Highlight Showcase 2025: The Power of Human Connection in an Age of AI
In the keynote session of Highlight Showcase 2025 by Smiley Poswolsky, we explore how AI is transforming the way we work - but not the way we relate to our colleagues and customers. Understanding the emotions and psychology that drive connection, affinity, and empathy is more important than ever to leverage a new generation of tools empowering us to work smarter.
Automated webinar transcript
Smiley Poswolsky, Keynote speaker: Hello, Highlight Showcase 2025. My name is Smiley Poswolsky. It's wonderful to join all of you today. In my 10 years of working with some of the largest and most influential organizations in the world, I really learned that there's one thing that they do to attract and retain top R&D talent to navigate an overwhelming future of work and to drive massive innovation and growth in the CPG industry.
And that is. They build a culture of belonging and human connection for their team, for their employees, and most importantly for their customers. And I think we throw this word belonging out all of the time. We don't necessarily know what it means, but we know how it feels. We know it when we see it. We know it when we experience it.
We certainly know when it's missing. When it's not in the room or not on the teams call or the zoom call or or a product consult right now, I first learned about belonging way back over 25 years ago. The first week of high school freshman year. I grew up in Boston, Massachusetts. I went to a very big public high school, over 2000 kids, and I wanted to play a sport my freshman year.
And I know y'all can't see me right now 'cause this is a video, but trust me, I'm not that big of a dude football outta the question. Not gonna happen. Soccer also outta the question, our soccer team's like the best team in the state hockey, please. So I went out for one of the only sports left, which was maybe you can guess.
Cross country now. I didn't even know what the sport was. I assumed it was skiing, but it's actually just running. You go run three miles or five miles or 10 miles on the weekends. So a couple weeks into practice, we are doing a hill workout, which is exactly what it sounds like. You're just running up and down a hill over and over and over again.
So I'm outside running, smiling, having a good time, getting exercise. New England fall weather. Like this is great. I made the team. Everyone makes the team. It's all good. Yes, I made the team having a good time. My coach is this ha hard-nosed Boston guy and he just starts screaming at me. "What the hell you doing? Smiling kid. Stop smiling. Stop puking, kid staht puking. Stop smiling. Staht puking." So after that, the team nicknamed me, Smiley. I was the slowest kid on the team. I never placed at any of our races, but I was like our cheerleader. I get us pumped up before every single race. Ended up running cross country, indoor outdoor track, all 12 seasons, all four years of high school.
And guess what? I became captain my senior year. I was still the slowest kid on the team, but I had a role to play. I mattered. I belonged and I think at its very essence, at its very core, that's what belonging is. This sense that every single person, our on, our R&D team, every single customer we have, whether they've been with us for 20 years, for two years, for two weeks, they matter.
They belong. And the problem is that most people go to work every day and they come home from work every day, and they do not feel this basic sense of belonging. In fact, 70% of Americans right now are disengaged at their jobs. 70%, one fifth of those people are so disengaged. They're actively undermining their coworker's work.
They're litigating paid by the company they work for to screw things up for that company. Now, I think that should be a concern to all of you on this call because you're leaders. It means there's, sometimes there's people on your team that feel like they shouldn't be there, that feel like they don't belong, that feel like they don't have a voice.
But I really think it should be a concern to everyone because it means that millions of people are waking up every day unhappy. Unfulfilled, sometimes depressed, not showing up fully for themselves, for their colleagues, for their team, for their company, and most importantly, for the communities and neighborhoods and people that they serve.
So what does this mean in the context of the workplace that we find ourselves in today? With everything happening, the multi-generational workforce, the shift to ai. All of the complications, people navigating a hybrid workforce changes in consumer behavior. The onslaught of attention, everyone vying for detention every single second.
Well, for the first time in history, we have as many as six generations joining every single day. At work online and in the consumer space, right? I know we probably don't have any gen alphas any, uh, 15 year olds coming into work every day, but they're coming in quick. This is a generation that does not know a world without chat.
GPT does not know a world without chat. GPT, iGen, gen Z, the smartphone generation, a generation that does not know a world without the iPhone, you know, it used to be that we double clicked. That's too much work. Swipe right, swipe right. I can get what? A car, an Uber food delivered, right? A place to stay a date didn't work so well for me.
Works for a lot of people. And then those people come to work and they're looking on our third day like, Hey, I, uh, probably should get a raise. It's your third day. I should probably be senior vice president. You've been here for three and a half weeks. Swipe right Between millennials and Gen Z, they currently make up over 50% of the workforce.
Some data shows that the next five to 10 years, they will make up as much as 75% of the workforce. So I myself, I'm an elder millennial. I was born in the early eighties. I call us the Oregon Trail Generation. Like we understand technology, we get it. We had early email, we had instant messenger. We got dysentery playing Oregon Trail, like we get it.
But back in the day, if it was 7:00 PM and you were meeting up with someone and they weren't there, like you got stood up, right? It's not like, oh my Uber's late. I can't find you on Google Maps. Like unless there's a payphone right there. And both of you are sketchy enough to have a pager like you got stood up.
