262. Expert Predictions for 2026 (Part 1): Ethical AI, text chat and the death of the resume

0:00Happy New Year's Eve!

0:10Leanne:Hello everyone! I hope you had a lovely Christmas. We're in that glorious lost week, if you've got it off work, between Christmas and New Year. And no one really knows what day it is. Nobody's pants fit anymore. And we're kind of looking forward to going back to work just to stop eating all the chocolate. Yes, Quality Street. Had enough of that. Yeah, anyway, if this happens to be your first time here, welcome. This is Truth, Eyes, and Work. We are the award-winning podcast where behavioral science meets workplace culture. And we, of course, still brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals.

0:42Leanne:Sometimes I do wonder if I say HubSpot's name more than my own, but let's say mine instead. Don't say it three times. Don't say it three times, otherwise they'll pop up, they'll appear behind you. My name is Leanne. I'm a Chartered Occupational Psychologist. My name is Al. I'm a business owner. Together we help you build amazing workplace cultures. Yes, we do. But today we're not doing that. We're not doing that today. Today we're doing something a bit different. We've gathered some of the smartest people we know to share their predictions for 2026. And I guarantee some of these are going to surprise you.

1:14But I'll be honest, if you're looking for something which wasn't about AI, then this probably ain't the prediction show for you. Let's be honest. Is there any prediction show going to be for 2026 that's not going to have AI in it?

1:26Leanne:I don't think so. If you are new here or newish here, if you've been with us less than a year, you might not know that Al and I have been doing these prediction episodes for the past three years. If you want to hear 2025's prediction episodes, go back to episode 159 and 160. And if you want to hear the ones from before that, you want to head back to episodes 71 and 72. Wow, that's a long way back. I know. I'll be honest, so far we've got nothing right, But don't let that discourage you from leaning in heavily to today's episode. Yes, our guests quite often get things right. So what is interesting about this year's guest is we're seeing two very different camps emerging, I felt, Al.

2:07Leanne:Some guests are feeling very hopeful about what's coming. Others are bracing for some pretty significant challenges. But they are all pointing to the same thing. The way we work is about to shift in some fundamental ways. Yes, so let's quickly run through who we've got and then we'll go to each individual guest and hear their prediction. First up, we've got Phil Agnew from Nudge. There's no prediction show that's complete without the amazing Phil. Phil is all about behavioural science and how people make decisions. He's got two predictions about AI that are going to make you think differently about how we interact with technology and each other.

2:38Leanne:Then we hear from Megan French Dunbar. MFD. MFD, who's taking a much more optimistic view of where AI is heading. She's been talking to people doing some really exciting work in healthcare and beyond. And her take on job creation versus job destruction might actually challenge what you've been hearing in the news. And after that, Erica Brewer, one of our brand new friends, she's going to be talking about something pretty profound, how we find meaning and identity. Now, she knows what she's talking about because she's a brand strategist. So she thinks about connection and identity for a living.

3:11She's got a couple of predictions about how people are going to fundamentally change their relationship with work.

3:15Leanne:Then we have Anthony Taylor, who's guessing a bit contrarian. Nice word, Chappell. Thank you. I don't use that very often. I'm writing it down so you can use it more often in 2026. Anthony, his words, not ours. He thinks AI is revealing something important about our organisations that we've been missing. And he's got some strong views about what really matters in the workplace. Bit of a spoiler. It's not what most people are focusing on. And finally, Georgia Mary Hodkinson is challenging the entire way we think about productivity. She reckons we've been measuring the wrong thing all along and burnout, well, that's not actually about individuals struggling with it.

3:52Leanne:So whether you are feeling optimistic or slightly terrified about 2026, we've got perspectives here that will make you think. So let's dive straight into these predictions right after a very quick message from our sponsors. HubSpot makes impossible growth impossibly easy for their customers. and here's a perfect example. Lee, your turn. Morehouse College needed to reach new students with fresh, engaging content. But with a massive 900-page website, even the tiniest updates took 30 minutes to publish. Breeze, which is HubSpot's collection of AI tools, helped them write and optimise their content in just a fraction of the time.

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4:45Welcome back. Right. Our first prediction comes from a friend of the show, fellow HubSpot Network podcaster and host of the UK's number one marketing podcast, the always cheerful, always amazing Phil Agnew from The Nudge Podcast. My prediction, like probably most people's prediction on today's show is to do with AI, because what else is there to predict other than AI? I have two predictions actually. Both of them are based around a bit of psychology because that's where my head's usually at. I'm often reading behavioral science journals and figuring out how people make decisions. The first one is this idea that I think AI come next year will start to be very clear in terms of showing it's working.

