EP # 3 Penn Lat: People-First Leadership Even in the Difficult Moments

EP # 6 Alvanson So: What Makes Humans Irreplaceable in the Age of AI

Vanson spent sixteen years in HR before he ever led a team. And when he finally did, unexpectedly, mid-pandemic, inheriting a team whose loyalty still belonged to his predecessor, he had to build trust over Zoom without a playbook, without precedent, and without a choice. In this conversation, I sit down with Vanson, Former Regional People Lead for Canva Southeast Asia, to talk about what it actually takes to build a culture people want to stay in, and what most organizations get wrong about how that happens. We get into the concept of the leadership shadow: the unintentional signal every leader sends, whether they know it or not, just by how they show up. We talk about psychological safety not as a culture initiative but as something that breaks the moment a manager title gets added to someone's name, and has to be actively rebuilt, every day, in every interaction. Vanson shares the one piece of advice Melanie Perkins the CEO of Canva, gave him in a fifteen-minute meeting that took him months to fully understand. We talk about what great culture actually is, not perks, not ping pong tables, but the kind of work you can sink your teeth into. And we close on something I think every leader needs to hear: that play is not optional, and that scheduling life like you schedule work might be the most important leadership practice there is. This is a conversation about what it means to lead with kindness, build with intention, and stay human in a world that keeps pushing us toward efficiency. What We Talked About * How sixteen years of competitive Magic: The Gathering, traveling the world, meeting people from every walk of life across a card table, became unexpected training for a career built on reading people and navigating difference * Being an individual contributor for most of his career: what it taught him to be led by stoic bosses, empathetic bosses, difficult bosses, and how every one of them contributed something to the leader he became * The accidental leadership role at Canva: stepping into an interim Head of People position right before COVID hit, inheriting a team mid-pandemic, and having to build genuine connection entirely over Zoom * The leadership shadow: the unintentional signal leaders cast just by how they show up, and why being conscious of it, asking for feedback on it, and actively managing it is one of the most important things a leader can do * How the manager title creates an instant barrier, turning candid relationships into careful, curated ones, and why leaders have to be intentional about breaking that wall down, repeatedly, because people will always naturally rebuild it * The fifteen-minute meeting with Mel Perkins, Canva's founder: the advice she gave him, "if you can choose to be kind, choose to be kind"  and why it took months for him to understand what she actually meant * The unlimited leave policy during COVID: the Nokia mindset that said it would be abused, and the reality that utilization stayed flat, because when you treat people kindly, they reciprocate * Culture as a self-cleaning system: why great cultures develop natural antibodies that make it hard for the wrong people to thrive, and easier for people with weak values to be strengthened by what they see around them * Spotting real talent: why interviews only reveal 10% of the surface, how to design conversations that put people in unpredictable real-life scenarios they can't script, and why the KSA framework is being inverted, attributes first, skills second, knowledge third * The 70-20-10 model reframed: 70% meaningful and challenging work, 20% social learning from mentors, 10% formal training, and the shift toward "just in time" learning over pre-learning * AI and the human element: why organizations are currently heavy on usage and light on ideas, and why that equation will flip as AI becomes embedded in everyday work * AI pushing people to rebuild their relationship with difficulty: why the muscle for doing hard, gritty, messy work is atrophying, and why that matters more than which tools you know how to use * The vision for meaningful work: every job has drivers and drainers, and the hope that technology takes the drainers away so people can do the work that actually fulfills them * HR spending 90% of its time on relationships: how elevating leadership capability across the organization lifts the admin burden so HR can do the work that actually matters * Bringing your own chair vs. having a seat reserved: the difference between being invited into critical conversations and having to fight your way in, and why HR leaders have to advocate for the kind of HR their organization deserves * Becoming a fulcrum: when HR has the hearts of the people leaders manage, it becomes a lever that multiplies organizational force rather than a complaints department putting out fires * The permission to play: why the balance between work and play shifts too far toward work as we age, and why carving out time for what brings you joy is not indulgence but sustainability * Closing message: schedule life like you schedule work, and don't let your calendar fill so completely with work that you forget to live Quote from the Episode "When you have a bunch of really good people, they create an environment where the bad ones can't thrive. It's like natural antibodies. And for those that enter with weak values, they tend to get strengthened by what they see around them." — Vanson, Former Head of People, Canva Philippines

