The Talent Sherpa Podcast

Stop Developing HR Leaders

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2546522/fan_mail/new] Nearly half of all CHRO appointments in 2024 came from outside the organization. The standard diagnosis: pipelines aren't keeping pace. The standard prescription: build better HR leaders, faster. Both are wrong. The pipeline isn't broken — it's aimed at the wrong destination. In this episode, Jackson Lynch breaks down why external CHRO hire rates keep climbing despite years of development investment, and what organizations need to redesign before the next seat opens. What You'll Learn * Why the CHRO role is not a more senior version of the HR job — it's a different job requiring a different identity * Why a faster pipeline aimed at the wrong destination just arrives wrong faster * How to audit the gap between what your development program produces and what the CHRO seat actually requires * Why organizations are eliminating the very roles that build enterprise judgment in senior HR leaders * How to use the external hire rate as a design diagnostic, not a development failure Key Quotes "A faster pipeline aimed at the wrong destination arrives wrong faster." "The pipeline is working. It is producing exactly what it was designed to produce." "Expecting an upgrade when the role requires a rebuild." Sources for Statistics Cited * Internal CHRO succession dropped from 73% to 53% in a single year — Talent Strategy Group CHRO Trends 2025 Report [https://talentstrategygroup.com/chro-trends-2025-report/] * External hire rate for CHRO approaching 50% — Talent Strategy Group CHRO Trends 2025 Report [https://talentstrategygroup.com/chro-trends-2025-report/] SEO Summary Meta Description (143 chars): Half of CHRO hires are now external. Jackson Lynch argues it's a design failure — your pipeline is aimed at the wrong destination. Here's what to fix. Keywords: CHRO succession, external CHRO hire rate, HR leadership development, CHRO pipeline, enterprise talent strategy, CHRO identity shift, human capital design, CHRO readiness, talent density, succession planning Support the show [https://www.buzzsprout.com/talentsherpa/support] If this episode landed, the next move is yours.  Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too.  All at mytalentsherpa.com. In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale.  All at getpropulsion.ai.

Good HR Is the Problem

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2546522/fan_mail/new] Most CHROs believe they are operating strategically. Their calendar tells a different story. Only 12% of HR leaders report spending the majority of their time on enterprise-wide business problems — the rest are managing the function, often without realizing it. Jackson and Scott deliver the actual test: audit your calendar, name your constraints, and have the mandate conversation your CEO has been waiting for. If you've been telling yourself you're strategic, your calendar knows the truth. What You'll Learn * The 50% rule: a properly executed CHRO role means at least half your calendar is outside the HR function — not your intention, your actual schedule. * The three calendar buckets that reveal whether you're executing, aligning, or actually changing how the organization operates. * Why "strategic partner" has run its course — and the replacement frame: a business operator who owns the human capital scorecard. * The Evaluation Default Loop — the structural cycle that traps CHROs in diagnostic mode and fills the calendar with urgency over importance. * Three Monday-morning plays: free the time, upgrade the function's talent density, and have the explicit CEO mandate conversation. Key Quotes * "The calendar is the great truth arbiter. It will tell you what you have been doing." * "A partner can be in the room without changing the outcome. An operator is accountable for what the system produces." * "If the function can't run without you, you've built a dependency. It's not a team." Sources for Statistics Cited * 12% of HR leaders spend majority of time on enterprise-wide business problems — McKinsey HR Monitor 2025 [https://www.mckinsey.com/capabilities/people-and-organizational-performance/our-insights/hr-monitor-2025] (Note: McKinsey's primary 12% figure relates to strategic workforce planning with a 3-year horizon; the episode framing may be a paraphrase) * "Strategic partner" HR model traced to Dave Ulrich's 1996 book Human Resource Champions — AIHR: HR Business Partner Model [https://www.aihr.com/blog/hr-business-partner-model/] Support the show [https://www.buzzsprout.com/talentsherpa/support] If this episode landed, the next move is yours.  Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too.  All at mytalentsherpa.com. In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale.  All at getpropulsion.ai.

Are OPs Reading the Wrong Signal

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2546522/fan_mail/new] Before a deal closes, most operating partners have already formed a talent verdict on the management team. They just haven't said it out loud. The gap between what they've concluded and what the leadership team assumes is exactly where most post-close surprises live. A strong management presentation tells you whether the team can sell the thesis. It doesn't tell you whether the organization can execute it. That distinction — and the design flaw that keeps us from closing it — is what this episode is about. What You'll Learn * Management presentations measure communication skill under favorable conditions, not executional fitness — and those two things are completely different signals * Talent density gaps two or more levels below the CEO are where most value creation plans actually stall, yet pre-close assessments rarely go there * Three plays for operating partners to build a real organizational diagnostic before the deal closes — not as a retrofit, but as a structural input * Why CHROs need to push their way into pre-close diligence and what the answer (yes or no) reveals about the PE environment they're entering * How feeding the talent diagnostic into the transaction structure before signing sharpens retention design, equity, and the first ninety-day plan Key Quotes "The management team in a prepared presentation is not the same management team you call at nine o'clock on a Tuesday when a key customer is threatening to walk." "Presentation performance is a very narrow signal. It doesn't capture decision-making under pressure, capacity to manage executional complexity at PE pace, or the willingness to escalate when the plan isn't working." "The talent decisions in a private equity deal are made before close, whether you make them deliberately or not." SEO Summary PE talent diligence stops at the pitch room. Learn what operating partners miss and what CHROs must do before a deal closes to avoid post-close surprises. Keywords: private equity talent diligence, CHRO pre-close diligence, management assessment PE, organizational diagnostic private equity, post-close talent risk, CHRO PE environment, operating partner talent assessment, human capital diligence, PE value creation plan, talent density private equity Support the show [https://www.buzzsprout.com/talentsherpa/support] If this episode landed, the next move is yours.  Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too.  All at mytalentsherpa.com. In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale.  All at getpropulsion.ai.

