Korn Ferry Swallows AMS, Handshake Grabs Uplimit

Get ready, boys and girls, because The Chad & Cheese Podcast is back at full strength! Joel is finally back from his massive summer hiatus across Italy, Paris, and RecFest London—and he’s joined by co-host Emi to break down an absolutely jam-packed week of global travel stories, World Cup drama, and massive industry shakeups.

First up on the chopping block, global consulting giant Korn Ferry just swallowed up RPO powerhouse AMS, while early-career network Handshake acquired AI-skilling platform Uplimit. We debate whether these are brilliant strategic marriages or recipes for disaster. Then, we look at a major AI reality check as Ford rehired 350 engineers after automation failed their quality standards, and Mark Zuckerberg admitted Meta misjudged how fast AI could scale.

Is the artificial intelligence hype train finally derailing, or is this just a minor speed bump? We also dive into the talent crisis, breaking down a brutal Wall Street Journal analysis on why Gen X is getting crushed by long-term unemployment, and we tackle Scott Galloway's viral claim that work-from-home culture completely broke entry-level onboarding. Finally, we look at the future of tech, from Meta donating smart glasses to blind veterans to a fully robot-operated hotel launching in China.

We’ve also got World Cup predictions, Mbappé shoutouts, political dodging, and the triumphant, rusty return of Joel’s infamous dad jokes. Do these industry moves make sense, or are these companies completely losing their minds? To find out exactly what we think, you've got to tune in.

PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION

Joel Cheesman (00:06.169)

I'm back

Joel Cheesman (00:32.855)

it feels good. yeah. From charming to alarming in seconds. Hey boys and girls, it's the Chad and Cheese Podcast. I'm your co-host, Joel Infinite Red Card Cheesman.

Emi (00:45.194)

And I am Emi, I am still recovering from RECFEST. Beredugo.

Joel Cheesman (00:50.307)

this episode of HR's Most Dangerous Podcast, porn fairies, hand jobs, and hotel femme bots. yeah, I'm coming in hot. Let's do this.

Joel Cheesman (01:06.199)

What's up, Emmy?

Emi (01:07.608)

Hey, where have you been? You've been gone away for so long.

Joel Cheesman (01:09.912)

man. man. Thursday out. Thursday. June out. Sorry. This is it's we're recording not on Thursday. I am so discombobulated with work. I'm gonna make so many mistakes on this show because I'm so I'm so rusty and out of practice. But yeah, so a year or two ago, Chad and I agreed like pick a month.

Emi (01:18.357)

Yeah.

Emi (01:26.557)

my god.

Joel Cheesman (01:35.669)

And and we'll take it off. And part of like bringing you and JT and Mo and Leave and everybody, like having a team is like we're able to take time off, do something else, clear our head, get away from things. So June June was my pick, because my wife does a conference every two years in a pretty nice location. we did Singapore a couple of years ago, we did like Quebec City a few years ago. So this year was Italy.

the city was Turin, Italy, and I've never been to Italy. So I said, like, let's go. So I said, I'm taking June off. Her conference was in June. the two weeks of first two weeks of June, we did Rome, Saw the Pope live and in the flesh. the south yes. No, it wasn't that kind of it wasn't that kind of Saw the Pope. But if I tell all my stories, it'll be the whole show. But so the Pope was kind of unique.

Emi (02:07.713)

Yeah.

Emi (02:18.485)

You saw the Pope? Did he get an autograph?

my god. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (02:31.553)

we we had a tour to see the Vatican Museum and we end up we show up and we we Google ahead of time like the Pope's in town or Pope's gonna make an appearance, which is kind of a big deal in Rome. Like when that happens, Romans know it. And so we went early to see, like, maybe we'll see the Pope or maybe the Pope Mobile or something. And we end up and we just kind of go with the flow of all these people going to the Vatican, and we're like, museum, we'll get to it.

Emi (02:42.837)

Absolutely.

Emi (02:55.553)

Yeah?

Joel Cheesman (02:59.607)

So we end up, there's this big seating area. If you've been to the Vatican, huge seating area. And it's it's it's sort of like partitioned off into fours. So probably security. by the way, security is the Pope Security, they're in these like weird yellow and blue outfits. They've probably been since the Renaissance dressed like this, but their traditional keeps it going. Anyway, side note. so we sat down and they have people from around the world in these different segments. So it's like,

Emi (03:03.455)

No, I haven't actually.

Emi (03:19.137)

Yeah?

Joel Cheesman (03:29.175)

Let's hear it from Italy or Italy's bad example. Let's hear it from France. And France will come in and like they'll have little flags and they'll like pump up their their hype to be see the Pope. So then the Pope finally comes out and it's the Pope Mobile. Everyone's seen this thing. It's got glass. he comes out and he's got this little just like route and he waves. If he sees a baby, they get the baby and he holds the baby, he blesses the baby, whatever. otherwise you're waving, people are running. It's like the Beatles in a Pope Mobile.

Emi (03:42.993)

Love that. Yes.

Emi (03:53.771)

that. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (03:58.733)

People are going nuts. And so we saw him. I got pictures. if you are connected me on social media, I posted those. a less of a big deal to me. I'm not a Catholic. I'm not all that religious, but I I appreciate I appreciate the gravity of the Pope. so that was really cool. So I don't want to get too bogged down in so Rome, Colosseum, pizza, like great food, good town. Went to Venice from there.

Emi (04:10.359)

Still cool to see the Pope though. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (04:23.725)

Venice, very cool, but very touristy and was very hot. if tourist if the tourist trap is not your thing, that might be challenging. Turin was beautiful, the mountains. it was a about a million and a half people I think live there. So it's a city, it's a European city, but it's not overcrowded. There's not a lot of tourism there. So you could you could kind of settle in there. And then we went to Milan. That was our final destination. Milan, outside of the big church, which is very cool, and the Da Vinci stuff.

Emi (04:45.885)

Love Milan. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (04:53.249)

It's it's it's beautiful people looking as beautiful as they can and trying to outbeautiful everyone else who's beautiful. So yes, it's like a yeah, it's fashion, it's the stores, it's the yeah, so so that's not really my jam, fashion and all that. So that wasn't a big, a big draw from I don't need to go back to Milan, I don't need to go back to Venice, I don't need to go back to Darren. I do need to go back to Rome. A lot more of Rome, I think, I could experience. so I'll I will probably be back there. Came back home.

Emi (04:56.991)

Yeah. yeah. It's like a proper fashion show, isn't it? Yeah. I love it. Yes.

Emi (05:16.917)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (05:23.309)

Had a couple weeks, had about a week rest. And then, as people know, Cole and I, my son, he's 19 now, we go to Europe for the Recfesh conference, and he gets to pick a city and we go. And this year he picked Paris. So he's I've been many times, he's never been. So went to Paris. Of course, it's a heat wave, as you know. You felt this in in Britain. It's a hundred degrees in France in Paris.

Emi (05:38.519)

Good choice, Cole.

Emi (05:44.535)

huh. Yes.

Joel Cheesman (05:50.113)

Which is really bizarre. it was not fun at all. But we did like a f we did the sprint, we did the catacombs, the Louvre, Normandy, Notre Dame, Eiffel Tow like everything you could do in Paris. We did like a full court press and got it all done and then went to went to London where I saw you at Wreckfest. which was great. So I'll pass it on to you how your summer's going, how your June was, July, and of course we s celebrated Independence Day here.

Emi (06:00.103)

wow.

Emi (06:11.382)

Yes you did!

Joel Cheesman (06:20.161)

as well. But let's let's talk about wreckfest. What were your takeaways, thoughts? Had a good time. Weather was great. Weather was perfect.

Emi (06:20.236)

Yes you did.

Emi (06:25.122)

You know what? yeah, it was, it was, I was expecting it to be a bit more of a heat wave because you know, it's been boiling hot over here. It was perfect. It was like, I can't convert it into your numbers, but I think it's about 25 degrees over here. And honestly, perfect weather. It was beautiful. It was so much fun. I saw some old faces, met some new friends and new contacts. And I was hosting the innovate stage, some

Joel Cheesman (06:33.337)

Uh-huh.

Emi (06:54.296)

great people who are on my stage as well. So, you know, it's just one of those events that I just always, always look forward to. And this year I had one of my friends come with me who's, you know, she works in a HR space, has always been to the more, you know, the traditional kind of like HR conferences. I said, look, I don't know. yeah. And I was like, I don't know how to explain REC Fest. Even if I'm telling you that this is a, you know, it's almost like a...