5:28So right now it sort of sometimes says what it might be doing and then gives you an answer but it doesn't really tell you what it's been doing and i think ai companies will actually start to build tools to show the working of the ai so when they write you an email it will give you you'll be able to click a button it will say here's exactly why i wrote the email in that way here's why i used this line rather than this line here's why i said this rather than this i think the reason they will do this is because showing the working will make customers actually value the output even more because the magic has worn off now so two years ago when we were using chat GPT to write an email, it was magical.

6:05It really blew our mind. Now it just seems normal. And actually, I think we undervalue how impressive it is because it just happens so fast and we don't really think about it. And I think AI companies will realise something that psychologists have realised for a long time, which is that if you show you're working, for example, people will value the thing you create more. I'm sure I've heard an episode around open kitchens or something, which is where you can see the chef actually make it. Is this a similar kind of idea? So that's a study by Ryan Buell from Harvard University. And he's studying something called operational transparency.

6:41And it's exactly that. In Harvard canteens, he sets up these studies where sometimes the people who are dining in the canteen can see the chef cooking their meal. And other times he places a partition between the chefs and the diners and so no one can see each other. and what you find consistently is that diners enjoy their meal more when the when they can see the chef whether they could see the chef working interestingly the chefs also enjoy creating the meal more when they can see diners enjoying the meal so this is operational transparency if you can see behind the scenes you value things you value things more and there's other elements of this as well which and i think the one which is pertinent to the ai example is that this is again a michael norton and ryan burrell study they did a study with kayak where people were shown the kayak home page they entered their search so i want to do whitewater rafting in new zealand and kayak because this was back in the sort of um 2010s early 2010s it took a bit of time to load so it was a loading screen sometimes the loading screen just showed a wheel loading and other times the loading screen showed it's working when it does that loading screen they find that people value the results more than when the loading screen is blank interestingly if they show they're working the loading screen can take like three times as long and people still value the results more because you can see all the effort going into it and i think because ai has got so fast it's become so omnipresent it's lost a bit of that magic a bit of that shine and i think companies will realize that if they actually reveal a bit of what's going on behind the under the hood people will will value a bit more for for that reason so you have a second prediction yeah this one's silly and it's for the same reason there's this weird thing that happens when you realize something is created by ai which is you start to devalue it undervalue it so there's this amazing study with shared on my show with by professor matt johnson where he shows individuals two pieces of art.

8:48Now it's a podcast I can't describe I can't show you the art but one of the pieces of art is actually quite beautiful it's really symmetrical the colors sort of mesh really nicely it's pleasing to look at. The other piece of art is a bit janky and it's not quite as nice to look at. So when people look at these two pieces of art me included and you're asked which do you prefer pretty much everyone prefers that one which is nice to look at I did too. However, the study then reveals to the viewers that that piece of art, the nice one to look at, is AI generated and the janky one is human created.

9:22And then they show these labels to people and they find that when the piece of art is labelled as AI generated, we actually don't like it anywhere near as much. And we suddenly say, oh no, I much prefer the human created piece of art i don't like the ai piece of art i think this is maybe a bit of a problem with ai and you see it a lot i spend a lot of time on linkedin because i'm a loser and you see it a lot on linkedin you see people calling out other people for using m hyphens and clearly using ai comments and clearly using ai and so my prediction next year as a sort of fight back against ai is that text speak is going to become a thing again so text speak you know how we always used to speak on texts when you paid by the letter and you couldn't be asked to write out a full message see you late with an eight i think that's going to start coming back or dripping into our vocabulary i think there's going to be this weird value that people place on messages that have so clearly been not created by an ai because they're chaotic and weird and grammatically incorrect in some ways or cut short in others or meshing words together in a way that AI wouldn't.

10:36Previously, before AI, that would have just been nonsensical and would have looked unprofessional. But now in a world where potentially so many of the messages, especially on someone like LinkedIn, are written by a robot, not a human, that'll become weirdly valuable.

10:48Leanne:If you enjoyed that, you absolutely need to check out Nudge. And here's the thing, right? You're already 90 % of the way there because you've got your podcast app open right now so press pause type in nudge press follow press play we're all happy well don't press play just yet because i've got a few more predictions for you um so i meant come back and then press play wasn't very clear there well okay on to prediction number two then yes our next prediction comes from none other than the incredible megan french dunbar or as we call her mfd megan is brilliant she is an author she's worked with some of the most forward-thinking organizations.