Gen X, give it up for Gen X. We can give a clap here. Uh, gen X gets no love, I guarantee. If you go to any business, industry conference, any CPG conference, anywhere in the world, on any date, no matter what, there is not one session titled Gen X. Anything. I think we need to talk more about investing in our mid-career talent and our folks often leading our organizations and baby boomers.
I think we often treat baby boomers as if they're already out the door. As if there's just a clock on the wall and they're just TikTok. TikTok waiting for retirement when these are the people that have built our organizations, our brands, our products, right? They're the people that have the legacy, the wisdom, the institutional knowledge to pass it on to the next generation.
And people are working later and later into their lives, either out of financial necessity to provide for their families or because they simply love their work. So we have to create a workplace and a product innovation space that works for everyone. I do, however, wanna swipe right a little bit on Gen Z because I think it gives us some clues into where culture is headed, both in terms of company culture and team culture, but also in terms of product intelligence and product culture and reaching our customers faster and better.
First of all, timely, fast digital personalized updates. Does anyone know the average attention span of a Gen Z right now? If any of you have teenagers at home, you'll probably get this fairly quickly. It is. Six seconds. Six seconds, three hours a day on TikTok. Six second attention span. So when these people come to us looking for a job or asking to test our product, and we say, well get back to you in three weeks.
Three weeks, this person has, remember what happened three and a half minutes ago, three weeks. So I obviously, I'm not saying we hired that person on the spot, but that conversation has to be about them. It has to be about their future, right? They are not applying for the role that the person had six years ago.
Frankly, they are not applying for the role that the person had six months ago. They are applying for the role for their future. What does that look like? So when people talk about flexibility today at work, I think people often think it means, oh, the ability to work from home and hybrid. Like, I don't wanna put on pants.
Like I love sweatpants, I like, I like wearing yoga pants. I'm not trying to go to work, I don't want to commute. That might be part of it, but often what people are actually meaning with that is the ability to have. Agency and autonomy in terms of what their job looks like and what their relationship with the brands that they support Looks like personal and professional success, a sense of thriving.
This is something that has changed across the generations. It used to be that you expected your job to provide professional growth, right? New skills. Take some classes, right? Get a raise, kind of get a promotion. Kind of work up the corporate ladder. Increasingly young people are looking for personal growth at work.
Right. This sense of navigating an overwhelming world, navigating a world where things are changing so quickly, the rate of changes is constant, right? And they are looking for support from their boss, their supervisor, to be a mentor, to be a coach, to guide them through this incent intense life that they're living.
And people kind of say to me, it's like, yeah, but Smiley, like these young people, they want me to be, they want me to be. They're therapists. Like, I'm not your therapist. I'm not your mom. Like I'm your boss. I pay you right? I pay you to be here. I get that. But if, when these people come to us with their whole life story and everything that happened, like, oh my God, you won't believe this Tinder date.
I want on 'em. Blah, blah, blah, blah. And instead of just being like, I can't with this person, I never want to hear from them again. We take a deep breath, close our eyes and say what's on your mind? Tell me more. How can I support you? Right? What do you need right now? Have you listened to this podcast? Have you read this book?
Have you had coffee with this person? Right? They actually don't even work at our company, right? But I think they'd be a good person for you to chat with. You know, when I was your age, this was really helpful for me. That person's probably gonna do incredible work. A culture built on mental health and wellbeing, right?
We used to never talk about mental health at work. It was like you got mental health issues like go see a therapist, right? If you can get an appointment Tuesday night at eight o'clock, good luck. Right? It took a pandemic for us to start talking about mental health in the workplace. Frankly, it took a pandemic for us to start talking about.
Uh, the mental health needs of working parents, specifically work, working women in the workplace. So, according to LinkedIn, 66% of Gen Z expect that their workplace is going to be rooted, rooted in mental health and wellbeing. And it's not just young people. According to the American Psychological Association, 92% of all employees expect that their workplace is gonna look out for their mental health and wellbeing, their emotional and psychological wellbeing.
So this is something that is really affecting. Our culture today. So when I think about the realities shaping the future of work and the future of how we build and how we test our products, I think of the fact of the overwhelm, the disconnection, the burnout, the uncertainty. 60% of employees lack the time or the energy to do their job.
70% don't have enough uninterrupted focus time to learn the AI skills that would help them. Do their job more efficiently in the first place. They 70% lack the time to learn the very AI skills that might help them do their job faster and more efficiently in the workplace. So when people say all the time, oh, AI is not going to take your job.
Your job is going to replace by someone who understands how to use ai, I actually disagree. I believe AI's not going to replace your job. Your job is going to replace by someone who understands how to connect with other people. In a world with ai, where AI is dominant, your job is going to be replaced by someone who understands how to connect with other human beings and relate to other human beings.
In a world where AI is dominant. And why this matters so much, especially for the work that all of you are doing when it comes to CPG innovation, when it comes to retail innovation and intelligence, and, and understanding what people want for our products and what they want to consume and what they want in their home with their children, with their families.