Joel Cheesman (07:08.441)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (07:13.549)

The buttoned up conferences, yeah.

Emi (07:22.04)

party in a crowd where you're still learning, you're still finding out what's going on about what's going on in the industry, but you're going to have fun. It's unlike anything that can ever imagine. And she loved it. She absolutely loved it. And for anyone who didn't go, please get a ticket next year. Just please get yourself there. It's a fabulous, fabulous day. One of the best events in the HR and definitely TA calendar.

Joel Cheesman (07:23.993)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (07:48.974)

Wow, that's a s that's a pitch. If that's not an endorsement, I don't know what is. and if you're and if you're a lot of our listeners in the States, if you can't make it over to London, like come to Nashville. it's third year three, I think, of Nashville. And it's starting to gain some nice traction. Because not it'll never quite be Nebworth with the Ferris wheel and like the on site land mass that it is, but it's a totally different animal. Chad and I'll be there in all of our glory. I don't think you're set to come to Nashville, are you?

Emi (07:51.957)

I know, honestly.

Emi (07:57.854)

Absolutely.

Emi (08:11.969)

Yeah.

Emi (08:17.501)

No, I don't really want to. So, you know, if you want to get me there, you know, just saying, Joe.

Joel Cheesman (08:20.971)

I don't really w you don't want to come to Nashville, the estates, or wreckfest in the US?

Emi (08:26.068)

Wow, just get me to all of those places, I'm easy. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (08:28.521)

Okay. Well speaking of coming to America, World Cup, England's still in it. I assume that's who you're rooting for. Of course.

Emi (08:33.111)

Yes.

Emi (08:36.642)

course. mean, yeah, mean, Nigeria is not in it. And I would always have to vote, you know, support England and Nigeria because my roots are Nigerian. They didn't even qualify. So I'm all in for England. All in. Although they did scare me against Mexico.

Joel Cheesman (08:45.976)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (08:50.765)

Now do you do you really objectively think they're gonna they they could win it all?

Emi (08:55.692)

I'm going to say yes, because I'm a patriot. Yeah, to be fair, yeah. he's a beast. He is fantastic. I don't understand how he can move that fast with how big and tall that he is. But I'm going to keep rooting for England. I'm there. I'm behind them. I'm manifesting in World Cup win. Absolutely.

Joel Cheesman (08:56.695)

Yeah, okay.

I'm gonna love I'm gonna love the the Norway game. Er Erling Holland is a freak. He's yeah.

Joel Cheesman (09:21.347)

Yeah. I'm I'm yeah, I'm rooting I always root for England for whatever reason. and sest ancestry. I don't know. I usually know more of the players. France is probably the best team I've seen, if I'm being objective. Spain is probably close to. Messi is messy. I mean, what I love is all the stars are bringing it. Messi, Holland, Kane, Bellingham, Mbappe, like they're all they're all bringing it.

Emi (09:26.188)

Didn't you? Good. Yeah.

Yeah. 100%. Yeah.

Emi (09:42.457)

Yes, they are. Yeah, they are. Although did you see the last Argentina game, like against Egypt? So that one, was like, I remember that because I tuned in a little bit late because I was working and I was like, what? Egypt's two goals up, you know, and then literally I took one call for 10 minutes, came back, two goals. I'm like, Argentina's back. And I suppose that's the difference between playing

Joel Cheesman (09:54.029)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (10:10.391)

Yeah.

Emi (10:10.776)

you know, between a good team and a great team, like Argentina, even from behind. And in the last minute, they are still going to come out, you know, and win. So, no, think they're doing well, but it's still all for England, all for England.

Joel Cheesman (10:25.145)

Yeah, the cream always rises in the World Cup. Like as much as much noise as we make about like this the US is here and you know, the other teams like, Okay, it's Argentina, it's England, it's France. so it's

Emi (10:27.735)

Yes.

Emi (10:36.801)

Yeah.

Yeah, but talking about the US, though, what about Trump trying to rig the US?

Joel Cheesman (10:44.621)

You know, like so so w when you travel overseas, although Europe is sort of obsessed with Trump and the US, it is n it is nice to unplug from that and not have to worry about. So I had an I had a good time of like just not watching the news, not watching industry news, political news, whatever. And I was watch obviously the World Cup and what was going on is exciting. And it's just it's just s he's just such a shithead to c you know, he was sitting there like,

Emi (10:52.183)

Yeah.

Emi (11:11.328)

Yes.

Joel Cheesman (11:12.803)

All right, what's getting all the attention in the news right now? Like World Cup. Okay, how can I inject myself into that? Be a dick, t steal some thunder. And it just like just it was nice to have the politics out of it. America was having a moment, you know, like all the social media about America's great, Waffle House, Walmart, like Buckies. It was like, man, America's having a moment, even to the point where people in Europe are like, We owe America an apology.

Emi (11:15.795)

you up.

Yeah.

Emi (11:33.452)

Positive, for once, yeah.

Emi (11:40.887)

Yeah!

Joel Cheesman (11:40.983)

Like what what we've been hearing about America is not true. Like the people are great and dah dah da. The sc the Scots coming in and drinking Boston Dry. Cra awesome and cra like Boston is not Salt Lake City. Like there's a lot of beer in Boston. So the fact that that's a total Scottish thing. so it's sh it was just great. And then Shithead had to come and like get his nose and things and and s and like

Emi (11:54.582)

Okay.

I love that, love that.

Emi (12:06.104)

Get involved. What was that? I know about sports. I'm really good at sports. And that wasn't a record.

Joel Cheesman (12:11.309)

Yeah, yeah. And that and as we and now he's in Europe telling Europe what to do and gimme Greenland and

The Iranians went from like very, very intelligent people. The new regime was much different, much more f affable to us. And now they're like the the devils now. So it's just it's just it's just whack. I I yeah, yeah.

Emi (12:28.308)

Yeah. Yeah.

It's unnecessary. It's like, just get out of the sport. This has nothing to do with you. Just leave it, leave it alone. know? Yeah, no, was bad.

Joel Cheesman (12:37.399)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. At least he didn't stick his nose in the Taylor Swift wedding. At least at least there is some something sacred. Yeah

Emi (12:47.0)

You say that. Let's see. Give it a week. Somehow he'll be involved. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (12:52.109)

Give it a week. Give it a week. All right, let's get to shout out, shall we?

All right, Emmy. Shout outs are sponsored by our friends at Proven Base. If you love free bourbon and who doesn't, well, our friends at Proven Base are making miracles happen, but you can't win if you don't play. So visit Chadcheese.com slash free today for your chance to finally let your liver know who's boss. That's right. All right, Emmy, let's get to shout outs. What you got?

Emi (13:20.588)

Wow, I'm going to be cheeky. I'm going to say two. Okay, so first one, I'm going to stay on the World Cup theme. So my first one is for Mbappé from France. So if anyone saw Instagram.

Joel Cheesman (13:23.288)

Uh-huh.

Joel Cheesman (13:33.177)

For our Merrick, some for some that don't know soccer, give us a little bit about Mbappe.

Emi (13:36.885)

Okay, Mbappe, amazing French player from African ethnicity. And he was playing against the French team were playing against Paraguay. And you know, they were outplayed because Paraguay were dirty in that match. They were trying all kinds of tricks. It's like, what are you doing? There's like literally what are you doing? Like tripping people up. The ref, I don't know what match the ref was actually watching. But it definitely wasn't watching, you know, the game in front of him.

Joel Cheesman (13:51.671)

Mm. It was a nasty game, yeah.

Emi (14:06.756)

Anyway, after all of that, know, France won, Mbappe is the captain. One of the senators of Paraguay just wrote this really racist, like his vile, vile kind of like post on X. And, know, and I went into it. I looked, because it was also posted on Instagram, and I was like, what is wrong with this person? This person is a senator for one, but, know, feeling, know, brave enough to be so openly racist.

Joel Cheesman (14:22.339)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (14:35.161)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (14:35.832)

What I loved is that Mbappe didn't sink down to her level. He just called her out and said, you're a disgrace to your country. And because of what you've done, the focus is now off how well Paraguay played in the past or the Paraguayan people, but now is focused on the fact that you are a racist. You're a disgrace to your country. So I love the really elegant, classy way that he clapped back at her. So that is my first shout out.

