This is the weekly newsletter for People people who think like Product people. If you think traditional HR practices are stale and out of touch, you have found your People🤘

Learn how product principles and design thinking can transform your People function into a growth driver… all in the time it takes to drink your morning coffee☕

Whether you’re a PX newbie or already a pro, here you’ll find actionable tools and tactics to get full leadership buy-in and make an impact from day 1 🚀

P.S …mine’s a Cortado with oat if you’re buying 😉

TL:DR 👇 💡 This is not a new model for HR. It just isn't. We need to stop talking about it like it is. 👀 PX Live was a blast! Next up are the Immersive PX experiences in May and June. Will you be in the room? 💜 This community is made up of the most incredible people, I appreciate you 🙏🏻 📽️ Did you see I launched the first of my YouTube docuseries - (Life of Freedom)? - In it I am trying to capture the reality of my life as father, entrepreneur, frustrated runner, and coffee obsessive. Give it a watch and let me know what you think!

Coffee Fix ☕ For those interested in the “Espresso” part of this newsletter, today I am drinking the PX Live collab roast, in partnership with The Coffee Obsessive and Scenery 🙌🏻 Fun fact, this is the first coffee I have sold directly through SapienX, which feels like a cool milestone in my entrepreneurial journey. I always said I would have a coffee business at some stage. This isn't it, but it's a step! 8/10☕. If you are in the UK you can buy a jar here, I will send it out to you free postage and packaging 🤘🏻

Read time: 6 minutes*

*note: today's edition is a little longer than usual, but stick with me. I am sharing some big leaps forward in my thinking and one landmark shift in my positioning.

Hey Reader 👋🏻

A week on from PX Live | London, I am still feeling the energy of what was a very special day. If you couldn't join us for this one, I hope to see you at a PX event in the near future.

These gatherings are made what they are by the people in the room. This community is made up of the most incredible people, which means the in-person alchemy is off the scale when we get together in person. 💜

I look forward to many more days like this one 🙌🏻 Here are a shots of the day if you missed it, or if you want to relive it 😍

2-years of progress. Signals of change.

I will share plenty of pictures and videos about the event on LinkedIn in the coming weeks, so I wont bombard you here. Instead, what I want to do in today's newsletter is reflect on what's changed in the 2-years between the inaugural PX Live (in late 2024) and the PX Live this time last week.

The whole day felt different to last time. In a good way.

That said, the energy in the inaugural was something special. Back in 2024 it was raw and unrefined. A real sense of a collective ownership in a yet to be defined future, but a definitive commitment to change. A shift from the status quo to something new, exciting, and product-led.

This time round, the same undercurrent of anti-establishment energy was there, but this time there was a maturity. A maturity that I could see and feel. Honestly, it isn't something I had expected. I was expecting the same raucous feel from 2024, but this time the room was less raucous and more focused. Honestly it threw me off a little 😅 Once I adjusted, I was both delighted and proud that the energy had changed. It was a real marker of progress.

I kicked off the 2024 event with a keynote, as I did this time. Back then, I introduced the phrase "the Post-HR generation" to capture the aspirational movement that would lead the shift from traditional HR practices to product-led and be the catalyst for People teams to move from support to strategic.

At that time, I spoke about how I believed product and design thinking would be the unlock for People teams to make that shift and drive real value and impact... 2 years on, what was aspirational is now a reality. That was the energy change I felt.

In the last 2-years more and more teams are looking outside of traditional HR channels for inspiration, for something new, a way to break free from the constraints of HR models and exceptions. More and more People teams are experimenting with product and design thinking.

We now have the first few pioneering companies who have shifted their People org to something that looks more like a full product operating model, which is really f'in cool 😎

Maybe unjustified, I don't know, but I can't help but feel a sense of pride in that.

I have dedicated the last 4 years of my life to enabling the shift towards product-led People teams. To be able to feel that shift, see it in motion in a real way, felt really good. Even if my part in the shift is smaller than I think it is, I still feel very proud to have played a part (alongside incredible peers) in shifting hearts, minds, and operating models 💜

Hearts, Minds, and Operating Models - that could be the title of modern classic - A sort of Jane Austen meets Adam Grant novella, or maybe even a Shakespearian tale; two operating models, both alike in dignity. From ancient practices, break new opportunity... I am having too much fun with this! 😅

This is what happens when I cast AI aside - you get my dumb jokes back haha. AI didn't think I was funny, it always wanted me to edit my jokes out!... Well, have some of this AI 🖕🏻😆).

Sorry, back on track... Whilst the movement has picked up momentum, we are still in the early stages of adoption.

The good news is, we have shifted from early adoption mindset, to early adoption action. My hope is that we can keep building this momentum to move product-led People teams toward the tipping point of more widespread adoption.

Is HR Dead?

I started the day with a question I wish I hadn't asked to be honest; Is HR Dead?

