Companies Put Limits on AI Spending, Ford Rehires Humans, and Palantir's Alex Karp Calls Out the AI Vendors
01/07/2026 | 27 mins.
July 1, 2026: Companies are discovering that AI agents can drive token usage far beyond what they budgeted for, forcing leaders to bring cloud-style cost controls into AI spending. Then I get into Ford bringing back 300 veteran quality inspectors and engineers after its AI-driven quality checks missed what experienced humans could catch. Finally, I look at Palantir CEO Alex Karp's CNBC warning about token pricing, customer data, model control, and why more companies may start rethinking how much of their AI strategy they want to outsource.
The Companies Using AI the Most Are Hiring the Most & Amazon's $1B Bet on People
30/06/2026 | 25 mins.
June 30, 2026: New research from Ramp Economics Lab and Revelio Labs shows that companies spending the most on AI are not shrinking the fastest. They are actually growing headcount faster, including in entry-level roles many assumed would disappear first. Then I get into Amazon Web Services' $1 billion push to build a new unit of embedded AI engineers, sending teams directly into customer organizations to help turn AI pilots into real work. The bigger story is that AI is not simply replacing jobs. It is changing which jobs grow, which skills matter, and where the real bottleneck is.
Unisys CEO & President Mike Thomson on AI Hype, Layoffs, Data Centers, and the Workforce Reality Check
29/06/2026 | 53 mins.
I talk with Mike Thomson, President and CEO of Unisys, about the real state of AI inside companies. We get into why some organizations are using AI as cover for layoffs, why the backlash against data centers is often built on incomplete information, and why enterprise AI adoption will take years instead of weeks. Mike also explains why technical debt, messy data, governance, security, token costs, and workforce readiness are the real barriers leaders need to understand before they assume AI can simply replace people at scale.
ChatGPT 5.6 Is Here, California's AI Job-Loss Tracker, and Why Executives Don't Want the CEO Job
26/06/2026 | 24 mins.
June 26, 2026: OpenAI launched ChatGPT 5.6 with limited access to only 20 organizations, showing how frontier AI capability and government review are starting to split. Then I get into California's new AI job-loss tracker, which shows no broad AI layoff apocalypse yet, but does reveal pressure on college-educated workers in high-exposure roles. Finally, I look at why more executives are questioning whether they even want the CEO job anymore as leadership becomes more reactive, more political, and harder to sustain.
Meta Pauses AI Surveillance, Losing Access to Fable 5 Triggers Lawsuit, and Engineers Hit AI Paralysis
24/06/2026 | 31 mins.
June 24, 2026: Meta's employee surveillance program, which tracked keystrokes, mouse activity, and screenshots before a data exposure forced the company to pause it. Then I get into Legion's lawsuit against the U.S. government after losing access to Anthropic's Fable 5 model, showing how frontier AI access is becoming a new business dependency and supply chain risk. I also look at software engineers facing workplace paralysis as AI models keep changing faster than people can master them, and why AI rollouts may be burning out the very high performers companies need most.
The future of work isn't coming. It's already here — and it's moving fast. Future Ready is the podcast for leaders who want to stay ahead of AI, workplace transformation, and the forces reshaping how organizations operate and compete. Hosted by Jacob Morgan, futurist and bestselling author, this is where strategy meets reality.
Every week, two formats in one feed: honest, unfiltered conversations with the CEOs, CHROs, and senior executives actually building the future of work — and sharp, no-fluff daily briefings that take the most important developments in artificial intelligence, AI agents, leadership, hybrid work, and organizational strategy and tell you exactly what they mean for your business.
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