Joel Cheesman (14:54.617)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (15:03.352)

In terms of the second one, I'm like I said, I'm going for England. Every opportunity that I have, I am rooting for England. Absolutely. I'm looking at Kane. I'm looking at Bellingham. I'm looking for more goals. Come on. We are going to get to the final and we are going to win. This is going to be our year. So those are my two. Oh, yeah. It was a song. It's coming home. It's coming home. It's coming. Football's coming home. Yes.

Joel Cheesman (15:22.049)

Is it coming is it coming home, Amy? Is c

Joel Cheesman (15:30.297)

She was the the Paraguayan Senator, man. nasty. coconut milk. I mean like really old school racism shit. It was I was

Emi (15:36.918)

That honestly... Yes!

Yeah, it's like what the hell is this? You didn't have breast milk, you drank coconut milk as a child. It's like come on, come on. But that's the world now. People are brazen. You have people with all the far-right parties going, yes, fine, be racist. That is the world that I've put you in.

Joel Cheesman (15:46.881)

It was wild. Yeah. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (15:58.041)

Yeah. Mbappe Mbappe is a great sort of figurehead for the for the sport. I mean he's he's he laughed a lot of it off in that game, a lot of smiles like you guys are gnats on my ass. Like, I mean, yeah. So I he got he had a chance to to get in the mud and and he didn't. So I I definitely appreciate that. Way to way to go, Mbappe. Even though you're gonna lose to London if it c or England if it comes to it. Sorry about that. Sorry about that. It's coming home.

Emi (16:02.07)

Yes. Yeah.

Emi (16:07.264)

Yeah, who knew what they were doing? Yeah.

Emi (16:14.338)

Yeah. He wrote it. It it above him.

Absolutely. Bare not. England's coming. We're bringing it home. It's coming home.

Joel Cheesman (16:26.901)

It's coming home. Not if Trump has something to do with it. All right. So we talk about my my smart glasses on the show quite a bit. And it's it's back and forth. I haven't asked you what you think about it. I think women are less into it because of the privacy thing and the beginning film thing. we'll get to that in a second, but I want to give a shout out to Meta. Also, Meta doesn't get a lot of love on the show, but they

They recently are they recently offered to give or they're now giving a hundred and thirty thousand free pairs of meta smart glasses to blind veterans. So they they put out a little video about this, which I think really kind of encapsulates it very well. So let's check that out.

Joel Cheesman (17:47.075)

So I don't know, hate on smart glasses if you want, hate on meta if you want, but you know, this is good meta. This is a good thing. I I never really thought about what meta could do to someone who was do for with someone who was blind or someone who was disabled. And this sort of paints in a different light. I think it's great. so shout out to to Meta for me. Now now you go ahead and tell me why smart glasses are so bad.

Emi (18:11.42)

I I think it's a boy thing. I don't see the need to have like a computer on my face. I'm sure there's some cool things about it, but I'm not gonna do that. And I don't like the, it just feels a bit creepy, know, invasion of privacy. That's just me.

Joel Cheesman (18:18.263)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (18:29.357)

So when I have them on and I'm talking to you, are you freaked out? Are you creeped out? Are you do you even notice?

Emi (18:34.368)

No, I don't know this. thought they look really like really cool kind of aviator style glasses. To be honest, I was going to compliment you on them. I was like, yeah, they look cool. But so yeah, so you know, you get in the way with it. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (18:42.617)

There you go. Well anyway. I I'm I'm it they've they've helped they've been great for me, if they can help blind people of all of all kinds, including veterans. So I think that's great and good for Meta for for giving those those freebies away.

Joel Cheesman (19:01.667)

Well, we just talked about Recfest coming up in Nashville in the fall. but more or less taking a little break from travel. I know there's some stuff going on. wanted to definitely give a shout out to our our travel sponsor, Shaker Recruitment Marketing. I know that actually Joe Shaker was in Italy a couple of days after I was. So we actually missed each other. that was kind of a little irony there, but

the Cubs I think are doing all right. the Bears are gonna move to Indiana, which I know he's he's upset about. But shout out to Joe and Shager recruitment marketing on the travel. If you want to find out where we're gonna be, just head out to Chadchees.com, click on the events to see where we're going. Emmy, are you going anywhere? including your vacation spots, because I'm always interested to know where the next v next vacation is.

Emi (19:46.137)

Wow, we are thinking about a long weekend in Spain. So not sure where in Spain, but I just kind of need a little bit beachy kind of holiday for a couple of days or Croatia. So it's between the two and then at the end of the year back to Brazil. I love that country. I love that country. There's so much more I need to see. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (19:55.702)

Uh-huh.

Joel Cheesman (20:08.579)

How I need to know how to make Emmy money. God damn. Man, their travel spots are awesome. Love it.

Emi (20:14.443)

Honestly, I, yeah, all my money goes on travel at the moment. I'm just like, oh dear, but no, I love him. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (20:19.245)

Ha ha.

I think that's becoming common, like particularly with younger people, like I can't afford a house, I can't afford a car anymore. Like let's just let's just go to Croatia. Let's just go on vacation. Yeah, let's just see the world.

Emi (20:29.014)

Let's just see the world. And that's the thing. And this is great thing about being in London because these countries are not actually not that far away. You know, to get to Spain, I'm there in that three and a half hours. So it's perfect. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Love it. That's okay. Come over to the UK.

Joel Cheesman (20:36.482)

Yeah.

And it's yeah, direct flights everywhere for you. You get to the States and it's you know, one way. all right. Well, well, cool. well well maybe a few people, Mike Microsoft will have something to do, because there are there are some layoffs to talk about this week. Microsoft laid off forty eight hundred people or so, roughly two percent of its workforce. ADP, which is in our space, they had reported seventy-six job cuts in New Jersey, which New Jersey requires you to list the layoffs that you're going to have.

Emi (20:52.279)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (21:08.749)

But online chatter says that the layoffs are going much deeper at ADP. So stay tuned. here on the show we'll we'll be watching that to see exactly what's going on at ADP. And Culture AMP, if you're a Culture AMP user, they apparently cut nine percent of their workforce, roughly seventy folks. Hopefully everyone will land on their feet from that one. Amy, any comments about the layoffs? Feels kind of like garden variety,

We need to do something. Let's let's lay off some people.

Emi (21:40.217)

I know. mean, what can I say? It's just like a common story at the moment. Like it seems to be every single week you go on LinkedIn, you look at news, you go whatever. Another company is making cuts. And it's just so hard because I just think there's so many good people out there looking for a job. But now it's taken even longer because you're competing with so many more people. And that's why I I do, I feel sorry for people going through it.

Joel Cheesman (21:46.819)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (22:08.11)

Yeah.

Emi (22:09.496)

I think there's more organizations can do to support people, you know, going through redundancies. Cause I, what I'm tending to see is like, okay, I understand people have to make business decisions and we hope that organizations are not doing for personal reasons, but the support, the after support is like, you know, how do I just help people? How do you get a new job? How do you upskill yourselves? How could you put together CV? You know, what a good job hunting tips. I just don't see that.

Joel Cheesman (22:13.261)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (22:31.577)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (22:37.269)

After after support. That's why we bring the Europeans on the show. A little empathy, a little little kindness. That's right.

Emi (22:39.456)

Yeah, absolutely. Yes. I'm like, what are you doing organizations? Help people. These are tough times.

Joel Cheesman (22:47.469)

Well, if y if you like tough times, this is your lucky day 'cause this show has a lot of tough times, but let's get into the topic, shall we?

Emi (22:55.018)

Thank

Joel Cheesman (22:59.897)

All real quick, Emmy. This segment is powered by our friends at Aspentech Labs. If you love free beer, we'll get ready to turn into a sloppy summertime life of the party. But you can't win if you don't play Emmy. So visit Chadcheese.com free today slash free today for your chance to replace that shit beer in your mom's fridge with some good, good stuff, everybody. Because nobody likes the bad beer. That's right. All right, let's get into the news, Emmy. Acquisitions.

Emi (23:24.856)

you

Okay.

Joel Cheesman (23:27.965)

Search firm Korn Ferry has agreed to acquire RPO services provider Alex Mann Solutions, or what the kids like to call AMS, for approximately 1.1 billion USD in a mix of cash and stock. But wait, there's more acquisition goodness in me. Handshake has acquired learning platform Uplimit, hoping to bolster Handshake's skilling off skill offerings for early career professionals. Financial details of the transaction were not disclosed.

It's a tale of two acquisitions, Emmy. Give us your take.