It was deliberately provocative. I asked this question back in October at Immersive PX - It led to a fabulous and progressive conversation - I thought the question needed a bigger stage. I was wrong. I think it’s a small room question, where there is a safer space to properly unpack and respond to it.

It was clear in the room that the question was jarring. Some people loved the provocation. Others found it very uncomfortable.

I get it. As People practitioners our sense of professional identity is currently tied to HR as the only recognised function of traditional work in which People & PX work sits in. So asking “is HR dead?” is internalised as “will my job exist / am I valued / does my work matter / will I be made redundant? etc”. I understand that feeling 100%.

But honestly, I do think HR in it’s current modality is on it's way out… It’s not dead. But parts of it will die. Parts of it need to die. That's just how I feel. Which doesn't mean it's true. Time will tell it's own story on that.

I personally can’t see companies 10 years from now choosing to have an internal function that is recognisable as what we know today as HR. Perhaps the better question would have been something like: How long will the current HR operating model survive? OR If the current HR model is dieing, what will replace it?

I don’t know. Something along those lines may have made for a softer landing in larger room.

In any case, for me the death of traditional HR feels inevitable. That isn’t at all a reflection on the people doing HR work. I want to be very clear about that. It’s a reflection of a need to radically rethink how we design the experience and the system of work. How we build businesses. And the role that work plays in our lives in totality, not just whilst we are at or engaged in work. HR has changed a great deal in the last 100 years, but what’s always been true is that HR is a model of control. A means of managing the workforce as a resource.

I think it’s time for an alternative model to emerge. A model that recognises the duality of the value being exchanged between worker and work.

My moment of clarity

This now feels a little anticlimactic perhaps, but the thing that crystallised for me at PX Live is that Product-led PX is not HR reinvented. This is not a new model for HR. It just isn't. We need to stop talking about it like it is.

As long as we see PX as an evolution of HR we are holding ourselves back. I made the decision on stage that I am personally going to phase out my use of “HR” as it relates to the work I am doing through SapienX. I am not trying to layer product ways of working over a HR operating model.

In fact, it would be a huge mistake to productise HR rather than make a true shift to a Product Operating Model. Doing better HR is not the objective - Designing and engineering the product of work is. Work is the product. Not HR.

This is not a new thought for me. I have been making this point for the last 2 years (at least), on podcasts, on panels, and in my own content. But until Friday, I hadn’t intellectually uncoupled myself - and so SapienX - from HR.

I have now.

SapienX doesn’t exist as a vehicle to improve HR through product practices.

SapienX exists to offer an alternative model. A true product operating model for People teams.

Some orgs will still choose to implement - or continue with - a traditional HR model. And that is OK. It's a choice.

Some will choose to be brave, to be different. They will choose a Product Operating Model (POM).

My bet (along with Chris) is that the companies who choose to implement a People POM to intentionally design their product of work will significantly outperform those who don’t.

It’s not even a risky bet to make. It’s already proven to be true within actual Product orgs. Learning from, and adapting, the Product Operating Model for People teams to deliver better outcomes for employees and the business alike is as sure a bet as I could think to make right now.

People teams with a POM will stop organising around HR work and tasks to be done; and will start organising around clearly defined problems to solve within durable problem spaces.

The next foreseeable period of my working life will be dedicated to making the POM shift for People teams both possible and scalable.

What happen's in the next 2-years?

All predictions are guess work, so let's call this a vision instead - over the next 2 years I expect to see a rapid maturity and acceleration of POM adoption/activation within People teams.

I believe we will continue to see the progression of PX as a Product from niche concept for radicals and pioneers, to recognised and accepted model for People teams. 24 months may be too ambitious, but I see a vision for the not too distant future where a People POM is the default modality for new businesses (and progressive enterprises). Some businesses will go straight to this new way of designing work and skip the HR model altogether.

Some parts of traditional HR will likely remain (but they may look and feel very different). Employment compliance, ER, Legal etc - these things are table stakes for a business (not for HR) so they won't disappear - but they will be designed to support the product of work, not as the core of elements and utility of the function of HR.

Work is broken. Product will fix it.

It's worth restating; The shift from HR to PX is not about better HR. It’s about building a better experience of work which creates value for employees and drives business growth.

I ended my talk with a new mantra for this next phase. Something more certain and action bound than my previous aspirational phrase (the post-HR generation):

Work is broken. Product will fix it.

If we take this opportunity I believe we can use the Product Operating Model to change work, society, and the world. In that order.

And that, my friends... is a f'in exciting thought 😎🤘🏻

Far more so than... maybe we can make HR a little bit better.

It's decision time...

On with the default model HR and control.

OR, forward with a new model of value creation, for employees and for business.

I know which path I am on. Have you decided yet?

OK, that’s a wrap for this week.

Grab your coffee and open up your inbox same time next week for more insights, tips, and resource flags on how to smash HR* silos, add strategic value and turn your People function into a growth driver 🚀

With love,

Luke ✌🏻

*I guess I need to re-write this closing paragraph now 😆 leave it with me...

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