![Most companies have the "what" (AI) and the "how" (the tools). The opportunity for HR is to own the "why"—and shape how the transformation actually feels for employees. Diane Gherson (fmr CHRO, IBM) breaks down what CHROs can bring to the table.<br /><br />🎥 Watch the full Davos 2026 CHRO roundtable: [link]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/dgAoLynLS1U/maxresdefault.jpg)
Former IBM CHRO: How HR Can Lead the AI Transformation (Not Just Manage It)
![Most companies have the "what" (AI) and the "how" (the tools). The opportunity for HR is to own the "why"—and shape how the transformation actually feels for employees. Diane Gherson (fmr CHRO, IBM) breaks down what CHROs can bring to the table.<br /><br />🎥 Watch the full Davos 2026 CHRO roundtable: [link]](https://ainews.cafe/wp-content/plugins/youtube-feed-pro/img/placeholder.png)
Former IBM CHRO: How HR Can Lead the AI Transformation (Not Just Manage It)
Most companies have the "what" (AI) and the "how" (the tools). The opportunity for HR is to own the "why"—and shape how the transformation actually feels for employees. Diane Gherson (fmr CHRO, IBM) breaks down what CHROs can bring to the table.
🎥 Watch the full Davos 2026 CHRO roundtable: [link]
Why AI Coaching Works for Feedback with the Galderma CHRO
"When you have AI just observing how the team dynamics work... it automatically takes away that defensiveness."
Allison Pinkham, former CHRO at Galderma, explains how AI coaching can observe team dynamics and deliver feedback without the bias concerns that hold teams back.
🎥 Watch the full Davos 2026 CHRO roundtable: [link to full video]
Learning Is Becoming Performance: A Chief People Officer on the Future of Skills
Holly Tyson breaks humanity's skills into three categories: intellectual, emotional, and physical.
Her hypothesis? AI is about to democratize the intellectual—which means the emotional skills of relationship and trust-building become more valuable, not less.
🎥 Watch the full Davos 2026 CHRO roundtable: [link]
Davos 2026 | 3 Fortune 500 CHROs on AI, Jobs, and the Future of Work
What did CHROs learn at Davos 2026? Three Fortune 500 HR leaders share the biggest themes, debates, and takeaways from the World Economic Forum and what they mean for the future of work.
Featuring:
Diane Gherson, former CHRO of IBM, board member at Kraft Heinz, Harvard Business School lecturer
Holly Tyson, Chief People Officer at Cushman & Wakefield
Allison Pinkham, former CHRO at Galderma
Hosted by Anand Chopra-McGowan, Managing Director at Valence
Topics discussed:
00:00 Introduction
02:31 The mood at Davos: optimism meets uncertainty
05:00 Geopolitics and the end of the global corporation
05:55 AI and unemployment: the 3-5 year warning
07:43 Job losses: cost savings vs. portfolio optimization
09:19 Design principles for meaningful work in the AI era
11:26 The "why" problem: productivity isn't inspiring
15:39 Will AI raise the value of physical and emotional work?
17:24 AI at the team level, not just individual
20:24 Degree for life, AI board members, and Firefly teams
25:08 The decay of foundational skills
AI Coaching for Performance Management with Delta and Experian
Join HR leaders from Delta and Experian as they share real-world use cases, lessons learned, and practical insights from deploying Valence’s AI coach, Nadia, to transform performance reviews, feedback conversations and goal setting for improved performance management at scale.
In this conversation-style session, they’ll discuss:
- How they rolled out Nadia across large, diverse populations — from Delta’s 15,000 corporate managers to Experian’s global workforce.
- What drove adoption — including champions, tailored change management, and overcoming early skepticism.
- The impact so far — like Experian boosting goal delivery rates to 90%, and Nadia becoming Delta’s highest-rated HR tool.
- How Nadia is reshaping performance conversations — helping employees set clearer goals, preparing managers for better reviews, and connecting individual work to company priorities.
- The lessons that mattered most — patience, iteration, the importance of storytelling, and why “one-size-fits-all” never works in performance management.