EP #5 Nicolas Bivero: The Best Remote Teams Aren't Built on Talent Alone

Most companies say they're people-first. Fewer can show you what that actually looks like when growth gets uncomfortable, when key people go on leave, when a global pandemic forces you to rebuild how you onboard both employees and clients from scratch. In this episode, I sat down with Nico Bivero, Co-founder of PenBrothers — one of the fastest-growing outsourcing companies in the Philippines. Nico grew up in South America, studied in Switzerland, spent years building teams for a Japanese logistics company, and has now called Manila home for fifteen years. His perspective on leadership is shaped by all of it. We get into what it actually takes to build a people-first culture over time — not as a statement of values, but as a set of behaviors, processes, and choices that compound. Nico talks about where the cracks showed up as PenBrothers scaled, how a data-driven onboarding initiative called HyperCare took their new client success rate from around 50% to 86%, and why involving the people who execute a process in designing it isn't just good leadership — it's the only way change actually sticks. We also talk about the cultural gaps that show up when Western clients work with Filipino teams for the first time, why AI is making their model more human rather than less, and what Nico believes the Philippines needs to become known for beyond the talent it exports. This is a conversation about the long game — in business, in culture, and in people. What We Talked About * How Nico's first exposure to Filipino talent — as the sole foreigner building teams for a Japanese shipping company starting in 2005 — planted the seed for everything he's built since * Why "people first" isn't a philosophy you arrive at in university — and how working in Japan and the Philippines taught him that the right team, built with care, outperforms a group of A-players who don't jive * The long-game mindset he borrowed from Japanese business culture: not thinking quarter to quarter, but building something sustainable over five, ten, fifteen years — and the patience that requires from a self-described impatient person * The modeling gap: why you can't tell your team it's about the long game and then walk into a meeting angry about last week's numbers — and how Nico keeps himself honest about this * The hidden process risk inside growing companies: when key people leave or go on maternity leave and you realize the systems were never actually the reason things were working * How COVID exposed the gap in their onboarding process — and how Pen Brothers turned that into HyperCare, an intensive cross-cultural onboarding system for both new employees and new clients * The data behind HyperCare: client success rates that moved from roughly 50% to 86% after six months — discovered not from intuition, but from looking at what their best account executives were already doing differently * Cross-cultural communication in Filipino-Western remote teams: the British politeness trap, the importance of comprehension questions, and why "ask even if it seems obvious" is the advice Nico gives every new hire * How change actually sticks in an organization: co-creating the process with the people who have to execute it — slower on the front end, much faster on implementation * Why AI is making Pen Brothers more people-first, not less — by freeing up customer success and HR to have more time for actual human connection instead of reviewing email threads * Using AI for first-round candidate interviews as an opt-in tool — widening the talent funnel while making the experience easier for candidates to schedule on their own time * What it would take for the Philippines to be known not just for talent, but for leadership — and why it requires the private sector, industry, and government working together to grow the economy and bring experienced Filipinos home * Nico's 10-year vision: clients who say they couldn't be what they are without their Filipino team — and Filipino professionals who grew into senior leadership through the exposure Pen Brothers gave them "You can have great people, but if you don't make them work together and you don't have the right team structure, the whole ship won't function — and it will stop working pretty quickly." — Nicolas Bivero, CEO & Co-founder, PenBrothers Resources Mentioned * "Acquired" Podcast (recommended by Nico) — business history storytelling covering how major companies were founded, grew, and navigated their biggest challenges; episodes run 3–4 hours and Nico says 80% is deep company history; great for founders who want perspective on their own challenges

EP #4 Char Rivera : The Jobs AI Can't Replace: Leading People in the Age of Technology