11:25And she just released a book called This Isn't Working, which to be frank, if you care about the future of work, you 100 % need to read it. Although, come on, let's be honest, you're clever. You've probably already read it, listen, haven't you?

11:35Leanne:Yeah, absolutely. I mean, Megan is just one of those people who manages to be both incredibly hopeful about where we're heading and brutally honest about what needs to change. So let's hear what she thinks is coming in 2026. I feel hopeful. I think we're going to start seeing more positive advances. I think AI is going to be used in not just negative ways. I think there's going to be ways that it's going to be used in like really helpful, positive. I think we're going to see breakthrough research, breakthrough technologies, things coming through that are advancing people's lives and health care and like actually using business to the betterment of humanity.

12:14There's an oncologist from Nigeria who is working with a friend of mine, and he is using it to do oncology research. And it is rapidly advancing a ton of research that has been stagnating and taking so long over years and years and years. like when we use AI on really deep vertical trenches of solving problems like this like very specific oncology. And there's another one that was being used for deepening connection and like helping people who have like-minded interests to be able to connect with each other. Like people actually taking it and using it as a tool for good, that is going to, I hope and assume, create more jobs as we advance in research, as we advance in ideas and solutions and new ways of being in the business space, I do think there are some sectors that are going to get hit.

13:06And my hope is that with enough of these like deep vertical AI ways that we're applying it, that it actually, there's a ton of new jobs that are going to be created again in things that are advancing humanity and society. One of the places I was in recently, they were talking about a new AI application that makes accounting like a breeze and like things that are like numbers based where it's pretty black and white and a computer could do them pretty well. They were also, there was one that was talking about using it for legal application and like my husband is an attorney. And, but like that again, black and white, like here is the letter of the law.

13:51And And this was pretty much a like entrepreneurial kit to get started with all the business things that you need to know as like when you're a brand new entrepreneur, which 10 years ago I would have loved. And this woman was like, I used to work at one of the largest business law firms in the world. And I can do all of the setup for a company and one one hundredth of the cost of what you would spend on a traditional attorney. So it's like fabulous for entrepreneurial endeavors and like all that and advancing that. And then like the legal profession, I'm like, ooh. But then like with that, you know, someone asked like, what do you what do you think about the fact that that's probably going to be cannibalizing the legal profession?

14:34And you are, in fact, an attorney. And she was like, well, I think lawyers need to be starting to see themselves in a different capacity. Like, yes, they need to understand the letter of the law, but they need to be more in a place of strategic advisors. and like really thinking about what are the nuanced perspectives that you can bring that are from experience and from studies and like all the amalgamation of information you have in your brain that you can bring to bear that puts you in more of an advisory capacity rather than like a, I am going to help you interpret the law because there will most likely be AI applications for that.

15:07So most of the things that are like very black and white. and I think there's also like with this it wasn't like it's gonna all of the lawyer jobs are going to be gone it was like you're just going to need to tweak the way that you're thinking about your profession and I was like oh that's hopeful. How are you applying that hope into into what

15:28Leanne:what that world is going to look like next year because it does affect us all it really does. Just heard this last week I was at an event and Vicky Saunders who you should if you haven't had her on the show. I'm like, she's like a guru. Oh, my gosh. She mentioned that before every progression, there is a regression and that she feels like right now, this moment in history is like the bow being pulled back. That's the regression to like launch the arrow that is about to go further than we've ever imagined. And I was like, that's how I that's what I need to stick. I have to have that in my head as what is happening right now.

16:04And I think like the number one predictor of consistent behavior change is who you surround yourself with. And I like intentionally put myself in rooms with people who are hopeful, people who are like trying to make change, people who are looking at solutions, like people that are using their time on this planet to just try to make it better. And it's hard not to be hopeful when you're like looking at the extraordinary brains and wisdom and energy that is going into creating wonderful things in the world. Like there's a lot of bad shit. Uh-huh. Like, and you can focus on that. It's not, uh, I have to like almost put like horse blinders on right now and like just stay the course so that I can keep doing what I'm doing.

16:54That resonated with you and I suspect it will have done. Go grab Megan's book. This isn't working. You can find it on Amazon or we've put a link to a website in the show notes.