Emi (24:01.269)

It is a tailor to acquisition. So if I talk about Korn ferry, these are two names that I've, I haven't interacted that much with them personally, but these are two massive, massive organizations with huge kind of brand presence. So I think, you know, bringing together Korn ferries, kind of executive search consultancy experience with Alexander man, which he obviously specializes in recruitment process, outsourcing or RPOs, early careers, campus recruitings. I actually think that's a really good.

acquisition. And I'll tell you the reason why. It's because if you look at what Conferee primarily specializes in, which I said is executive search consulting, that is a pretty volatile market at the moment. You know, it could be lucrative when things are going well, but it's uneven. The revenue stream, you can't always guarantee it. So especially when you're in this kind of economy. So if you're bolstering

bringing into Alexander man solutions into your portfolio, that is stabilizing the revenue stream. This is more guaranteed revenue coming into the organization. It's, you know, they're already coming with contracts underneath their belts, recurring contracts. So I think together is a great solution. And what it does, it means that as an organization,

whatever they're going to call themselves, because I don't know if AMS are going to keep their brand name in the future, but they can go now and pitch themselves as an organization that can cover everything from ground level, from careers, all the way up to executive search, and it can actually consult for the business. So you get an all in one solution. So I think that's a really good acquisition, to be honest. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%. And then we talked about, yeah.

Joel Cheesman (25:40.557)

You're into it. You like it. cool. Now your hand handshake, take.

Emi (25:46.553)

handshake again. Up limit, be honest, I don't know too much about them as well, but I know handshake. So I know that they're great for university recruiting. So I went away, did a little bit more research, what is up limit? And they are apparently an AI native learning platform. And I think in this day and market, bringing those two people together is quite good. Because if you're thinking about AI, okay, take someone like me.

I'm trying to learn AI, you know, I'm all for it. I'm implementing AI tools and trying to like, you know, is integrated everything that I do personally and in the workplace. However, AI is accelerating so quickly. that having an AI native platform with Handshake educating the early careers, the generation, I think is fantastic. And what they're doing is also partnering with educational institutions.

So they're making sure that their curriculum is always up to date. I think that's going to be a great pipeline for the future. But what I liked about them even more, because there's so many courses out there, they're like a theoretical, watch this video. I'm not being funny. Just watching a video doesn't really help you. You need to get your hands dirty. You need to start playing around with building agents. That is what UpLimit does. They give you real hands-on project experience, which is what recruiters are actually looking for, hiring managers are actually looking for.

Don't just wave your certification and say, yes, I know how to build an agent. No, no, show me the work that you've done. Verify your skills. So yeah, two great acquisitions, I think. I am.

Joel Cheesman (27:10.531)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (27:19.309)

You're a fan. I love it. All right.

so the the Korn Fairy, and we don't talk about executive search much on this show, but just being in the industry, you kind of know Korn Fairy and Alexander Mann solution. So this this really is a one plus one equals three situation, in my in my opinion. This is not like a clearance rack acquisition. This is not desperation, this is not this makes sense. This is the round hole and the round peg. I think that when you look at

the world is the world as it's becoming and it's a mystery as to like the layoffs. Are the layoffs AI driven? Are the AI like are the layoffs stock driven? Are the layoffs whatever the reason is, companies seem to be sort of washing away, giving in a reason to like wash things away and like let's build it back up differently. Whether that's executives and hand in hand with AI, if that's AI in some form,

Emi (28:15.981)

Mm.

Joel Cheesman (28:21.123)

portions of the business, maybe it's all people in some of the portions. It just feels like companies, and this is a little bit of theme of the show. Companies have said, like, let's flush some shit down the toilet and then build stuff back and see and see if we can build it differently for a world with AI. So to me, Korn Fairy is at the right place at the right time. people are going to need executives. People are going to need people that know shit. And they've

Flush a lot of them out and maybe they need different executives. But Korn Fairy to me is right on the precipice of something big in the in the in the rebuilding of organizations. On this flip side of that, you have the RPO and Alexander Mann and what they're doing. So it's a perfect fit, deeper in the funnel, makes sense, don't step on each other's toes. They complement each other very well. I think that's great. If I'm looking for one negative in this deal, it's the cultures are so different, as I I like.

Emi (29:07.489)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (29:15.704)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (29:16.889)

Korn Fairy is mad men, buttoned up, belts and suspend, like just very conservative, very like no sh no fucking around Korn Fairy. AMS, let's say a little more loose with the culture and the vibe, the energy. So I don't I is it is it gonna be like China getting Hong Kong, where they like Hong Kong is not Hong Kong anymore. They're they're China, or do they let do they let AMS be AMS?

Emi (29:28.205)

Yeah.

Emi (29:42.164)

Yeah, could be.

Joel Cheesman (29:46.753)

I don't know. I don't know enough about Korn Fairy's acquisition history to say that. I would think that as a big public company, they will eventually absorb the name will go away. They'll absorb the products. It'll be Korn Fairy RPO or whatever. that that'll happen. But the culture's clashing, that'd be the only thing I could think about that might that might put be a grenade down the hallway in this deal. The handshake thing, handshake is a really interesting slash weird story.

Emi (30:05.027)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (30:16.823)

They they come in and they're like, We're gonna do college, we're gonna do college jobs. We're gonna partner with all the schools and get people in jobs, which is a shitty business. These companies that do colleges, they come and go, colleges change their mind, people, they're attrition in college, like students leave, they want something new and cool. So someone like it just someone new and cool comes in. So Handshake gets a ton of money. They say, We're gonna be the next LinkedIn.

And on the show I said, You're full of shit. and then and then and then the next thing they do is they become like this AI training business because they have all these students that have PhDs and master's degrees and they go, Hey, train the AI and we'll pay you. And this this for them is a mul a billion dollar business, apparently. Mercor is their main competitor. Mercor just came out being they said they're two billion dollar ARR business now.

Emi (31:08.78)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (31:13.059)

This is a huge, huge opera. So, like, they pivot into that. But I have to think that in the back of their minds, they were like, you know, that dream to kick LinkedIn in the nuts. Like, let's let's revisit that. Bring in this up limit thing. And so Uplimit comes along and they are pushing themselves. Let me get this right. They they describe themselves as the job and skilling network for the AI age, whereas LinkedIn held that crown in the digital age.

Emi (31:38.551)

Okay.

Joel Cheesman (31:43.085)

I don't know what the hell that means. digital age, AI age. I thought it was all digital. I don't know. Terminator's coming. So, so if if if they sold this good bill of goods to Handshake that, hey, we have something that's LinkedIn ish, but LinkedIn doesn't do it, and we can like leapfrog LinkedIn with this new stuff. Like, hey, we got an EV, they got a gas guzzler. maybe this thing can work.

Emi (31:45.73)

Sounds good, doesn't it?

Joel Cheesman (32:09.293)

The terms were not disclosed. I don't know how much they paid for this. Maybe it was like pocket change. So look, I think their LLM training business, that thing is that thing is a just yeah, just a menace. It's huge. They're getting more and more competition. That I think is gonna be a three to five year opportunity, but then they're they're probably gonna have to figure out what they're gonna be after that. Maybe the next LinkedIn is hit. I am skeptical. I am skeptical. Yeah.

Emi (32:13.302)

that I couldn't find anything, yeah.

Emi (32:34.252)

Maybe. Really? Yeah. You're always skeptical, Joel. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (32:37.995)

I believe in brands. I believe in strong brands. I believe in unseating brands is really, really hard. they have to do something very, very different. I think peop look, I have 15,000 followers slash connectins on LinkedIn. I there I'm not leaving. There's no way. And and don't tell me that you on LinkedIn would leave LinkedIn.

Emi (32:59.778)

But I'm not asking you to leave LinkedIn. You can have both platforms. I have Instagram and I have TikTok. I use both. Yeah, that's fine.

Joel Cheesman (33:03.885)

Yeah, why? Why?

Yeah. I I'm too old and and grumpy to like start a whole new LinkedIn thing. So that's just not me. And we we've had this whole thing like we're LinkedIn for the kids, we're LinkedIn for people who don't have LinkedIn. What and it none of it works. So if Handshake has the secret recipe, God bless ya. But you know, I I don't know if I'm falling for the banana and the tailpipe in me. I don't think I'm falling.

Emi (33:13.462)

come on, we're about the same age, it's fine.

Emi (33:32.79)

Well, handshake if you're listening, I'm rooting for you. Come on, prove Joe wrong,

Joel Cheesman (33:37.151)

All right. And ME can be found at 1800. No, I'm just kidding. All right. All right. Let's go to our next story here. I mean, talking about AI, Ford, that says in the car, speaking of gas closers, rehired 350 veteran engineers after AI and automated systems failed to meet quality standards. The quote, gray beard engineers are training younger staff and reprogramming AI tools.