We are in the midst of a loneliness epidemic. It was raging prior to the pandemic. It's only gotten worse. 50% of Americans right now are lonely. 50%. One in two loneliness is as dangerous to your health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. It's correlated with increased risk of stress, anxiety, depression, even early death.
And guess what? 80% of Gen Z are lonely. And you're like, Smiley. How could these young people be lonely? Literally all day long, all they're doing is double tapping on the phone saying an emoji on TikTok on Instagram. Like, how could they be lonely? Well, guess what? It turns out that swiping right is not real human connection.
In fact, in fact, it takes 90 hours with someone IRL in real life for them to become a friend over 200 hours for them to become a close friend. So right now, one in five people don't have someone for a close social conversation. That is to say it's just heartbreaking. If someone in their family were to get sick, they wouldn't have anyone to call.
15% of men have no, no zero close friends at all, which leads to so many horrible outcomes. So I think this is why this work matters so much and it's like, oh yeah, Smiley. Wouldn't it be nice if people had more friends? Who cares? We got a business to run, right? We got, we got products to move. We got inventory to sell.
I get it. But the cost of disconnection at work are enormous. So lonely, disconnected employees, more missed days at work, double the sick days, 45%. Lower productivity, lower quality of work, higher risk of turnover. They cost their employers 154 billion, billion dollars per year in loss productivity. So if this is our R&D team, our innovation team and folks do not feel a strong sense of connection, they are not going to be innovate.
You gotta be able to innovate the next generation of products, right? They're not going to move our company forward and become a category leader because they don't have this strong kind sense of connection and, and really connection is the cure. When people do not have to hide their true self at work, whatever that looks like for them, they are nine points less lonely on the UCI loneliness scale.
Employees have a best friend at work. Employees have a best friend at work are seven times more engaged in their job. In fact, if you do not have a close set friend at work, there is only a one in 12 chance that you'll be engaged at your job when technology is used to make meaningful connections. Right.
So not just to assign more work or fill out this survey, uh, by the end of the day, fill out this spreadsheet, but actually to learn and grow, get to know our customers, right? Get to know our colleagues on a deeper level, to grow together, to try new things to innovate. When we have shared goals with our colleagues, a sense of mission and vision and purpose, as CPG leaders, we set that North Star People know where we're headed.
We're all on the ship together, we're headed in the right direction. Everyone knows their roles. People feel a stronger sense of connection, simply picking up the phone and calling someone. Oh my gosh, imagine that, right? I could fire off this email to 12 people. It's gonna be a back and forth scheduling for two weeks.
Half the people won't read it. Or I could just pick up the phone and call this person and probably be done with this in about two and a half minutes. Work life separation. The ability to leave work at work. Notice that that doesn't say work-life balance is work-life balance. A thing I think we've kind of figured out at this point.
It's really not because if we are firing off emails from the dinner table with our kids at 8:00 PM or when we're on vacation with our families. What do you think our teams are gonna do when they're at the dinner table home with their kids, when they're on vacation with their families? People need to be able to turn off and really have that time.
So again, this is a bottom line business issue in, in addition to just being the right thing to do to create a more connected and healthy world, a strong sense of connection is a bottom line business issue. When we have high levels of belonging, there's a 56% increase in job performance. A 50% drop in turnover risk, 75% reduction in sick days, 18 times more promotions, double the raises.
170% increase in the chance that you're gonna recommend your job to somebody else and get incredible talent coming in to your company and to your product, which results in an annual savings of $52 million for a large company. So if we were to actually ask people today though, what flexibility looked like for them, they'd be like this.
They'd be like, I wanna work where I want, when I want, with whom I want on what I want, how I want. Now let me tell you something. This is not work. This is not a job. This is chilling on the beach in Mexico, sipping a margarita. However, however, however, within that, what are people and what are our customers often asking for?
In addition to demanding kind of like everything, the world, the ability to reimagine their purpose and their potential at work and in their lives, to try something new, to do something they've never done before. Right? To have a meaningful connection with a new person. Right. I, I'm struggling working with this person, but I really want to be over there and maybe we can solve that next week, but maybe we can talk about that in a month or two months or in a year, or, Hey, this way of working really is struggling for me, but like, let's try this and, okay, I can't fix that right away.
But I want you to be part of the conversation for how we might get there, right? And with our customers as well, we help them reimagine their purpose, their potential. We help them get to not the perfect place, but the next best place for them to live this, uh, a more thriving. Uh, a more thriving life of work and and beyond work.
So I think really in the new context of, of the world of work today, hybrid is not just where we work, it's how we connect. I think for a long time we had this sense of, of people's hybrid policy, right? How many days a week are they in the office, right? And what often was happening there is like, you gotta be in on Wednesdays, right?
Like everyone's gotta be in. So it's like, oh my God, I gotta put on pants, right? Oh my God, I leave the breakfast table. In the morning with my daughter, I don't get to have breakfast with my daughter. I get in the car, right? I sit in traffic for 45 minutes, or I get in the subway, the bus, it's crowded. I'm sweating.
