Workplace Stories by RedThread Research

This week on the podcast, we welcome Heather Stefanski, Chief Learning and Development Officer at McKinsey & Company. We explore how organizations like McKinsey are reimagining employee development for the age of AI, shifting learning into the flow of work, focusing on systems and purposeful apprenticeships, and embedding L&D directly into workflow design. You'll also hear all about the evolving skill sets for L&D teams and the importance of updating how we measure development. 
You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...
00:00 Integrating development into AI assistants
04:49 Heather's role at McKinsey
08:32 Developing skills in the workplace
16:08 Designing developmental workflows with AI
24:56 Understanding skill proficiency levels
26:25 Building agentic development solutions
30:53 Assessing AI proficiency levels
33:18 Future skills focus at McKinsey
42:55 AI in performance evaluations
53:13 Using AI for feedback and review

Rethinking Language: Why Development Surpasses Training
One of the first shifts Heather Stefanski identifies is a deliberate move away from talking about “training” or even just “learning.” Instead, McKinsey centers its L&D strategy on development, a more holistic approach that encompasses formal programs, feedback mechanisms, leadership modeling, and real-time experiences in the flow of work.
For McKinsey, development is inseparable from business outcomes, and employee development is critical to the firm’s value proposition. This means McKinsey designs work intentionally to be developmental, combining upskilling, leadership building, and project experiences into a seamless ecosystem.
Purposeful Apprenticeship
Heather discusses embedding rituals, such as performance check-ins and feedback sessions, directly into core workflows to build a system grounded in purposeful practices. By standardizing these rituals, McKinsey can even quantify the impact of great teachers on advancement, and L&D becomes part of organizational culture rather than a siloed function.The New Learning Tech Stack
One of the most exciting transformations is McKinsey’s ongoing work to blend learning seamlessly into technology-enabled workflows. Rather than relying solely on traditional LMS platforms, McKinsey is embedding learning designers into business teams that are building agentic workflows—AI-powered systems that guide, prompt, and provide real-time feedback as employees work.
AI agents are being designed to do more than just increase productivity. Heather emphasizes that agents should also foster professional development by challenging users, prompting reflective questions, and offering immediate coaching. This shift pushes L&D professionals to evolve their skills, requiring fluency not just in instructional design but in data analysis and collaborative workflow engineering.
What Skills Do Employees Still Need?
As AI tools automate routine tasks, think aligning PowerPoint columns or data cleanup, McKinsey is strategically deciding what to stop teaching, redirecting focus to what keeps the firm distinctive: problem solving, judgment, metacognition, systems thinking, and authentic leadership. Purposeful abandonment of now-obsolete skills is as vital as doubling down on those that matter, ensuring development keeps pace with the shifting demands of knowledge work.
 Resources & People Mentioned
Lisa Christensen on LinkedIn 
mckinsey.com
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CLO Lift Group 

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Heather Stefanski at McKinsey & Company 
Heather Stefanski on LinkedIn 

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Frontline workers form the massive, beating heart of the global workforce, constituting up to 80% of all employees. But their enablement, experience, and upward mobility often remain quietly neglected. We sit down with J.D. Dillon, author of the upcoming Frontline Enablement Playbook, to dissect the persistent challenges these vital employees face and explore how organizations can better support and empower the often-overlooked deskless workforce.
We discuss why frontline managers are structurally trapped, JD breaks down a hierarchy of frontline worker needs, and shares more about the essential role of connection—over traditional training—and why genuinely understanding, not "othering," frontline experiences is key to meaningful change. 

You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...
[00:00] How organizations support their managers
[12:08] Understanding the frontline workforce
[28:42] Improving employee retention strategies
[36:39] Measuring impact on frontline work
[40:33] Inviting in frontline employee feedback
[48:40] Challenges faced by frontline managers
[52:10] Supporting new managers effectively
[57:07] AI tools for frontline employees

Understanding the Structural Trap for Frontline Managers

Managers are often tasked with driving outcomes, hitting KPIs, retaining staff, and resolving customer complaints, but can be denied the resources or authority necessary to actually effect change. Everything in organizations is pushed through managers, but the visibility and empowerment of frontline managers is substantially less than that of their corporate peers, making both their influence and recognition of their struggles far more limited. This leads to a burned-out, under-supported middle layer that directly impacts both employee engagement and business performance.