Your Work System Has No Owner

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2546522/fan_mail/new] The HRBP model is 30 years old. Most organizations changed the title without changing the work — service logic stayed, compliance logic stayed. PwC research shows only 60% of CEOs call their CHRO highly effective, despite years of transformation investment. The capability problem is real. But it's downstream of a design problem most organizations keep skipping. This episode names what's actually broken and builds a frame for what fixes it. Jackson, Scott, and guest Phil Kirshner make the case for the Chief of Work — designed to own what no current role does: the combined output of how work is actually designed and experienced. What You'll Learn * You can put excellent people in a broken role and still get broken outcomes. * HR has two fundamentally different jobs — run the business and change the business — and giving both to the same function guarantees one never gets done. * IT, HR, and real estate each optimize their own lane; the combined output of all three has no owner, and that accountability gap has a measurable cost. * Freeing up calendar time through AI doesn't produce strategic capability — it produces more of the same kind of work without design changes. * The Chief of Work only works if it sits outside the functions it's reading — independence isn't a preference, it's the design requirement. Key Quotes "You can put excellent people into a role structurally designed to produce a service outcome, and they will produce a service outcome." "I want to do it with you, not to you." Sources for Statistics Cited * 60% of CEOs describe their CHRO as highly effective — PwC Pulse Survey, 2024 [https://www.pwc.com/us/en/library/pulse-survey/finding-opportunity-in-business-reinvention/chro.html] * Employee engagement cited as dropping,  — Gallup Global Workplace  [https://www.gallup.com/workplace/349484/state-of-the-global-workplace.aspx] * 41% of CHROs want greater depth in data analytics — Mercer 2024 [https://www.mercer.com/en-us/insights/talent-and-transformation/2024-voice-of-the-chro-maximizing-hr-effectiveness/] * 39% of HR functions have adopted AI — SHRM 2026 [https://www.shrm.org/topics-tools/research/state-of-ai-hr-2026/full-report] * Workers using AI tools report 346% increase in time on certain tasks — NBER/Duke [https://walktheworkline.com/article/is-time-on-your-side] Connect with Phil Kirschner * LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/in/philkirschner/] * Walk the Work Line [https://walktheworkline.com/] Because Jackson Would Want You to Have This * "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means." [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTRKCXC0JFg] — The Princess Bride (1987) Support the show [https://www.buzzsprout.com/talentsherpa/support] If this episode landed, the next move is yours.  Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too.  All at mytalentsherpa.com. In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale.  All at getpropulsion.ai.

AI Can't Learn What No One Wrote

Send us Fan Mail [https://www.buzzsprout.com/2546522/fan_mail/new] Most companies think the hard part of AI adoption is the technology. The organizations further along have hit a different wall: when you try to teach an AI system how your organization actually works, you find out nobody ever wrote that down. This episode breaks down HubSpot's three-stage AI adoption arc and what happens at Stage 3 — where the technology is ready but the organizational foundation isn't. This is where the CHRO has a clear mandate, if they move fast enough to claim it. What You'll Learn * HubSpot's three-stage AI adoption framework and why Stage 3 is where most organizations stall * Why your process documentation describes how you were designed to work — not how you actually run * The two types of missing organizational knowledge and why one can never just be "found" * Why decisions about what AI systems handle are organizational design choices, not engineering problems * Three immediate plays CHROs can run to get ahead of this work before engineers define it for them Key Quotes * "When you sit down to teach an AI system how your organization makes decisions, you find out nobody ever wrote that down." * "The technology is usually ready. The organizational part — that's the part that's not ready." * "Teaching AI systems how your organization actually operates forces every organization to confront what it was really running on." Sources for Statistics Cited * 94% of HubSpot employees use AI weekly — HubSpot Blog: How We Operate as an AI-First Company [https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-we-operate-as-an-ai-first-company] * 3,900+ AI tools built by HubSpot employees — HubSpot Blog: How We Operate as an AI-First Company [https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-we-operate-as-an-ai-first-company] * Recruiting cut 10 days off time to hire — Source not fully verified * 80% of scheduling automated — HubSpot: Human-Led, AI-Accelerated Talent Acquisition [https://www.hubspot.com/careers-blog/human-led-ai-accelerated-our-vision-for-talent-acquisition] SEO Summary CHROs must lead AI adoption's toughest stage — surfacing undocumented organizational knowledge before engineers define the future of work without them. Keywords: CHRO, AI adoption, human capital strategy, organizational knowledge, AI implementation, HR leadership, workforce transformation, CHRO mandate, talent strategy, AI systems Support the show [https://www.buzzsprout.com/talentsherpa/support] If this episode landed, the next move is yours.  Coaching is where it closes fastest — Jackson has developed CHROs from both sides of the table, as their leader and as their coach. The CHRO Ascent Academy, CHRO Chronicles, and the best-selling Substack are there too.  All at mytalentsherpa.com. In private equity: Propulsion AI surfaces workforce risk before the close and translates strategy into individual accountability after it. Before AI automation -  drive outcome clarity with digital teammates to do the work fast and at scale.  All at getpropulsion.ai.