I finally get to my desk at work, work. My boss who called the meeting isn't even there. And everyone else is on wall to wall zoom or teams meetings all day long with noise canceling headphones on. Like, why did I just sit in traffic for 45 minutes? Right? Why did I not have an extra 20 minutes with my daughter this morning?
So it's not just where we work, it's how we connect. We have to make the in-person worth it. We have to design for human connection wherever our team is, wherever our people are, and wherever our customers are. So I had the opportunity to do some work recently with Unilever. Um, and they had just built this, you know, beautiful new headquarters in Hoboken, New Jersey, 110 square feet.
Feet, right? Uh, right downtown in Hoboken. And the idea here is that they're building this incredible workplace that's all around in-person workplace innovation, right? And they call it intentionally hybrid. Right. So this idea that it's not just enough to say we're hybrid, we're flexible, but like why?
What's the point of that? And the point of that is to drive that human connection when people are here in Hoboken. But obviously it's a team. Uh, Unilever is working all around the country, all around the world, but people are not gonna be there all the time. Sometimes they're with clients, sometimes they're testing products, but they build that intentionally hybrid.
Um, way of working so that we're always driving connection wherever we are. So when we think about intentionally hybrid, it's this idea of designing for human connection everywhere, creating a culture of constant feedback. So actually the research shows that 80% of employees who receive meaningful feedback are engaged regardless of how many days they're in the office.
Right. So there's this big push now to say, oh, you gotta be in five days a week, four days a week, five days a week, fine. But the data actually shows that it's more about, are people actually receiving feedback when they're in person, when they're remote, when they're hybrid, when they're on the road, when they're with the client, when they're on an airplane, not just where they're working.
That's the most important thing, that the boost in employee engagement from meaningful feedback is four times greater. Then the boost from having the right number of days in the office and when people do come in, right, we make that in-person time worth it, and we prioritize care, right? Care comes first.
We can balance giving people flexibility while also setting clear and robust expectations for people, getting their work done and working really hard. So some tools here are some practical kind of actionable tools to think about, to kind of how to cr increase connection and innovation on your teams.
And then we'll kind of shift into a little bit about thinking about how does this apply to kind of, uh, the product, uh, mapping journey and, and product intelligence and really thinking about your customers in, in the CPG space. Uh, but first of all, not always talking about work. So we create that five minutes.
Okay, Smiley, we don't have five minutes. One minute, fine at the start of a meeting for people to share what's coming up for them, right? To share something that's happened that weekend to share something going on in their life. And people like say to me, sometimes I Smiley, like, what if I don't wanna share?
I got someone on my team. It's like I'm just here to do my job. I'm not trying to talk about my personal life, like, ah, I got a therapist, or I don't wanna talk about that stuff. I'm here to work. I'm here to work. Cool. That person could just say, pass, skip. No thank you. Not today. I'm good. But they don't get to create a culture where other people don't get to share 'cause it might be incredibly important for them.
We gradually build vulnerability. So a lot of the science of vulnerability shows that we are not going to build that relationship overnight. Right. When someone comes in off Monday morning. Telling you their deepest, darkest secret. Oh my God, you won't believe what just happened. And I met this person from Instagram and I haven't even had my coffee yet.
Chill out. Right? But we're gonna build that relationship over time, right? We're gonna start just kind of casually and we build it up over time. But the vulnerability has to be a two way street. If we as leaders are not willing to share, if we're not willing to share our stories, how can we expect our teams, our people to our customers to share their stories?
Right. We have to lead first. We have to go first. Create a connect with me doc. So I actually have this example, this one pager, one pager you'll get after my talk and the resources, um, just of asking people questions about how they do their best work, right? Uh, do they wor, are they an introvert? Are they extrovert?
Do they do their best work in the, in the morning, uh, in the evening? Do they work better by themself with one other person, with three people with 15 people? And again, we're not asking those questions to learn everyone's demands or to check them off of a list. We're learning them to just get to know them better, to understand how they like to connect and what connection looks like for them.
When we have innovation sprints, we can think of those perhaps as community gatherings, right? Preferably in person, where we're bringing people together from different departments across silos, across across departments, or even we're bringing together our customers. Our social community to give feedback live and to get excited about our products, like when we are actually bringing people together.
The most important thing that happens now, whether it's training, onboarding, a hackathon, an innovation sprint, a product launch, is that people make a new friend, right? We can send out the PDFs, we can send out the links afterwards, like we can send out all the content, quote unquote. What's most important is the connection.
Could someone turn that someone next to 'em be like. I don't really understand what he's talking about. Me neither. Let's be friends or I don't really agree with what this product is trying to do. Me neither. Let's be friends. Like that's the most important thing. Intergenerational co-leadership, where we're pairing talent.
That's a little bit more green with people that have a lot more experience. So we get that 24-year-old, right? That's got a lot of good ideas, but is like trying to get a promotion. It's like it's your third day. Okay, chill out. That person be like, wait a second. There's a lot I don't understand here. It's like, of course there's a lot you don't understand here.