What does it actually take to build a team that trusts you — and each other? In this conversation, I sit down with Char, a human-centric leader who has spent her career in the outsourcing space building teams from the inside out. Every senior leader and team lead in her organization started from rank and file. That's not a coincidence — it's a philosophy. We get into the distinction between managing tasks and managing people, and why so many leaders confuse the two for years before something forces them to wake up. Char talks about how her entire culture is anchored in a single core value — Malasakit, the Filipino concept of genuine, heartfelt care — and how that one word shapes everything from recruitment to accountability conversations. We also dig into one of the tensions I hear about constantly: how do you hold people accountable and still lead with compassion? Char draws a line I haven't heard drawn this clearly before — empathy is feeling it, compassion is doing something about it. And it turns out that doing something about it is exactly what drives performance. We also talk about AI, what it means for teams doing outsourcing work, and why the leaders who will thrive aren't the ones who resist technology — they're the ones who use it to go deeper with their people, not further from them. This is a conversation about trust, about caring enough to act, and about what it looks like to lead humans in a way that makes them actually want to stay. What We Talked About * How Char's leadership philosophy started when someone simply believed in her potential — before she had even proven it — and why that single experience shaped everything about how she develops people today * The shift from managing tasks to managing humans: why she used to think leadership was about driving performance and what changed when she realized people need the right support to perform at their best * Why speed is a short-term play — and how structure, clarity, and accountability create sustainability over urgency * How to understand what actually motivates people, and why passion is a choice — not something people stumble into * Malasakit as a core value: the single Filipino concept of genuine care that anchors her entire culture, introduced from day one in recruitment, not buried in an onboarding deck * Why she personally meets every batch of new hires on their first day — spending 15–30 minutes making sure they know her outside her title, and feel known beyond their resume * Trust as a mutual act: why great leaders both earn trust and extend it — and what happens when two people who are each trustworthy still have low trust between them * The Trust Battery exercise: a simple team activity where people ask each other "how much do you trust me?" — and the surprising realizations and action plans that follow * How she builds homegrown leaders: every senior in her organization started at rank and file, developed through shadowing, challenge, and the radical transparency of showing her own struggles out loud * Why she leads with a flat, linear mindset rather than a pyramid — and how showing vulnerability as a confident leader doesn't undermine authority, it creates it * The empathy vs. compassion distinction: empathy is understanding how someone feels, compassion is doing something because of it — and why she pushes her leaders to move from one to the other * How compassion directly connects to performance: the story of a team member missing KPIs because of a new baby and a misaligned shift — and how one small change turned it around * Why punitive accountability backfires — it activates fear, not growth — and what genuinely compassionate accountability looks like in practice * AI and the future of outsourcing: why technology doesn't make human leadership less relevant — it makes it more essential — and how her team is upskilling from transactional roles into coaching-centric ones * "How is this person smart?" — reframing how leaders evaluate talent in an AI-augmented world * Training your algorithm intentionally: why Chat recommends TikTok and YouTube as real leadership learning tools — and the mindset of curating your digital inputs the same way you'd curate a reading list "Empathy is putting yourself in their shoes. Compassion is actually doing something because of it. It's the action that is crucial — not just the feeling." — Char Rivera

EP # 3 Penn Lat: People-First Leadership Even in the Difficult Moments

I sat down with Penny, Co-CEO of Virtua Solutions, a remote staffing company that's been quietly doing something most companies just talk about — keeping people. At 95% employee retention, some team members still around from 2014, Penny's built something rare: a team that actually wants to stay. But this conversation isn't a highlight reel. Penny gets honest about the moments that humbled her — including a hard lesson about communicating change to her team the wrong way, one that cost Virtua a client. That story alone is worth the listen. We go deep on what "people first" actually looks like when performance is slipping and a client is frustrated. We talk about why slowing down isn't weakness — it's leadership. And we get into something I think we don't talk about enough: emotional regulation as a core leadership skill. Not a wellness trend. A real, practical requirement if you want to show up steady for your team. Penny also shares how she and her co-founder Francis model the culture they want — not through leadership manuals, but through how they show up in every meeting, every check-in, every joke. And we get into something close to my heart: the deference culture in the Philippines, why it holds our leaders back, and what it's going to take to move past it. If you're a people manager, HR leader, or founder trying to figure out how to build a team worth staying on — this one's for you. WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT * How Penny's early experience as a remote worker for a US-based SaaS startup gave her the blueprint for the kind of leader and culture she wanted to build * The founding of Virtua Solutions in 2017 — and how the company has held a 95% employee retention rate, with some team members still around since 2014 * The costly mistake of communicating a major change to her team using business logic instead of leading with what it meant for the people — and losing a client because of it * Why slowing down is one of the most underrated leadership skills, especially for fast-moving, systems-oriented leaders * Emotional regulation as a real leadership practice — not a buzzword — and Penny's honest account of learning to regulate her own state before bringing hard news to the team * The breathwork and mindfulness techniques Penny actually uses, and why she's still figuring out what sticks for her personality * What "people first" looks like in practice when someone is underperforming — understanding the full story before jumping to solutions, and using trusted peers as a bridge when direct conversations shut people down * The skill vs. will distinction in performance conversations — and why you can't coach your way out of what you don't understand first * How Penny and Francis model the leadership culture they want, rather than prescribing it — and why that approach produces leaders who put their own spin on it, which is the point * The role of humor and lightness in building psychological safety — and why breaking the ice (or "breaking" someone, in Penny's words) is actually a signal that trust has been built * Hierarchy in the Filipino workplace — where it comes from, why it's largely subconscious, and the quiet cost it has on how teams communicate and perform * The deference Filipinos can show toward Western or foreign leaders, and why Penny frames it as a shared human experience rather than a culture problem * What's shifting (and what isn't) as Gen Z enters the workforce with more international exposure and fewer ingrained sir/ma'am habits * What Virtua is still building toward: a culture-specific leadership training program that defines what it means to lead a team the Virtua way * The one thing Penny would tell every new leader: understand yourself first — your emotions, your triggers, your communication patterns — because how you manage yourself is how you'll manage others EPISODE QUOTE "If you don't understand your own complexities as a person, how would you understand that the people on your team also have complexities?" — Penny, Co-CEO, Virtua Solutions