Connection Over Content

Traditional strategies for improving frontline performance tend to default to more training or pressuring managers to be the catch-all for corporate initiatives. But this approach is not just incomplete—it may even be counterproductive. Instead of overloading managers with binders and leadership development modules, organizations should focus on fostering connection—especially enabling peer connections among frontline managers at different locations. Meaningful conversations, mentoring, and crowdsourced problem-solving trump content-driven learning. Managers, after all, best learn from each other’s lived realities, not generic directives.

The Hierarchy of Frontline Needs

At the core of Dillon’s framework is a hierarchy of needs for frontline workers:
Livelihood – The basic requirement: fair pay and benefits, recognizing that for many, work is first and foremost about economic necessity.
Stability – Reliable schedules, clear policies, and the ability to plan life around work.
Community – A sense of belonging and connection with coworkers; the knowledge that one’s immediate work environment isn’t built around corporate KPIs, but relationships.
Culture and Purpose – The “top” of the pyramid: tying individual roles to broader organizational purpose and values.

Organizations often leap to culture-focused initiatives while neglecting the foundational layers. Without addressing pay, scheduling, and daily support first, those higher-order efforts rarely stick.

Tensions, Trade-offs, and Small-Scale Change

Frontline management must constantly navigate tensions such as being tasked with outcomes but denied the necessary authority, being pushed to develop staff but overwhelmed by daily operational issues, and being measured by metrics that don’t always reflect lived realities. JD believes that these tensions don’t have simple solutions; they have to be navigated, not "fixed".

Large-scale, top-down changes are rare. Instead, incremental improvements, like investing in small process shifts, removing single pain points for managers, or fostering peer communities, can create real traction every shift. “Every shift counts, small shifts matter,” according to JD.

 Resources & People Mentioned
The Frontline Enablement Playbook by JD Dillon
Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

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In this episode, we sit down with John Barrand, CHRO for the State of Utah, to discuss an inspiring transformation in public sector performance management. John led a bold effort to overhaul Utah’s performance management system—moving it from a culture of “adequacy” and silence to one focused on learning, growth, connection, and accountability. John shares how he and his team achieved legislative change requiring quarterly check-ins, implemented management training, and shifted the state’s mindset around performance and development.

 You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...
[01:16] Initial state of Utah’s performance management system
[06:23] Value of continuous learning and curiosity in government 
[10:06] Defining the “why” for performance management in Utah
[17:02] Risks and Resistance in Systemic Change
[20:06] Quarterly employee check-ins initiative
[25:59] Balancing fairness and measurement without alienating staff 
[34:28] Creation of a system-wide talent mobility program 
[40:01] Development of incentive structures and bonus allocations 
[44:22] Sustainability and future of the program

Performance Management is a Sector-Spanning Challenge

Performance management has a notorious reputation, often maligned as bureaucratic and misaligned. These challenges aren’t confined to just the private sector. Public organizations often face a wealth of bureaucracy and challenges that can inhibit transformation, compounded by a cultural tendency towards silence and an adequacy mindset.

When John assumed his role in 2021 for the state of Utah, over 70% of employees had an “unknown” performance rating, and only 16% had received annual reviews. The pervasive culture of silence fostered disengagement and suspicion, and performance management, where it occurred, was simply about maintaining adequacy—a relic from nearly a century and a half of defensive bureaucracy.

From Compliance to Connection

The first pivotal move was defining purpose. Clarity on the “why” behind performance management is crucial. For Utah, the why was growth: enabling employees to learn and grow while retaining top talent—shifting away from the punitive roots of performance management. As John says: “Employees don’t want feedback, they want connection. They don’t want evaluation, they want attention”.