You're 24 years old, right? But you also get that person with decades more experience, right? That's maybe been with us for 20, 30 years, or that's been in the CPG industry for 20 years saying, huh, this young person. It is thinking about the world and our products in a completely different way. They represent the future of our company.
They also represent the future of our customer or our current customer. Frankly, I should probably understand what's going on in their head. So you get that symbiotic relationship. Office hours, small win parties, and Dow clubs. There's a lot of research that shows that the path to human flourishing is all about celebrating the small little wins along the way.
The things that we often blow back we're like, yeah, yeah, that happened. Whatever. Like if, unless we hit our annual target or Right. If someone's retirement party or our huge launch, who cares? Like I'm just on to the big thing. It's actually about stopping and celebrating those tiny little moments. Right, and it's about having places for people to express.
Their doubts, their fears, their concerns, right? Because if they do that, that's actually how they're gonna get to that psychological safety, right? Psychological safety is about people feeling safe to be, to take risks and be vulnerable in front of each other, to admit their mistakes, to not know the answer.
To see senior leaders being like, we got that wrong, or I messed up, or, we can do better. I want you to help me and support me in doing that. Thrive Interviews. Right. So I think we all know what an exit interview, it's like, let's, this is my last day. Let me tell you everything that sucks about working here.
It's like, okay, that would've been helpful information several months ago, which has led to, uh, stay interviews. Like, what would make you wanna stay here? But what if we took that one step further, what would make you thrive here? What do you need to do your best work to have that wellbeing, uh, to really feel like we're invested in your future?
And again, not to check off every single box on someone's list. But to simply have that conversation as an opportunity for connection. Small little acts of kindness and gratitude. When you actually often ask people if they feel a sense of belonging at work, or they feel like their manager truly sees them, or their R&D team really sees them, they often say it's the smallest little things right.
Like that remembered my kid's birthday. When my mom was sick, they sent flowers to the hospital. They know my favorite coffee order from my favorite spot, my favorite sandwich from my favorite deli. It is the smallest things. They wrote a handwritten letter once thanking me for something like those are the things that I think matter so much in this Always moving, always on.
Go, go, go world that we live in.
So, with our time left, I wanna suggest some kind of product mindset shifts and a kind of culture mindset shifts and a and, and a couple like practical examples of what this could look like for all of you in the work that you do. Uh, to, to really kind of make this a little bit more about what you're doing and, and kind of sh share some lessons I've learned from, from, from chatting with a few of you that are on this call and a few of your colleagues.
Um, that I think in the current. World that we live in. Product innovation is about relationships. It is about relationship building, right? It kind of used to be the sense of, look at how great we are, look at how many pro products we've moved and sold, and how wonderful our brand is and our logo and everybody knows it and we are amazing.
I'm like, yeah, okay. Yeah, we get it. Like you are amazing. The product is amazing, but I think in the lonely, disconnected shift to ai. Uh, really intimidating world that we are facing today in terms of, of innovation and just frankly, attention that product innovation is about. Listening unexpectedly.
Listening. Listening. When you, when you didn't think we were listening. Listening even though we kind of thought you weren't listening, even though you used to not listen. Like that is what it's about. And building that deep, deep relationship both with the people, obviously around you and on your team that you work with every day, or that you're hiring, right, or that you're trying to retain.
But also most importantly, with that customer that unexpectedly listening. So all of you probably are very familiar with Chewy and, and, and, and they're kind of how they kind of think about that customer relationship. But like what's I think so interesting. First of all, these are being posted on Reddit.
Like if you are getting. Traction for your brand, for your product on Reddit, like you are doing something right. Uh, the back, kind of the backbone of the internet, like this is like serious social media capital right here. Chewy unexpectedly sent me a hand-painted portrait of Matilda. I unexpectedly re received a hand.
A painted portrait of my rabbit from Chewy. This is something they do on, on pet birthdays. They do, uh, for pet condolences. Um, chewy sent us a painting of our cat after we told them their customer service that our dog passed away, like the fact, and they have that the, the photos on file of the animal, they know what it looks like.
It's just like a beautiful thing and totally doable for almost any brand. But again, it's that unexpected touch. That unexpected touch that makes someone's day so much so that they're gonna post on Reddit about it and receive 18,000. Uh, likes, um, and I was just kind of looking a little bit at the Highlight blog and, and, and some of what you all are doing about this, but this idea of kind of like customer co-creation and what does it mean to actually involve our customer?
Um. In, in the process. Right? And, and one example obviously is Lola, uh, who makes, uh, feminine products and sexual wellness products all about listening to their consumers, right to great packaging, uh, for their organic tampons that people really liked. And they said they got 152 completion rate on this survey, right?
52% over, uh, what they were looking for, partly because of this idea of truly listening to their customer, uh, and actually involving their customer. Um, while their customer is at home and in that, in-home testing. And I think that that actually really is the future, uh, uh, of, uh, product intelligence and product marketing is really making the consumer, the customer part of that process.