Emi (33:40.918)

Hahaha!

Emi (33:59.597)

Yes.

Joel Cheesman (34:03.341)

Leading to reduced warranty and recall costs. But wait, there's more. Emmy Mark Zuckerberg has told employees the company has made mistakes in the AI transformation of its workforce, specifically a miscalculation of how quickly AI agents would improve and scale in the business. AI's having a a a moment of grow, growing pains, or is this something bigger in the works, Emmy?

Emi (34:28.536)

I think this is people who are, what do you say in the US? Drinking the Kool-Aid a little bit too much? Is that right? Have I used it in the right way? Yeah? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, AI is new. We are learning about AI, but all of a sudden, everyone's been thinking, or they're believing too much, AI can replace human workers. That's not what AI should be for. Organizations need to take a more conservative approach to AI and not assume that is there to,

Joel Cheesman (34:35.833)

Bringing the Kool Aid. Too much faith in AI and n yeah, all right.

Emi (34:57.942)

replace people because these organizations that, know, Ford is not the only one who realized their fuck up and go, it's actually not replacing the institutional knowledge that their employees have. They need to take a more conservative approach and think as AI as a co-pilot. Yeah. See how it works first, you know, see how it actually produces where it produces efficiencies. And then you're not going to make the mistakes that, you know, that Ford made and having to

Joel Cheesman (35:07.747)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (35:20.153)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (35:25.196)

revert back and basically swallow their pie, pick up the phone and rehire the people that they actually let go. How does that look to the market? It looks like they haven't thought things through. They don't have a proper strategy. yeah, I think it's a stupid mistake to make, but unfortunately, a lot of companies are making that mistake. I'm going to save so much money. This is going to look great for the shareholders if I can reduce their headcount and still increase revenue. People need to be a little bit more wiser.

So that's my thoughts when it comes to Ford. And when it comes to Meta, well, know, Meta, he look about, because he's an idiot. Yeah. I mean, I mean, look at him. He puts so much into, he's trying to compete so hard with the anthropics of the worlds and in open AIs. And it's like, yeah, you know, this is, we're going to compete. We're going to be a major player. It's like.

Joel Cheesman (36:02.115)

Move fast and break things, Ed Meta, yeah.

Joel Cheesman (36:17.433)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (36:18.392)

Meta, you're a bit of a dinosaur right now. And they're making mistake upon mistake upon mistake. And again, he's made another real public mistake in this area. AI isn't working the way he imagined. It's not bringing the efficiencies that he imagined. The the agentic AI is not moving as fast as that he expected. And he thought that all of this was going to, this is a good reason for him to get rid of a whole bunch of people because

And whoever was left deployed them into eight more AI departments. Again, the decisions he's making doesn't sound like they're properly thought through. And what's that doing is damaging his brand, is damaging trust with the market because it looks like he doesn't know what he's doing and having to admit publicly that he's done wrong.

Joel Cheesman (37:08.505)

Which is weird 'cause we we have some hidden hidden camera footage of Mark Zuckerberg in his bathroom. Check it out.

Joel Cheesman (37:21.399)

So it's funny you say market and embarrassed because I think the market is why companies do stupid shit in in some cases because there was like a we're still in it. There was a two, three year period where if you weren't laying off people because of AI and efficiencies, like something must be wrong and the market penalized you for it. So companies were almost incentivized to say like layoffs.

Emi (37:35.159)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (37:51.621)

AI, efficiency, costs, cost savings. Like, and from Ford to Meta to really almost everybody, every public company was talking about layoffs and blaming it on AI and head like that. We need this. So it's it's no surprise to so if you didn't do that, like you know, in contrast, you got killed. Why why aren't you laying off people? Why aren't you cutting headcount? Like, what's wrong with you? It was almost bad.

Emi (37:53.89)

Woo! Sightings.

Joel Cheesman (38:20.259)

to keep people and to keep you know, keep good people that were there because AI was gonna take every job out there because Elon Elon says so. but obviously that is not happening certainly with every organization, probably not most organizations, which lead us to a little bit of a history lesson, Emmy.

Emi (38:28.193)

Yeah.

Emi (38:37.844)

Okay, tell me.

Joel Cheesman (38:40.759)

So I had a I have a friend who in two thousand and six, five or six or so, started a business of or he had a business of staffing car companies with executives. The car the car industry putting together cars is incredibly inefficient and difficult and disparate and it's awful. So 2008 happened. His business kind of is chugging along, and then 2008 happens. Two thousand and eight happens, what happened? The world fell apart.

the government comes in and they save the car companies. They say, We'll give you this loan, but you have to do A, B, and C. And one of those things they had to do was they needed to cut the real expensive headcount. So the the people that were real experienced had been there for a long time, they all got buyouts, early retirement, et cetera. They didn't necessarily want to retire, but the company really had no choice because they were taking money from the government. So my friend

Emi (39:24.248)

Mm.

Joel Cheesman (39:38.519)

He he now had this business where all these experienced executives were unemployed, got a big paycheck, still wanted to work, but didn't want to necessarily work a full-time job. So my my friend, his business went a you know, parabolic because all these car companies were like, you know, we had to lay Joe off because of the because of the deal.

Emi (40:03.084)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (40:03.107)

But we need Joe back because Joe only Joe knows how to do A, B, and C. So they were willing to pay whatever it they had to pay to get Joe back as a contractor. They're they're paying him more than they were as an employee because now he's a contractor. Correct. Correct. So cargo, they're paying Joe. Now they got to pay Joe a lot to retire. And now they're going to pay Joe a lot to come back as a contractor. That's kind of what's happening. Like companies have said.

Emi (40:13.656)

So they paid, yeah.

Emi (40:19.116)

to do the same job that he was doing before. Yeah.

Emi (40:31.095)

Yes.

Joel Cheesman (40:32.459)

Okay, AI, we gotta lay people off like, shit, we need these people. AI can't fix a carburetor or whatever it is, right? And so now they have to come back and sort of recalculate what the the headcount is. And I think we're gonna see this in a lot of businesses. People have over they have overshot the AI story and they're gonna have to to bring people back. I think it's good.

For the short term, my question is now all these experienced people are gonna train the AI better, I guess, or or more or longer period, to then have AI take their job because they've learned everything from Joe, the real experienced guy. But in the short term, I think it's a good thing for a lot these workers. But long term, you're basically creating the the monster that's gonna eat you at some point.

Emi (41:17.494)

Yeah, but I think also that's the case, something that we talked about before. Yes, the role they have now may disappear, but I fully believe that new roles, roles that we haven't even thought about yet will actually appear. So those people, because they understand AI, they're the experts in AI, they trained those models, they will move pivot into another type of role.

Joel Cheesman (41:24.345)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (41:38.497)

And and they may become contractors, right? They may be like, okay, we know how to train the AI. we like we'll work with five car companies and their AI as opposed to work for one company. So I agree with you long term, more opportunities, more jobs. but for some people we'll be left behind. But a lot of people that can adapt, they'll do they'll do just fine. for reference, Ford has laid off around 10,000 people in the last year. So potentially a lot more people could be coming back to Ford.

Emi (41:40.95)

Yeah. Yeah.

Emi (41:48.555)

Absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah.

That would do well. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (42:06.731)

if this AI adventure proves any any worse for them. Guys, we're gonna take a quick break. If you like what you've heard, please leave us a review, follow us on your podcast platform of choice, and you can even check us out on YouTube at youtube.com slash at Chad Cheese. We'll be right back.

Joel Cheesman (42:31.545)

All right, Emmy, let's talk a little Gen X. Maybe Ford has taught us there's hope for an older worker because this story has no ray of sunshine, unfortunately. According to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Boston College's retirement study, that sounds like a real fun time, doesn't it? Retirement study. among Gen X Gen X Americans, aged fifty forty forty to sixty-five, fourteen percent were laid off at least once in the past decade.

Emi (42:48.748)

No.

Joel Cheesman (42:59.681)

And of those affected, nearly a quarter, predominantly Gen Xers in senior roles, have remained unemployed since, while Lumbers of those who found new work had to accept pay cuts. Emmy, as a card carrying member of Gen X just like me, what are your thoughts on

Emi (43:15.096)

Uh, did you just say that on live? Why? Do you understand how many times I lie about my age to people? You've just told people that I'm Gen X. I've been 35 for years. Thank you, Joel.