17:02Leanne:It is a proper good read. She doesn't pull any punches, but she's also got this really infectious optimism about what's possible when we actually rethink how work works. Okay, prediction number three coming up. Prediction number three comes from Erica Brewer. And if you don't know Erica yet, you're in for a treat. Erica is a messaging strategist who basically helps businesses figure out what to say and more importantly, what not to say. She's also the co-host of Trash Talk Podcast, which has possibly the best tagline we've ever heard, where cliched advice goes to die. She also runs something called the Worst Kept Secrets Hour, which is a monthly meetup for people who've got something genuinely new to say.

17:43Needless to say, we are not invited and never have been and never will be.

17:48Leanne:Yes, none of this reheated talking points from 2016 nonsense, Al. Erica is worth more than that. And also, new things, new ideas is exactly what you're about to hear. Erica has two predictions that are anything but recycled wisdom. So let's hear what she has to say. For a long time, our work was also a thing of identity. So in addition to our daily duties, the work was also being or figuring, becoming more of who you were. And that came with reward, too. Like in focusing on that, you've got a pension. But I think people are keen to the fact that those rewards just aren't the same anymore. You can't even rely on the consistency of a job or a career these days.

18:36Leanne:So it's a shaky place to stake identity. And that's where I think deviation comes in, right? From seeing employment as this place to, you know, figure out who you'll become to seeing other places to do that work of identity or finding meaning. How do you start to untangle that in an effective and healthy way? My thought is that people will do it through places where they do have control in hobbies, in recreation, in play or things that we would think of as play or within, like, say, healing practices, whether that's yoga or some other modality. I think people will are going to foreground those as, quote, the work making air quotes for people who are just listening.

19:27Leanne:And it's the source of reward. Right. I don't want to say it's a sure thing, but it's more of a sure thing than what we would experience in our nine to five lives. And what do you imagine the impact of that being as we start to reclaim our identity from more sources than just work? I think we'll see some more articles in Harvard Business Review about people not taking their work seriously anymore. Nobody wants to work anymore. You know, getting labeled as a deviant, especially as, you know, there's propaganda around the younger generations. But the flip side of that is that we're going to have to find new ways to motivate and inspire the people on our teams.

20:09Leanne:and, you know, maybe not bring them back to the dark side of finding identity through work, but finding different ways to engage them in general because the reward's not there. You know, the sense of who am I might not be as much there anymore, but there are probably other things that we can start thinking about. I feel like speed is breaking us and most of the people I talk to are exhausted by that. And then there's optimization. it's boring us. It's not making better products or better marketing campaigns. You know, executives optimizing my viewing experience isn't really making Netflix better than it was five years ago.

20:54Leanne:Exploration inspires and excites me because it's what we need. We need new things right now. We need solutions that have never existed before. And I really think that's where exploration comes in. I mean, we need it in our careers on an individual level. We need it in the marketplace. We don't need to go faster. So, yeah, I'm not inspired by optimizing anything that I'm doing or doing it better. Everything I do is pretty damn good, right? But it is about exploring and experimenting, having those unpolished rifts that you put it out there. I think that's how you get to the important things yeah so deviate and explore those are my predictions and I think actually I know that's going to get you what you need I really like how Erica thinks about things I think she's not afraid to challenge the state's quote and just say it as she sees it and if you want to hear more of that kind of thinking go check out her podcast Trash Talk it's so good yeah it's so good it's very very good or head to her website we've put the link in the show notes and if you're anywhere near one of her Worst Kept Secrets Hour meetups, honestly, just go.

22:08I mean, I say honestly, just go. Never been. Sounds good.

22:12Leanne:I'm sure it is brilliant. I'm sure it is. Yeah, and you'll be hearing more from Erica in the new year. Spoiler alert. Right, on to prediction number four. After this very quick break, though, yeah? Everyone needs a... What day are we on? Go and get a copper. Yeah. We don't know. We don't know what day it is. What time is it? What year? I genuinely don't even know what year it is. Bailey's? See you in a second. Billion Dollar Moves, hosted by Sarah Chen Spellings, is brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination of business professionals. Join venture capitalist and strategist Sarah Chen Spellings as she asks the hard questions and learns through the triumphs, failures and hard lessons of the creme de la creme, so you too can make billion dollar moves in venture, in business and in life.

22:54Maybe start with episode 124, where you're going to hear how industry giants from Canva to YouTube define leadership.