Um, shift number two, it's just an ad to belonging is the. So I, I, I really think that, um, we've passed the point at which this can be achieved in a one-off ad or in a campaign or a slogan or kind of appealing to something in the moment. And we are now in a place where like if, if you're really trying to achieve something or stand for something as a product, like people are gonna see right through it, unless it's actually a long-term goal, even less, you're actually living it.
Uh, and, and this used to be something I think people would sometimes listen to my talk and be like, oh yeah, belonging, smile. Like my HR team's over there. Right? Right. They're over there. I don't know what they do all day long, but like that's belonging's their job, like they're on it. And I actually think that in the current future of work and the current landscape, belonging is everyone's job.
Yeah. The R&D team, the innovation team, the product team, the marketing team, the social team, like belonging is your job too. Whether you've been with us for 20 years, for two years, for two weeks, it is your job to make sure you feel a sense of belonging. The people around you feel a sense of belonging and that yes, our customers feel a sense of belonging too.
That's what this is about. Um, so obviously, uh, you know, an example of this would be kind of Dove's Real Beauty campaign and the fact that this was something. That was launched 20 years ago, and when it was launched, I was looking at some of the press around it, like they got a lot of pushback from this, right?
People are like, oh yeah, you're just kind of trying to culturally appeal, like whatever, like real bodies, like okay, changing the face of, of advertising. Okay. Um, it doesn't mean anything. You sell soap. It's soap, who cares? It's soap. It's like, don't use your soap box to sell soap. But then, you know, dove and Unilever, to their credit, like this is a 20 year journey that they're on, right?
And they haven't abandoned it and they haven't had it as just an ad, right? It's a campaign that's still actually trying to, you know, change, uh, the bodies that we see every day and what does beauty really look like? Um, and now with the conversation around AI and committing to, Hey, we're not going to use ai.
To perpetuate unrealistic beauty standards. Like that stands for something and that's meaningful 20 years later and it's still meaningful. So if you're gonna gonna go, you're gonna go there, you gotta go there. Um, an example that is a little bit not in, in your all's world, but I think is important and a good lesson to learn from CultureAmp.
There are an employee experience, um, software pro, uh, uh, product that probably many, some of you actually may use actually as your employee engagement background to track, uh, performance management and to see if. Different people are engaged on one team. If everyone on one team is engaged, like maybe the problem isn't, that is not engaged, maybe the problem is not those employees, it's the manager.
And you can measure that over time. See people's varying levels of connection and belonging, right? They work with some of the top brands in the world and one of the things that they've done is built this incredible Culture Amp community of people that use the product. And usually people would call this like a user community.
But actually what's interesting is that it's all about the people in the community and not about the product. And that's, I think, something that we can learn from because let's be honest, when we usually start these communities, right, or have our kind of, um, user communities or customer communities, we're constantly bombarding people with more ads.
Buy this, sell this, get this upgrade. Cool. What if it was just actually about making these people's lives better? Right. So they now have a hundred chapters in 80 cities, 20 countries, 300 events, 40,000 HR leaders are part of this culture, first community that runs mostly on Slack. And the whole point of it is to actually help the people that are in this community.
Get promoted, get new jobs, find new opportunities, connect with each other, like it's about them. Obviously it is good for customer retention, right? And people continuing to use their product, obviously, but it's not the main thing. The main thing is supporting the people in the community. So I, I think a cool example, shift number three from product fit to product transformation.
Right. I think for a long time we've been looking for kind of like culture fit or product fit. Like yeah, this works, right? Like this is not gonna rock the boat too much. Like this works right when Actually, I think what we're looking for now is this idea of culture transformation and product transformation.
Like we're trying something we've never done before. We're gonna hire the person that has a whole new skillset, a whole new way of seeing the world. 'cause that's actually gonna, what, what's gonna make. Our product better, or this has worked for five years or 50 years. But it's not gonna work anymore, and we're going to embrace that transformation.
So I have the opportunity to talk to a couple of your colleagues that are, uh, with us all today during, uh, Highlight Showcase 2025. And I just wanna kind of share some of their insights. So the first person I spoke with was Tracy, uh, Tracy Luau, uh, co-founder and president of Hypnotic. Uh, she has a wealth of knowledge and experience in this area.
She's been food science for 25 years in research and insights. Spent 11 years at PepsiCo. Uh, five years at Nan at Danon, two years at Sabra, and she's the co-founder of this amazing whipped cream. A company called Hypnotic flavored whipped creams. Um, really awesome. Uh, they're really changing the game and like the nozzle and the flavors and all this stuff, and really heavy and, and doing great work on social.
And Tracy shared some really cool things with me. The first is that the point of our business is happiness, which I thought was actually not probably just for hypnotic, but probably for all of us in kind of the in, in, in, in most of the product space, especially. Uh, in, in, in food, but in, in, frankly, in, in, across different products in the CPG industry.
But creating those moments of joy, bringing people together to celebrate this idea that the power of proximity is a feeling, not just geography. Uh, when your team feels connected, your customers can to. Um, once a week, Tracy is on the factory line with her team. I wouldn't make them do anything I wouldn't do, right?