One of the new steps John took was to require quarterly check-in conversations with all employees. The effect was transformational: from just 16% of employees having annual reviews to 89% participating in four quarterly check-ins within the first year. This regular cadence broke the culture of silence, making communication a legal and cultural imperative.

Overhauling the System: What Changed

Where most organizations tinker at the edges, Utah’s public sector embraced bold, structural change. They implemented legislation for conversations, which included quarterly check-ins and annual reviews, demonstrating a high-level commitment to improving performance management.

Only 30% of managers previously had any training, and now, over 87% have been developed in crucial skills such as feedback, resilience, and collaboration. Utah also funds performance management by reallocating cost-of-living adjustments and introducing performance-driven bonuses. Goals now consist of both output-aligned objectives and developmental “how” objectives, pushing employees to reflect on and improve their impact.

Evidence of a Transformed Culture

Performance conversations have become increasingly meaningful. The organization saw a 40% increase in first-year exits for cause—not a sign of ruthless weeding out, but of identifying and addressing performance issues sooner, thereby improving overall health without a drop in retention. High-potential (HIPO) employee retention rates rose 16% above the general population, and newly calibrated bonus systems rewarded and motivated top talent. Utah’s success has garnered attention from major institutions—including Harvard and the London School of Economics—looking to distill lessons from its model.

 Resources & People Mentioned
Utah Governor's Office
Utah Legislature
Harvard University
LSE 
HB0104
GRIT Initiative      

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John Barrand

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In this episode, we welcome Lisa Kay Solomon, designer-in-residence at Stanford's d.school and host of the "How We Future" podcast, and Jeffrey Rogers, principal of Learning and Facilitation at Radical and co-founder of Projectory. We discuss why foresight—the ability to anticipate and design the futures we want—is everybody's job, not just the domain of senior leaders or specialized futurists. They challenge the idea that organizations operate on an "official future" built from unexamined assumptions, and explore how narrative shapes both our approach to work and our readiness for rapid change, especially in the face of AI disruption.

 You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...

[00:00] Rethinking future-focused leadership
[03:39] HR's evolving role in shaping the future
[07:18] Understanding contested narratives and the potential to challenge them 
[21:50] The importance of adopting futures thinking through broad learning across multiple perspectives
[25:47] Strategic foresight and future practices
[35:13] Rethinking knowledge and learning priorities
[39:21] Reflecting on AI adoption barriers
[47:08] Helping leaders develop future-oriented skills
[51:14] Looking ahead to the future

The Leadership Muscle We Forget to Use

One of the most powerful ideas to emerge from the conversation is that of foresight as a "leadership muscle." Most leaders are trained and incentivized to focus on quarterly results and annual plans. The urgent often squeezes out the important, leaving little room for the kind of long-term, strategic thinking that anticipates disruption rather than simply reacts to it.

Foresight isn't someone else’s job—it's every leader's job. Yet, most organizations have let this muscle atrophy. Through scenario planning and immersive exercises like those facilitated at last year’s Summit, the hosts argue that HR and organizational leaders can rediscover the collective ability to inquire, imagine, and influence the future, rather than endure it.

Challenging the "Official Future" and the Power of Narrative

Every organization operates on an "official future," a set of unspoken assumptions about what tomorrow holds. In stable times, these guiding narratives are rarely questioned. But when the world is in flux, from technological disruptions like AI to geopolitical shocks, such narratives become vulnerabilities.

Leaders, especially in HR, have a responsibility to both recognize and challenge prevailing stories about the future. Wherever there’s a narrative, there’s also the possibility for a counter-narrative, and organizations need to cultivate the skill of holding multiple possible futures in mind, letting diverse perspectives inform strategic choices rather than defaulting to inherited assumptions.

Building Organizational Foresight: Tools, Skills, and Community

The value of events like the Red Thread Summit lies in three core takeaways: the experience of stepping back to envision the future, a toolkit of practices that can be applied immediately, and the creation of a community dedicated to learning and experimentation.