Expect a candid, interactive discussion focused on deployment tips, change management strategies, and how AI coaching can actually drive new levels of performance inside complex organizations.
Arianna Huffington & Valence: Leading Through the Human + AI Revolution
What if the real revolution of AI isn’t about productivity at all—but about unlocking the deepest potential of human beings?
At Valence's inaugural New York City Leadership Salon, Arianna Huffington joined Parker Mitchell for an intimate conversation, exploring one of the most important questions facing leaders today:
How do we guide our people through the Human + AI era with trust, resilience, and humanity?
Together, they dive into:
- The rapidly shifting public sentiment around AI—and why fear and excitement are both rising
- The coming era of hyper-personalized AI coaching and how it can unlock human potential
- Why human skills—resilience, self-awareness, collaboration—matter even more in an AI-driven workplace
- The “hidden context” inside organizations and how AI can help teams work together with more empathy
- What leaders must get right in the next five years to support their workforces through transformative change
- A powerful reframing of AI not as an industrial revolution—but as a modern Renaissance
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The Future of AI-Enabled Leadership with Experian's Chief Talent Officer, Lesley Wilkinson
Experian Chief Talent Officer Lesley Wilkinson sits down with Valence CEO Parker Mitchell in London to unpack how AI is reshaping how we develop leaders. The conversation centers on the need for radical adaptability, enabling better human-to-human conversations, and building a continuous cycle of improvement.
With Nadia, Valence's AI coach, Experian is scaling support in the flow of work to 22,000 employees, with coaching fine-tuned to Experian's Characteristics of Great Leadership. Early pilots saw 100% adoption within the first hour of launch. Since then, Experian has seen a strong uptick in leadership effectiveness for managers who use of Nadia. Today, Nadia is deeply integrated into Experian's performance management cycle and leadership development programs.
Watch to learn:
- What “radical adaptability” looks like for today's leaders
- How AI coaching drives measurable ROI and stickier learning
- A practical model for goal-setting and performance conversations at scale
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00:00 Introduction
00:26 The evolving role of leaders
03:02 Enabling high performance at scale
04:19 Piloting AI coaching with Nadia
06:15 Driving ROI with leadership effectiveness
07:36 AI coaching as a framework for L&D programs
09:53 Reimagining performance management
11:41 Creating a continuous cycle of improvement
12:26 The future of leadership when everyone has AI coaching
Reimagining Leadership and Coaching in the Age of AI
Human + AI coaching works best as one system. Human coaches shift how leaders show up; AI provides daily, in-the-flow guidance that turns those shifts into habits across the org—especially for managers who rarely get 1:1 coaching time.
In this Executive Spark Talk from the 2025 NYU Coaching & Technology Summit (July 7, 2025), Levi Goertz (Head of Client Solutions, Valence) moderates a discussion with Christine Nollen (Global Head of Coaching, VML) and Liz Lowy (VP, Talent, Learning & Development, Hearst) on making entire companies coachable. They unpack “Big C” Coaching—the deep, presence-driven human work—and “little c” coaching—the in-the-moment prompting, reflection, prep, and follow-through. The takeaway: pair scarce human presence with AI that shows up every day so the culture actually scales.
What you’ll learn:
• Why traditional executive-only coaching doesn’t change day-to-day culture
• How to widen access for early-career managers without diluting quality
• Where Valence’s enterprise AI coach, Nadia, fits: prompts, reflection, prep, and consistent follow-ups that make learning stick
• Practical use cases (embedding AI into ILT, career conversations, feedback, conflict resolution, and more)
HR in the AI Era: Championing Human Potential
At the Conference Board’s recent CHRO Summit, leaders from Prudential, Hearst, VML, and ABM joined Valence Founder & CEO Parker Mitchell to share how they are championing the AI transformation in the talent function and positioning their workforces for lasting success.
Organizations poised to thrive over the coming decade won't merely adopt AI. They'll harness human + AI collaboration at scale. In this evolving landscape, CHROs stand uniquely positioned to lead, by shaping culture, reimagining talent strategy, and unlocking human potential across every level of the business.
