of rigor to it. So it's such it's such a tension, you know, and it's it's one of those tensions that people think about a lot, you know, you're such a purist. Um but but there is a difference between being a purist all almost in a way that you are becoming exclusive to saying, no, can you just apply a little bit of standards to what you're doing so that we can scale something, but it still has some kind of standards. But I think every every profession and any field is always thinking about this.
SPEAKER_00I think that's important as well because in the absence of people will find a gap. So we see people, for instance, using Chat GPT for guidance, for coaching, for mentoring as their therapist. To your point, if we don't put in those right structures, people will seek help exactly yet.
SPEAKER_03Exactly. I mean, if you think about there is there is that therapy, uh therapy board that has been, I think, welcomed by the South African depression group, for example. And I think because when it was designed, it was designed by therapists. So you apply a certain rigor. Because if you don't embrace something completely, you leave people to Chat GPT, and and we know that ChatGPT will end up telling you what you think you want to know anyway. So if you work with technology and you still apply a little bit of rigor uh to embrace the technology, and in the background, you make sure that this stuff is at least developed by people who are trained, we're gonna get a better outcome. Uh, it might not scale as much as ChatGPT, but at least we know that there's something that we can put in people's hands and say, this is the one we trust. Please play around with this one.
SPEAKER_00So back in the day, not that far off, there was this list, and it was called Skills of the Future. And all of us as HR professionals had to like learn the skills of the future, and we had to prepare the organizations for what was coming. And it's but we see it now, right? Like you said, creativity, there's cognitive load management, there's all of these things. What are the skills now that we need? Those ones we learned we needed them and we started to build them. Now, today, what skills should organizations, leaders, practitioners be investing in?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so I for fun, one of the things I really, really do for fun is looking at the world, that World Economic Forum Future of Jobs report. So I would go play around with it. And and and if you think about, if you think about it, I think right now the ones that they've just uh I've just said, I think they said uh skills of the future in 2030, and it does exactly what we've been speaking about. It's it's it's looking at both the skills, um the competencies, but also the jobs of the future. I think, in my view, um it is still things that that that that technology is struggling to do. So so the ability to to listen well, the critical thinking is still there. Because I don't know about you, Sunny, but you know, every time I'm feeding uh my thoughts to Chat GPT, for example, I'm just frustrated by the lack of critical thinking. And I'm like, uh I think you you get excited when you start, but initially you're like, oh, there's there's somewhere you're not getting. And so that ability to the critical thinking, the ability to separate, for example, um what is technology and what is supposed to be done by technology and what is supposed to be done by human, I think that's going to be a superpower. The ability to authentic leadership is a big, big superpower for me. The ability to listen to people, empathy is going to be a superpower. Uh, people want to be, uh you you see it, I I at least I see it all the time when people are sitting with someone and you just listen to them. And and how much how much they value those times because uh that oxytoxin that people are craving, because people are no longer having friends. We have a we have a proper loneliness crisis that people don't even have people they that listen to them. And so human first is going to be so critical in the next future. But for for a detailed one, I'll I would go and check out the future of jobs report.
SPEAKER_00I will definitely do that. Thank you for making me feel normal. I thought I was the only one who gets angry at chat and then types back wrong answer. So I'm glad I'm not the only one who gets frustrated when the answer that comes back is nonsense. I feel human. Um closing up the conversation on uh the PUB 2.0, what do you think is um the shift in perspective that leaders need to have at this point in time?
SPEAKER_03I I just think any leader right now, the ability to get the best out of people is your superpower. And and I was saying this to one of the leaders, I think yesterday, and and they were telling me how they're frustrated by someone in their team, they're frustrated by this people stuff, people keep coming to them and and so on. And and this is frustrating for them. And I and I just reminded them that you know that these ideas of coaching, mentoring, conversations, performance discussions, career conversations, that's actually your job now. All this other stuff is not really your job. This is your job. And I think uh having the ability to think carefully about the strengths uh of people in your team, how you can help them and unleash their performance is going to be really, really amazing. And that's why I'm a big, big, big fan of having conversations with people about what really drives them, what motivates them, getting tapping into their own why. And and hence, if you're having conversations, performance conversations, you want to make sure that you you tap into why people do the things that they they do. The that curiosity from a leader is a is a big point. Because I think if we don't, and I know those of us who are fascinated by positive psychology and positive organizational behavior, we've also pushed the strength movement a little too far. The idea was not that you shouldn't, you should never do jobs that are not in your strength. But the idea was if you are a leader and you know Spiwe loves this part, how can you curate or job craft parts of their jobs to unleash the other stuff that he loves to do? And and when you're able to do that, even the other parts of the job that they don't necessarily love to do, they're gonna show up a little bit better. So the ability to just have human-to-human talks, human-to-human conversations, understand people in your team, and be able to give them a platform to shine is your main thing. That that getting results through and with people is your main thing, and that is literally your job. And if you can strategize well about how to do it, do that, you'll do well as a leader.
SPEAKER_00Awesome. We're very serious people in the human behavior space. However, being serious and humor can coexist. Do you have a light story for us or a moment that stands out in your career to share with us?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I I have a lot of light moments. Um one of one of the things that one of the things I believe is um to hold gravity and levity both uh at the same time, right? So I laugh at myself a lot. I laugh at my own failures. And the one I the one I can think of is something that happened just just just last week. I bombed a little bit on stage uh for for a bit sets a few things that um I didn't, I was not phrasing them well, right? And and people, people in the audience said said said back to me, that's not the word, is shouting it like that. And I think that was funny. I think I embraced it. Um but I think but I think it's because I've created an environment where people feel like um it's okay to laugh with this guy, not at please. Um I do a little bit of self-deprecating as well, but but just in a way that is safe. I cannot think of a proper story, but the only one because of recensi bias is what happened last week, as people properly laughed at me while I was saying something wrong on stage.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but I like that sense of creating space where you can laugh at yourself and people feel they can they can say it bad, right? I think that's that's an important leadership capability to create space where people can speak back as well.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, one of my favorite quotes, and I'll never I'll never say it right, but it's by Jim Rohn that says something like leadership is being able to be funny but not be a fool. Um and if we get that balance right, it also feels liberating for you as a leader because I think sometimes we feel that we must probably be always serious, but it's not true.
SPEAKER_00Well, you you took my script away because I was gonna ask you to leave us with a quote to close ourselves. I don't know if you want to ahead or feel happy to I think that was good.
SPEAKER_03That was good. I can't remember the whole quote, yeah, but it is really my favorite. That that if we if we balance those two and were able to take our work seriously, but not take ourselves too seriously, I think we would have had a a nice balance.
SPEAKER_00Awesome. Thank you, Supiwa, for so generously giving of your time and efforts to come and be in conversation today. Thank you to the OBI for partnering with Psyopsa. Um, but I think most importantly, thank you for your openness, your authenticity, sharing of your insights. I lost count of how many models you said today, so I'm gonna go back and recount them. But I think this is what I've always enjoyed in your engagements, leaving, having learned something, but also having made it accessible so that we can all learn and take something away from us. So thank you so much for your time today.
SPEAKER_03Thanks for having me. That was great.
SPEAKER_00Thank you for another episode of the IOP lens. If you enjoyed this conversation, join us in July at the Psyopsa conference, where we'll be delving more into human plus AI and what this means for workplaces. Um, like, subscribe, and hope to see you in the next episode of the IOP lens.