Joel Cheesman (43:31.267)

Sergey, edit that out. Emmy, as as as as an aficionado and knowing a lot of Gen Xers, what's your take on this news?

Emi (43:32.929)

Yeah, please.

Emi (43:37.665)

Yes. Yes, I do know a lot of Gen Xers. I am not a Gen Xer. No, This is why I have to botox my forehead to try and look younger. No, I do know what this is. Again, terrible doom and gloom. This is what you said at the beginning. Why is this happening? And I think it's again, we've talked about this topic before. It's ageism. know, people.

Joel Cheesman (43:48.577)

That's all right.

Emi (44:06.081)

As much as we may talk about or organisations may talk about the negatives of ageism, obviously we need to value people of all ages, people still have those lazy, outdated stereotypes. People still would think that, someone who's older won't be able to adapt fast enough. Or someone who's nearing, maybe they're in their 60s, this is just a placeholder job for them. Why are they going for this job? They're nearing retirement. They're not going to be here in a couple of years time.

They're making all these kind of lazy assumptions about people. And unfortunately, that is affecting Gen Xers. You know, it is forcing people to do what I do, rely about their age or omit this age from their CVs. And it's the resume botox. Absolutely. You know, so it is a shame that this is still happening. Will it continue to happen? Unfortunately, yes, I do think it will continue to happen. And it's going we're going to see more and more Gen Xers.

Joel Cheesman (44:48.321)

Resume Botox. We've talked about that. Yeah. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (45:00.419)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (45:04.106)

on the market. And I think that if organizations don't kind of, I don't know what they need to do then, like they need to realize that when they're losing gen Xs, for example, like we said before with the Ford story, those people come with a lot of intellectual knowledge that's built up over years, whether it's like industry networks or, you know, just institutional knowledge that you can't replicate maybe in a younger workforce.

Joel Cheesman (45:27.449)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (45:29.718)

That's going to cause, that's going to result in massive issues for organizations, especially if they think that technology is going to take their roles. It's not, that's, Ford has actually proved that that doesn't happen. They're having to bring back people. So yeah, it is awful. I do hope organizations do change their minds. I do hope that especially the younger people in a workplace,

they need to change their mind because they need to realize that they, at one point in time, will become those people who are affected by ageism. So how we resolve that, to be honest, I don't know. But they need to stop with things like this stealth tactics, this voluntary retirement programs, to try and get people out the door. They need to stop all that kind of business.

Joel Cheesman (46:13.176)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (46:19.597)

Yeah. Well, Emmy, I have waxed poetic many times on the show about the young people and how they need to like get their shit together, with with the economy and and the job marketplaces it is. So I'm gonna have a get off my lawn moment for my own generation. You ready?

Emi (46:25.324)

Yeah.

Emi (46:37.004)

Okay, go for it.

Joel Cheesman (46:40.417)

All right. So Gen X, Gen X has gotten screwed its whole life. Okay. We missed out on the free love of the sixties and seventies. We missed out on like punk punk rock. Sex would kill us and as we came into sex having age because AIDS was gonna kill everybody. drugs was the equivalent of your brains on a s on a skillet getting fried.

The dot com crash happened shortly after we entered the workforce. the the we lost our homes from the real estate bust. I could go on and on and on.

Emi (47:17.228)

head itself.

Joel Cheesman (47:18.765)

But you would think like in our peak earning years, things would get better. But no, we're dealing with aging parents. Our children are growing up and leaving the house. We have a we're looming retirement. None of us have enough money saved up to retire. and now we're too old for the workplace. It's it's it sucks, but guess what, Gen X?

Emi (47:37.57)

But yet we need to work because everything's more expensive. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (47:42.893)

The whole time we've been here, it sucked. And we've adapted and we've survived and we figured shit out. This is just the next step in figuring our shit out. There are things now that exist that did not exist when we were coming up. Okay. You can learn skills all over the internet. You you can start, you can vibe code new businesses. You can drive DoorDash. You can contract out your the skills that you've gotten. Like there's don't.

Emi (47:44.632)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (48:12.109)

Don't just expect a job to fall out, you know, out the sky and on your front door. Like you gotta make this shit happen. And the only thing that sucks is time is running out for you. So like now more than ever, you gotta get your ass in gear. If you're if you've been unemployed for a decade, I mean, damn. Like maybe maybe there's a reason why, and I there are people like that. But if we you've survived this long in Gen X, you can do it. You can do it, man. You can survive the next 10, 20 years.

Until you know, ch whatever, whatever happens. The next thing that happens, we'll figure it out. But like whenever I see people like, it's the job and I can't get it and I gotta get less and I like you the world is amazing. You can figure it out. And Gen X, my people, you can do that. You can do it.

Emi (48:58.626)

You say that though, but some people need help. You're saying that you figure out where, how, where's the help? Who's doing that? Who's doing the things like combating ageism? No, but you can't just say that. Sometimes you need to like, how you gonna combat ageism? It's like, yeah, sorry, I read on the internet that you shouldn't discriminate against older workers, but you're still coming up against organizations who are thinking that way. So an individual can't always do that themselves when the system is against them.

Joel Cheesman (49:07.683)

The the internet, Emmy. The internet.

Emi (49:29.026)

So I don't think it's just a case of helping themselves. It is a hard place, but I think sometimes we recognize it's a hard place and help people.

Joel Cheesman (49:30.361)

The world is a hard place, Emmy. I don't you know I get it. I get it. And you're sitting there like you're a white male, like life has worked out for you, right? So so like so who who am I to be like, pull yourself up by the bootstraps? I get it. But what do you I mean like you gotta if you're gonna blame somebody, that's fine.

Emi (49:44.466)

Yeah, I wasn't going to say it, but you know, yeah, yeah, I'm like, I'm glad you came to that realisation. Yeah. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (50:00.163)

But it doesn't it to me it doesn't help.

Emi (50:03.713)

No, people need solution.

Joel Cheesman (50:04.087)

Yeah, yeah, you gotta look you gotta look in the mirror, kick your s like look, a a kick in the ass is still a step forward. So if my verbal kick in the ass is a step forward for somebody, like I get it. There are people that mentally or physically or have things that it just is it's just not gonna happen. So I'm not talking about those people. and look, th this isn't like a huge number. This is like ten to fifteen percent of the people out there. So the good news is most of us are fighting the good fight. They they are

Emi (50:14.422)

Yeah, yeah.

Joel Cheesman (50:33.581)

Getting up, getting their ass out of bed, and going forward. The people that aren't, if if you have reasons outside of just get off your ass, okay. But for those that aren't, like the world is a g is an amazing place. The opportunities are amazing, you can do this. This is an inspirational message, Emmy. I'm not

Emi (50:51.416)

OK. I mean, you're saying it's inspirational, but I'm thinking about the how many times I go on LinkedIn and I see people go, I'm just about to lose my home. I've depleted all my savings. I've applied to so many jobs. And I look at those people and yes, you know, if it was me, maybe I would just get up and I'll go work in McDonald's, you know, or I'd be a cleaner. I'll do anything to kind of bring in money. But sometimes people just don't know where to go and get help. They don't know. And I think

things need to, there needs to be some way that we can actually better support people who are unemployed. It is a tough world out there. And I'm younger than you, so I never went through all the kind of, you know, the shit that you mentioned. Yeah, he's so much younger. But you know, I was there when the financial crisis happened and I was like, crap, you know, this is hard. How are we going to pay bills? You know, but you need to...

Joel Cheesman (51:34.467)

So much younger than me, yes.

Joel Cheesman (51:46.273)

I I do agree and and one of the topics coming f coming up, I do agree like the the landscape is different now. I do agree like adapting is different now. it's not just reach out to ten more people. It's not just apply to ten more jobs. It's so and I think people are are scared and confused about why what has changed. And I'm not sure there's a good answer. so I agree with that. but

Emi (51:54.487)

Mmm.

Emi (52:02.273)

Yeah send out more feelings.

Emi (52:12.332)

No.

Joel Cheesman (52:15.961)

What are the options?

Okay.

Emi (52:21.964)

Somebody please help. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (52:22.431)

Inspirational message, Emmy. And I'll I'll I'll underscore it American inspiration message, not a European inspiration message. So let's get back let's get on backtrack here. it's not just experienced gym gen Xers that have issues, Emmy. it turns out the entry-level jobs are in the crosshairs too. Scott Galloway now says working from home, not automation, is the real force behind the youth hiring crisis, for example, while others say the whole process

is really broken and you shared this TikTok video, so I'll play that and you can chime in on the other side.