So she's like, as a leader, that is important to me. I want to be there. I wanna see what's going on. And because of that, she said that the team is actually able to solve problems better on their own. This idea that she's empowering her people, customers have a direct line to us. So every whip Ntic can has a one 800 number that goes directly to Tracy's sister's cell phone.
Right. Even still. That's so cool. Uh, hello@hypnotic.com goes to them, like actually still goes to them. They originally had it as like a quick way to get feedback when they were kind of in that startup world, but they kept it as we grew, right? To have that direct line to always know what our customers are thinking.
Keep getting feedback, keep iterating, keep improving. Uh, we still do sampling at grocery stores. Tracy and her sister are still there. They're the ones doing the sampling. They wanna be as close to their customer as possible and meet as many people as we can. That the change comes from our customers, right?
Not from some strategic plan, right? Or what we thought or what we did five years ago, or that quote unquote product fit, but actually from our customers, right? There's a QR code on the can how you swirl, right? Show us how you're using this and that. TikTok is their customer insights. Right. We see customers using this product on our coffee, and then they can overlay video with that, and then them commenting on like, have you tried this?
Have all of our other hypnotic fans, uh, tried this? Like, look what everyone's doing. Uh, and then having a customer kind of say like, dunking Cold Foam didn't respond to me, but Hypnotic did. Like, I got that message right from them. Um, and she was kind of saying, yes, you can be over 40 in responding to the TikTok comments.
In fact, that's the job. And I think that that's pretty telling, um, to listen to the next generation, right? Gen Z is incredibly knowledgeable and informed. They love trying new things. Take advice from them, respect their opinion. Uh, big data used to be the buzzword. Now it's ai. Like these things are gonna constantly be shifting and all the methods are valuable and can add to our work and our research and our insights.
But nothing replaces talking to people. Nothing replaces talking to people. Get out of the office, go talk to people, observe, spend time where our customers are. Back in the nineties, it was a company's job to create a trend. Now it's our job to spot the trend, understand it, and adapt. So thank you Tracy for, uh, taking some time to chat with me.
I, I also got some great insights from Taylor Anderson, uh, senior Director of Global Insights Capabilities at Colgate Palm Olive has, he's been there for 19 years, so again, he, he, he really knows this space so well. Uh, and Taylor shared a couple things as well, uh, giving your people your undivided attention.
Right. And this idea and this this current moment of, you know, people facing a deluge of things, vying for their attention, endless product choices, um, just endless kind of, you know, intensity. What does it mean to actually show up from a place of listening, of empathy and support? To to check in personally, to always be willing to lend a hand, to be a door opener, to open possibilities for people, be it via new insights, ideas, connections, perspectives or ways of doing things.
And that insights that provide meaningful human connection and the ability to speak to and fulfill the deep needs and wants of people are essential throughout. The entire purchase journey. In fact, those are the products, the ones that create that meaningful human connection that are gonna thrive. AI is an innovation tool that also needs the human touch and the human expertise and the human desire.
AI synthesis is awesome. But it has to maintain the humanity of what was originally expressed. Innovation in the space is most meaningful if it can uncover new connections that may have previously gone unnoticed or unrecognized open our understanding of the nuance, who, how, why. Moving from generalized insights to highly personalized insights, this is something that AI can definitely help with, right?
The demands and expectations of personalization at scale now demand that we understand the diversity of perspective much, much more. And on a granular level of actually knowing each person as an individual, uh, and moving away from those kind of generalized insights that frankly did not kind of include everyone.
Um, shift number four. And, and, and, and thank you again, Taylor. Um, and, and Tracy for taking the time to chat with me. Um, shift number four from hustle, hustle, hustle, hustle, hustle, hustle to human connection. And I kind of mean that both as a mindset in terms of. How we work and, and, and actually how we, how we do our product intelligence work and, and how we speak to and engage with our, our, our customers.
But moving from hustle to human connection. So the average employee right now sees between 4,000 and 10,000 ads a day. Switches between applications 1100 times a day, sends and receives 125 business emails per day, checks their inbox hundreds of times a day, checking email or teams every six minutes. So I'm not sure how it's possible to get any actual real work done when this is the case, but more importantly, I'm not sure how it's possible to have time for human connection when this is the case.
So this is what we're up against, designing for human connection in this overwhelming always on, always moving. Fast-paced, rapid change world, creating that time, uh, as Taylor was saying, to give people your undivided attention. So what does it mean to really kind of value, prioritize human connection in the age of ai, um, in product intelligence, in CPG, in the work that we do, making sure that our teams and our customers are listened to.
Accepted and celebrated. Does our R&D time HA team have time to connect, not just right once a year at an offsite or a hackathon, but within the workday, within the work week to connect, to play, to learn, to innovate? Can our customers ask for help and receive care in times of need? Can people share open feedback and become part.
Of the ongoing product journey, are we creating opportunities for discovering products and people in a new light? For people learning something new about themselves, for making a, discovering a surprising truth or something they didn't think could be true, or discovering someone in a way that they've never seen before.