Speakers
Rachel Kay, SVP and Chief People Officer, Hearst
Raúl Valentín, EVP & CHRO, ABM
Maree Prendergast, Global Chief People Officer, VML
Vicki Walia, Chief People Officer, Prudential
Moderator: Parker Mitchell, Founder, Valence
AI: The Untold Story - A Conversation with Reid Hoffman and Gillian Tett
We sat down with LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and Financial Times editorial board chair Gillian Tett to go beyond the headlines and get a deeper understanding of the economic and workforce impact of AI. Their message for HR leaders: act now, because the change is already here.
🧠 Key Takeaways from the Conversation
1. AI is here to amplify human potential. Instead of focusing on AI as a way to cut costs or reduce headcount, Reid and Gillian see AI as augmentative: a new member of the team that changes workflows and unlocks capacity for human creativity.
2. "AI is the best educational tool we have created in human history," Reid says. There are real challenges around AI's impact on how young people learn and develop the skills they need to enter the workforce. But Reid and Gillian explore how AI can create new models of education and training that personalize instruction in a way that was previously only possible at the most prestigious universities.
3. With AI, everyone becomes a manager. Reid sees a near future where every employee has a team of AI assistants that they manage to get work done. "There won't be such a thing as individual contributors anymore." In this world, the same EQ skills that make people great managers and coworkers become the skills that make them AI super-users .
4. "If you're not using AI, you're going to be under-tooled," says Reid. From leveraging AI to run better meetings to reimagining what's possible to achieve with an AI assistant at every employee's side, Reid and Gillian outline concrete starting points for driving change at scale. Because, as Reid says, in six months, if AI isn't embedded in your workflows, "It'll be like saying, 'I'm a carpenter, but I use rocks, not hammers.'"
About the Speakers
Reid Hoffman
Reid Hoffman is the co-founder of LinkedIn, co-founder of Inflection AI, and a partner at Greylock. He currently serves on the boards of companies such as Aurora, Coda, Entrepreneur First, Microsoft, and Nauto. He also serves on nonprofit boards, such as Kiva, Endeavor, CZI Biohub, Opportunity@Work, and the MacArthur Foundation’s Lever for Change.
He is the co-host of the Masters of Scale and Possible podcasts. He is the co-author of five best- selling books: The Startup of You, The Alliance, Blitzscaling, Masters of Scale, and Impromptu. He earned a master’s degree in philosophy from Oxford University, where he was a Marshall Scholar, and a bachelor’s degree with distinction in symbolic systems from Stanford University.
Gillian Tett
Gillian Tett is U.S. editor at large of the Financial Times, where she serves on the editorial board, writes weekly columns and co-founded the FT Moral Money newsletter. She is also provost of King’s College at Cambridge University. Previously FT’s U.S. managing editor from 2013 to 2019, Tett’s past roles at the publication include assistant editor for markets coverage, capital markets editor, Tokyo bureau chief, London-based economics reporter and reporter in Russia and Brussels. The author of four books, Tett’s most recent is Anthro-Vision: A New Way to See in Business and Life. In 2024, she received an Order of the British Empire for her services to journalism.
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How to Successfully Deploy an AI Coach
It’s one thing to buy seats for an AI tool, but it’s another thing entirely to successfully integrate it into your organization. In this deep dive on AI adoption strategy, Jonathan Crookall (Chief People Officer, Costa Coffee), Jennifer Carpenter (Global Head of Talent, ADI), and Maree Prendergast (Global Chief People Officer , VML) share the use cases that led them to roll out AI coaching with Nadia for their frontline workforces, tactics for successful onboarding, and lessons learned on the path to global adoption.
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The Future of AI in the Workplace with Valence CEO Parker Mitchell
Any big technology leap comes with a central promise and a lot of rough edges. With AI, the central promise is personal assistants and coaches who support us in every part of our lives — including at work. In this keynote address, Valence CEO Parker Mitchell lays out his vision for how work will change as AI makes personalized coaching available at scale to global workforces.
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🔗 Watch next: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLNHIu4PAeaIHdogZy5mpMnSpMkcdhtRwq&si=oB8c9XrQCbIV4plB
📱 Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/valenceteams/
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