Emi (52:57.304)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (53:49.923)

Go, Emmy. This is your moment. This is your this is your shit's heart out there. Let's hear it.

Emi (53:51.799)

Wow.

Okay, so remember literally just said people don't know what to do. Yeah, that video came out in the last couple of days. People are telling her, can't you just go out and take your CV out to businesses? That's not how you get a job now. You don't just walk down the road and go, hey, here's my CV, here's my CV, you know, for the majority of jobs. That's not how it works. You're applying online, but yet that's the advice that she's been given. So that's an example of where

people need better job hunting advice because otherwise they're just going to get stuck in a hole and wonder, I'm doing everything that I'm supposed to do. And it's like, actually you're not, you're not doing what it takes to actually get a job in 2026. And this whole fact of, you know, what exactly, a video of myself, how good I am and why I deserve washing dishes job. That's ridiculous. It's like, why are you putting barriers in place?

Joel Cheesman (54:47.299)

So what's interesting to me is I I don't I so to say like that's not how you d do it, f for whatever reason, companies have decided that, okay, job seeker, we're gonna we're gonna flip the script on you. We're gonna do all automated AI, whatever. The machines the machines are here. You guys need to figure this shit out. And

Emi (55:09.613)

Hmm.

Joel Cheesman (55:13.355)

A dishwasher does not need to submit an application into an ATS and like go through that process. Like we have taken out the nuance of hiring. We have taken out the humanity on one end of that spectrum, partly because the job seeker side is a lot of automation too. So you have automation on a lot of the job seeker side, but then you have real people that are being like just totally drowned by automated.

Emi (55:39.032)

Mm-hmm.

Joel Cheesman (55:40.383)

applicants and then companies are forced to say, well, we need to have bots to fight the bots. And people like this woman, I think, are getting just sucked into the the undertow not knowing what the hell's going on, not knowing about application automation and rob like bots applying to jobs that don't qualify and is in this is in this predicament. And I don't know if there are humans on the end of the company to say, hey guys, we have real people

getting s like trapped in into the the abyss that we're not talking to. So to me it's like the enterprise is giving up on people on the the pre screening on the funnel. Job seekers are flooding the funnel and people are getting screwed like this woman. There's no reason you say like it's not how you get jobs anymore, but like can she go to an employer and walk in the door anymore and say, hey, I want a dishwasher job

Emi (56:14.081)

Yeah.

Emi (56:23.362)

Okay.

Joel Cheesman (56:38.797)

My guess is they go, you gotta go to whatever dot com slash jobs and apply. And she goes, Okay. And then it's like, and then she's lost because the company said, Don't don't talk to people, send them into the ATS or send them into whatever. And it that's just it's just broken. It's

Emi (56:42.88)

Yeah. Yeah. How? Yeah. How do I do that?

Emi (56:55.138)

Yeah.

along with a video about how good I am washing dishes.

Joel Cheesman (57:01.953)

I guess do a TikTok. I don't know. Like I I I get that. And that's not her fault. It's the system's fault. But we we as part of the system need to figure this shit out. Like I had I had someone in the industry, I won't name name names, but they are a published keynote speaker level employer brand person.

Emi (57:03.032)

Yeah.

Nah.

Emi (57:12.493)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (57:30.967)

Decades in the industry, very well known. On the face of it, you would say if if if they got up if they got laid off today, in a week or two, they could make a few calls and be employed.

That's not the case. And this is someone who, like I said, years of experience, published like cream of the crop on the on its face. They've told me that they've applied to over a hundred opportunities and gotten two interviews.

Emi (58:04.376)

Cool.

Joel Cheesman (58:07.385)

She's not a dishwasher. She's she's not like an entry level hourly frontline person. If that's happening on both ends of that spectrum, we got a problem. And and she know they know the industry and can't doesn't have good answers. You know, they come to me like, Do you have an answer? Like, I don't have a great answer. I I don't know I don't know why it is the way that it is. Are there no more people to make a nuanced decision?

Emi (58:11.553)

Yeah.

Emi (58:24.439)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (58:35.125)

As to like, crap, we have an A player who's on the market. Let's go. It would be like it'd be like dating if you picked your dates totally o by automation. Like, I don't care to see them, I don't care to look at what they've done. Like, just let the bots figure it out. And then somebody some sh dude shows up at your door that was nothing what you expected. But it's like we've we've totally taken the human out of this and it's just mind boggling because no one is winning.

Emi (58:55.681)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (59:04.483)

Companies aren't hiring this qualified person and that qualified person is like, What the hell's wrong with this system?

Emi (59:09.782)

Yeah, but yet organizations will say, we care about the candidate experience. Gee, though, and what are you doing? Are you doing enough? It's like you're not. You focus on efficiency. You focus on yes. Yeah. Move faster, do more with less. And then you're impacting job seekers in this case. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (59:17.431)

No. No. They care about saving money, shareholder value, the you know, and I and I also think there's a lot of like

Joel Cheesman (59:33.721)

So I I I agree that there's some real shit, stupid shit going on. you still have to adapt though until that shit's fixed. On the on the Galloway, on the Galloway stuff, this was interesting. I know, I know I I threw it at you pretty late before the show. You may I don't know if you have any input on this, but like so Galloway, who I think is really intriguing, he's not always right. In fact, he's wrong a lot, but he is thought provoking. And his his thesis is that look, work from home has broken the traditional

Emi (59:39.864)

It's so harsh!

Joel Cheesman (01:00:02.133)

apprenticeship model for entry level workers. And they've they've gone from sort of face to face engaging, important part of the workforce to being a liability that I have to babysit at a distance. And I would much rather retrain or reskill someone who has been in the organization and that I know than have someone new come in and have to deal with that. And I do think there is some some truth to that. he talks about remote onboarding.

Think about the last you know, think about your first employer out of out of university or your first professional job. How important was onboarding? Here's the rules, kid. here's your boss, here's your coworkers, like super important. If you had to do that from a distance from a remote location, like how awful? How awful would that be? you know, hand holding over Zoom doesn't work very well. and I think that there is something to be said for that.

I also think proximity builds empathy, builds connection. funny so little little story here, a little more history time. I won't play the soundbite. but when I was my first job at in this industry was a company called East Ban, which became job options. Anyway, it was really fun in the in the in the nineties to like work for a dot com, wear jeans on Friday. That was like a cool thing. And then and then every Friday we would have employee breakfast.

Emi (01:01:28.056)

Cool.

Joel Cheesman (01:01:33.441)

Which meant people would sign up literally to bring in a breakfast. And most people would bring in a casserole, they'd bring whatever it was, right? And then and then me and another guy in his twenties, we said, okay, let we got to do breakfast. Let's do it like we would do it. So we brought in, we brought in like a whole bunch of White Castle sliders and cold pizza. Because that's how we would. So it's a little sandwich, a little cheeseburger.

Emi (01:01:42.092)

Yeah.

Emi (01:01:57.794)

What's the White Castle Slider?

Yeah. No, no, That's not here.

Joel Cheesman (01:02:02.467)

You know, you know White Castle? No? Okay. So White C it's a little, it's a little hamburger called sliders. You slide the bead. Anyway, they're really greasy. They're like late night, drunk, hungover food. The point is, while everyone's bringing in like breakfast casseroles, we bring in cold pizza and cheeseburgers. But it was great because everyone's like, this is the

Emi (01:02:10.092)

Yeah.

Emi (01:02:25.013)

Love it. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:02:29.329)

This is the piece that these idiots play in this company. They make us laugh. They're young. They're stupid. Like, okay, we get it. You can't do that in a remote environment. So like I think that you when you lose out on that, it definitely makes it suffer. And I do think that AI is a scapegoat. It's very it's much easier to say, like, AI is doing that. We don't need those people. We don't need intra-level people versus like the hard work of, you know what? It's really hard to onboard and work with people.

Emi (01:02:31.68)

Yeah

Joel Cheesman (01:02:58.679)

Over Zoom.

Emi (01:03:00.876)

Okay, I'm gonna have a slightly different view, okay? And I'll tell you why. I used to be the same, know? Until the pandemic, I was always in office. The idea of working remotely never even crossed my mind. just, you know, it wasn't allowed in my organizations. And then I moved back to the UK, joined an organization, fully remote, but I had to upskill people in my team. And I was like, how the hell will I do that? How do I do that? You know?

Joel Cheesman (01:03:15.574)

Uh-huh.