There are three critical skills:

Recognizing the narrative: Are you taking assumptions as fact, or seeing them as just one possible story?
Crafting your own narratives: Are you able to articulate clear, alternative futures?
Communicating vision: Can you equip others to see and believe in those visions?

Perhaps nowhere is the need for foresight and narrative-shaping more acute than in the realm of AI and automation. Today’s leaders are under immense pressure to adopt and justify new technologies, to navigate uncertainty, and to avoid being blindsided by change.
A key theme is the emerging digital (and AI) divide: those who are experimenting, learning, and shaping technology are pulling ahead, while those waiting for certainty risk being left behind. Learning, experimentation, and cross-pollination are essential. 

Creating the Conditions for Resilient Futures

Rather than chasing after blueprints or one "correct" answer, try to cultivate a design mindset: creating organizational conditions in which new ideas and approaches can flourish. This means expanding our definition of leadership to include not just the preservation of knowledge, but the nurturing of curiosity, experimentation, collaboration, and adaptability. 

 Resources & People Mentioned

Peter Drucker
Articles by Lisa Kay Solomon 
Pascal Finette on LinkedIn 
Implications Wheel
View from the Future at Stanford d.school  
Hazel Henderson

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This week, we’re sitting down with Ron Storn, Chief People and Culture Officer at Truckstop, to discuss culture—how it forms, who owns it, and how it scales in growing organizations. We explore the relationships between systems, processes, and cultural values, and discuss signs of cultural breakdown and the keys to recovery. We also discuss how AI is reshaping workplace dynamics, hiring practices, and performance management, and Ron offers practical, research-based insights and strategies for understanding and supporting positive workplace culture. 

You will want to hear this episode if you are interested in...

00:00 How company culture is formed
09:19 Building strong HR and leadership systems
11:54 Creating a positive culture for business success
18:59 Scaling and preserving company culture
22:53 Defining team behaviors and principles
29:26 Aligning culture with decision-making
32:13 Signs of a broken workplace
36:50 Challenges with management and team culture
41:45 Advantages of remote vs in-person work
44:56 AI's impact on workplace culture

Defining Culture

Some companies treat culture as little more than a list of values on the wall, disconnected from the day-to-day decisions and actions that define what it’s really like to work there. Ron believes culture is best understood as a set of shared behaviors, decision rights, and expectations to determine how a company actually executes its strategy when no one is watching. It’s how decisions are made, how people are hired or rewarded, and how work gets done when leadership isn’t in the room.

In smaller organizations, culture often starts with a clear vision or set of norms, and systems are built around it. As organizations scale, systems and practices increasingly shape (and sometimes reshape) the prevailing culture, the challenge is finding ways to make culture systemic, woven into processes, rewards, and leadership behaviors, so that the company’s values endure as it grows.

Who Owns Culture? Leadership, HR, and Systems

While HR is often perceived as the “owner” of culture, Ron believes it should be a shared responsibility, with ultimate ownership being at the very top. CEOs and founders define and embody desired cultural norms, while executive leaders model and cascade those norms through decisions and behaviors. HR’s role is to craft the mechanisms for how people are hired, evaluated, and developed to reinforce the company culture at scale. If only HR champions culture while leadership pays lip service or models different behaviors, culture will break down. Everyone, especially managers, must reinforce and live the culture for it to endure.

Signs of Cultural Erosion and How to Recover

When culture unravels, it’s usually a gradual process, increasing decision friction, high performers becoming disengaged, and inconsistent behaviors creeping in across teams. If left unchecked, the result is a loss of trust, bureaucracy, and top talent walking out the door.
Recovery is possible, but it needs radical transparency and recommitment.

Ron recommends that organizations in crisis go back to their roots and principles, engaging teams in candid conversations about what must change. Leaders should model vulnerability, drive clarity on decision-making and expectations, and ensure every manager is accountable for rebuilding the cultural fabric.  

Resources & People Mentioned

Truckstop.com 

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Ron Storn on LinkedIn 

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