EP # 2 Mia Lim: You Need To Stop Speaking HR & Start Speaking Human

Most HR leaders walk into organizations armed with frameworks, programs, and best practices. Mia walked in and just... listened. In this episode, I sat down with Mia, Head of People for TALA in the Philippines and Vietnam — a leader whose career path is anything but traditional. She started in brand management, moved through change management and consulting, got certified as an executive coach, and eventually found her way to one of the most people-forward roles in the Philippine tech space. What makes Mia's perspective rare isn't her credentials. It's her relentless insistence on context — on actually understanding what people's work lives look like before designing anything for them. They go deep on what real organizational transformation requires, why change so often fails at the last mile, and how a forwarded email she wasn't supposed to see became one of the most important leadership lessons of her career. They also talk about the future of work in the Philippines — what AI and automation could mean for human dignity in the workplace, why companies without HR at the table are more vulnerable than they think, and what Filipino organizations need to shift to unlock the leadership potential already sitting inside their teams. This is one of those conversations that will make you rethink how you show up — whether you're in HR, leading a team, or building a company. WHAT WE TALKED ABOUT * How Mia's non-traditional path — from brand management to consulting to executive coaching — shaped the way she thinks about people work * The pandemic moment that changed everything: why her boss kept telling her to get out of her bubble, and why it took years before she truly understood what that meant * Why context is the most underrated superpower in HR — and what it actually looks like to spend your first six months in a role just listening * The last mile problem in change management — why frameworks and programs fail when they're not translated into the language of the people they're designed for * Why organizational transformation has to start at the top — and the 20/80 rule Mia uses to balance time with senior leaders versus the rest of the organization * The performance rating wake-up call — how TALA discovered that 75% of their people were rated 4 or 5 out of 5, why that was not good, and what they did about it * Building a coaching culture at scale — why frequency of coaching wasn't the problem for frontline managers, and how fixing visibility into metrics transformed coaching quality overnight * The forwarded email she wasn't supposed to see — and what the brutal feedback inside it eventually taught her about pushing agendas without understanding context * The why to what shift — one of the most practical coaching tools in the episode, and why changing just the first word of a question can transform how people think about problems * Why HR needs a real seat at the table — and the very real business risk of building organizations where people are treated as replaceable boxes * The Good Job Strategy by Zeynep Ton — why creating good jobs is a strategic business choice, not just an HR aspiration * Bringing dignity back to work — what that phrase actually means, and why AI and automation could be the thing that finally makes it possible * What Filipino senior leaders need to shift — why giving people context and bringing them on the journey is the single biggest unlock for leadership potential in this country * The cascade moment — how one team lead's championship of a new performance policy became an unexpected and moving proof point for human-centered change BOOKS MENTIONED * The Good Job Strategy — Zeynep Ton * Work Rules — Laszlo Bock