Joel Cheesman (01:03:27.769)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (01:03:30.316)

But I learned. I learned and I was successful and I developed new skills. I adapted. I adapted. I did. Yeah. So what I say now is that is it harder? Yes. For most people, maybe of our generation, it will be harder because we didn't grow up working in a remote environment. So it's a new skill that we had to learn. But for the younger generation, it's actually not that bad, you know, because they will know no different because many organizations are either hybrid or remote now.

Joel Cheesman (01:03:35.331)

You adapted.

Emi (01:04:00.535)

So it's just a new skill that managers need to learn, just like everything else, how to onboard people. And you can still create that. Okay, it's not the same as you bringing in the cold pizzas, which I think is cool. And I do get like meeting people in person is fun. And it's like, and I love it. I've got people in my team that I've been in my company four years. I think I've met them three times. One of them I met once, and she's in Idaho.

Joel Cheesman (01:04:17.721)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (01:04:28.372)

We still have a great bond. We're looking at each other on Zoom and we still have a great connection. And I'm still able to kind of help upskill her. We're still able to forge a strong relationship within a team. Yes, it's harder, but it's a new skill like any other skill that you need to develop. So I don't think it's right. Yeah, they're younger than me. Yeah, so these are people in my team. All my team are younger than me. Yeah, Yeah, no, they're not out of school.

Joel Cheesman (01:04:43.95)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:04:47.917)

And these are young people you're mentoring.

Joel Cheesman (01:04:54.509)

Talking out out of school. We're talking entry level.

Emi (01:04:58.25)

No, but okay, not okay. These are not entry level ones in my team, but in the previous organizations, I have been entry level. You know, we, we hired people on an apprenticeship scheme and had to learn how to upskill them remotely and they worked. Yeah, it worked. So I think it's just a lazy. Absolutely. Yeah. Provide the training, teach people how to do that. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:05:11.801)

Remotely. Okay. So get get your shit together organization and and you can do it. Yeah. I I what scares me about young people, and I have two teenagers, the communicate it's different. Like they would rather text me from the same room than like speak to me. so how that's gonna translate in their professional lives, I don't know. but good luck, good luck to them.

Emi (01:05:28.76)

Is it?

Emi (01:05:32.696)

God. Yeah.

Emi (01:05:38.808)

You

Joel Cheesman (01:05:41.677)

Guys, we are gonna take a break. we'll be right back. If you haven't left us a review, please do so. We want to hear from you. And until then, we'll be right back to talk about robots in the hotel.

Emi (01:05:52.472)

Yes please, yay!

Joel Cheesman (01:06:03.393)

All right, Emmy, this last segment is sponsored by free t-shirts. Who doesn't love free t-shirts, especially when they're from Chad and Cheese? They're like a little hug from Chadme, you know, a little, little soft, little tri-blend hug from from Chadme. Anyway, we we got Aaron Apt to thanks for that. The company, the company behind all those red shoes you're seeing on social media. you're not limited to hearing Chad and Cheese. You can wear us as well. Just head to ChadCheese.com/slash free.

Emi (01:06:18.274)

That's selling it, isn't it?

Joel Cheesman (01:06:32.493)

To get your hug virtually in the form of a t-shirt from Chad and Cheese. Now let's get to robot hotels. You know what, Emmy? Who needs humans anyway? You know, a Chinese startup plans to build the world's first fully robot operated hotel by 2027. The hotel will feature robots for everything from check-in, room service, cleaning, luggage handling, and guest support. No word yet.

Emi (01:06:43.671)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:07:00.657)

of Fimbots roaming the halls for lonely business travelers, but you know you know it's coming. Emmy, are you ready to check into the Robot Hotel or is this one a non starter for you?

Emi (01:07:04.64)

It'll come, it'll come, yep.

Emi (01:07:12.12)

Okay, so kind of get it. I think there'll be a market for it. Maybe those hotels will be cheaper because they're not having to pay for human staff. So, you know, instead of going into, maybe that's what the three star hotels are going to be for the future. I don't like it though, you know, because sometimes when I go on holiday, I want the full human service. I want to know that if I'm hungry, I can call downstairs for room service. I want to know that if something goes

Joel Cheesman (01:07:25.753)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (01:07:41.985)

wrong, that I've got an empathetic employee at the end of the line, he can sort out shit and a robot can't, the robot can do many things, you know, it can check in, maybe it can check me in, like, you know, some people are doing now, maybe it can take my luggage to my particular room, maybe it can look after the cleaning side of things. But when I, when I think of a hotel, many hotels, there's like a luxury for me, it's somewhere, which is part of my holiday, not all, you know, obviously, if I'm on a work trip, then maybe it's not that.

Joel Cheesman (01:07:46.691)

Mm-hmm.

Emi (01:08:11.416)

But nine times out of 10, I want a human touch. So is there a place for this? Yes, I think there is a place for this. I think it will bring down prices. But I still think those premium hotels are going to be the ones that have humans in conjunction with robots.

Joel Cheesman (01:08:14.563)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:08:29.922)

Okay. Okay.

Joel Cheesman (01:08:35.321)

So for the record, Emmy only stays at five star hotels and luxurious ro locations. So it makes sense. It makes sense that she would want that. She has not stayed at the Holiday Inn in Stevenage, preparing for for Nebworth and Wreckfest. because if she had stayed there, she would be way into robots doing the entire process. isn't Airbnb mostly automated? I mean, like you have an app.

Emi (01:08:38.264)

I'm bougie like that.

Oh no. Oh no.

Joel Cheesman (01:09:03.489)

You talk virtually, get the code, you're like I think we're being trained for this anyway. I I'm all for it. I'm for like I agree with you. There are gonna be two tiers, right? This is the K-shaped economy. If you're staying at the La Quinta Inn, the Motel 6, the Holiday Inn at Stevenage, you're gonna be fine with automation. You're gonna be fine with like kiosk, take my money, give me my key, get the hell out of my way. you know.

Emi (01:09:10.392)

Kinda, yeah.

Emi (01:09:15.554)

Mm.

Emi (01:09:26.067)

Yeah.

Emi (01:09:29.503)

In-N-Out. Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:09:31.869)

Room service, I guess. if you you could probably have an app like call service or press a button and some service will come to you. so I think that if on that tier, the people hate working there anyway. Like just give me a r I'm kinda I feel kind of embarrassed I'm there anyway. I like no one likes like just let me give my key and let me get on with my miserable life. If you're at a four seasons like Emmy, if you're at you know, if you're at the Ritz Carlton like Emmy, no.

Robots aren't gonna cut it. You need that you need that white glove service. You need that, hi Emmy, welcome back. Glad to see you again. you're gonna want that nice housekeeping with that robe that's nice and warm because they just washed it, you know. Yeah, like that. Yeah, the the chef service on the ro you know, the room service meal. So yeah, I yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I think I think this is gonna be a thing. Like just like McDonald's, it's a kiosk, the cheap hotel.

Emi (01:10:07.852)

Yes!

Emi (01:10:14.544)

fluffy, exactly. The folded towels in a swan shape on the bed, I want that, you know, yeah.

Emi (01:10:29.933)

Yeah.

Joel Cheesman (01:10:31.201)

Gonna be a kiosk. Gonna shoot a ticket at you and say, like, here's your checkout. Make sure you leave it, leave it behind. Leave it behind. Robot. Yeah, the ro the robots are coming. Everybody. All right. And because I'm back, Emmy, the dad jokes are back. That's right. You know, you know you missed it. You know you love it. All right, here we go.

Emi (01:10:33.11)

Yeah.

Absolutely. The markets there just not for me.

Emi (01:10:46.184)

Woohoo! I missed this.

Joel Cheesman (01:10:57.111)

Why did the robot go on a diet? Why did the robot go on a diet? It had too many bites.

Emi (01:11:05.96)

no. god no. That's rubbish.

Joel Cheesman (01:11:09.721)

All right, maybe you like this one. How do robots eat salsa, Emmy? How do robots eat salsa?

Emi (01:11:16.639)

No idea.

Joel Cheesman (01:11:17.569)

With microchips. Microchips. Salsa.

Emi (01:11:22.496)

You're, you're, you're, no. Okay, Joel, your dad jokes used to be so funny. What's happening?

Joel Cheesman (01:11:30.669)

I was gone for a month. Give me I need to warm up a little bit. I'll bring it I'll get better next week. Okay. I will adapt to the situation in me and I will get better and embrace the opportunity. We out.

Emi (01:11:35.392)

Yes, Yes, please.

Emi (01:11:42.935)

We out! Woo!