Like that's what we are trying to do. So I want to kind of end here with a story that gets at the heart of what I'm trying to leave you with today. Uh, and, and then I'll leave you for the, for your rest of your, uh, Highlight Showcase. Um, but about, you know, a little over 10 years ago, I, I made this big career leap.
I, I left my, uh, kind of. Good on paper. Job in, in Washington DC I, I quit and, and moved out to California, to San Francisco to follow my dreams of becoming an author. Now, there's a few things you should know. Writing a book is really hard. It takes like four years, you make no money. Also, San Francisco is literally the most expensive city in the world.
So when I got there, I was like, I think I made a big mistake. I probably shouldn't have quit my job. Can I go back to DC and get it back? So one night I'm biking home in San Francisco, minding my own business. I'm on my bike on my way to get some tacos, when all of a sudden this guy bikes alongside me and says, my name's be I'm from Spain.
I was like, I don't know who the hell you are. And I tried to bike away. He keeps biking alongside me. My name's. I'm from Spain. I was like, please leave me alone. Like, who is this person? You gotta be careful talking to random people on the street in San Francisco. Let me tell you, he keeps biking alongside me.
My name's, I'm from Spain. I'm a designer. I'm a UX designer, user experience designer. I'm looking for a job here in San Francisco. There's no jobs in Spain right now. There's a lot of unemployment. I'm looking for a job. And I said to him, oh, Spain, like, that's interesting. Like I, I, I visited Barcelona once, like, that's a beautiful city.
That's like the most beautiful place I've, I've been to in the world. Like, what an incredible place. And he is like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Barcelona is all right. And he is like, well, what are you up to? How do you spend your days? What are you working on? I tell him, oh, I'm writing this book about people. They're, they're really lost and lonely.
They're looking for more meaning and belonging connection. I'm trying to help them. And he is like, well, do you have a cover designer yet for your book? And I'm like, no. He's like, well, go home. Check out my website. Maybe we can work together. So I go home. I get tacos first, obviously. Then I go home. I check out this guy Burnett's website, and I was like, wow, this guy's pretty good.
Like he had samples of his work, like a whole portfolio on his website. I was like, he's a pretty good designer. So I post on Facebook later that night. I just met this wild guy, Burnett while I was biking home. Tonight, he hails from Spain. He's a user experience designer. He's looking for a design job here in the Bay Area.
If you know of anything, let him know. A couple minutes later, my buddy Yi comments on the Facebook thread, oh, Bernache should meet with my friends. They're doing this mobile startup in Palo Alto. There's like five of them. They don't really know what they're doing. They don't have a lead designer yet.
Maybe they can work together. A couple weeks later, burn meets with the team. He gets hired to be the lead designer for this tiny mobile startup in Palo Alto, California. He gets a work visa to stay in the United States, which is a very big deal for him 'cause there was so much unemployment in Spain where he is from.
He sends me a quick thank you note, but a couple years go by, I don't really hear from the guy. And like two and a half years later I get a text message from Bernard out of the blue. Smiley, I'm taking you out to dinner anywhere you want to go. I was like, sweet. I'd love to get taken out to dinner. I'm an author.
I live in San Francisco. I'm broke free food. Like let's go. So we go out to this nice restaurant, get a bottle of wine, a bunch of food. I'm like, what's going on man? Why are you taking me out to dinner? Turns out that the mobile startup he had been working for had just been acquired by Yahoo for $80 million.
He's the fifth employee at the company. He's paid entirely in equity. Like he definitely a could afford to take me out to dinner. And he says to me, Smiley, Smiley, Smiley. Thank you. This wouldn't have happened if not for you. And I said to him, nah man, thank you. 'cause this guy talked to a random stranger.
In a city he didn't live in, in a country he wasn't from on a bicycle. Like, who the hell does that? So I think what I'm getting at here is that we have to create the culture on our teams, at our companies, with our customers, where people can make those big, bold asks, where they can channel their inner burnout, where they can go outside their comfort zone, where they can speak their truth, where they can give their feedback, where they can say what's on their mind, and we're not gonna be able to say yes a hundred percent of the time.
Or, or even 50% of that time, but we create that culture where people feel seen and heard, feel that sense of belonging, that sense of connection. I think if we do that, we create a culture of human connection, not just that highlight, right? Not just on our R&D teams or our product teams, not just at our companies, but most importantly.
For the people and the communities and the neighborhoods that we serve, some of whom are struggling so much right now. Thank you so much for having me today. It was wonderful to be with all of you. Uh, I've got a one pager. I got the slides. I got a, uh, 70 different ways, uh, full color guide, uh, 70 ways to connect at work, full color guide.
Uh, with a bunch of practical tools, resources, books, podcasts, things to check out if you wanna continue the work. Um, and keep going further. Please connect on LinkedIn so I can follow the incredible work that all of you are doing. And I really enjoyed spending some time with all of you. And I hope the rest of showcase goes great.
Thank you so much. It was great to be with all of you.