Ryan Roslansky: Former LinkedIn CEO on Building an Irreplaceable Career in the Age of AI | Career | E396

In the age of AI, career success isn’t guaranteed, and professionals risk falling behind if they don’t keep up with the rapidly evolving skill set required for success. As the former CEO and current Executive Vice President of LinkedIn and Microsoft Office, Ryan Roslansky has a front-row view of how jobs, hiring, and workplace expectations are shifting in real time. This perspective inspired his book, Open to Work, a guide to navigating the changing career landscape. In this episode, Ryan shares how professionals and entrepreneurs can stay ahead in the AI era and build the uniquely human skills that make them irreplaceable. In this episode, Hala and Ryan will discuss: (00:00) Introduction (02:50) How AI Is Changing Careers (07:36) Rethinking Job Titles and Task Automation (13:27) Top Five Skills AI Cannot Replace (18:20) Leading Teams Through AI Transformation (20:35) Finding What Makes You Unique (26:37) The Shift to Skills-Based Hiring (32:16) New Opportunities for LinkedIn Creators (37:43) Rethinking the “Open to Work” Mindset Ryan Roslansky is the former CEO of LinkedIn and currently serves as the Executive Vice President at LinkedIn and Microsoft, overseeing both LinkedIn and Microsoft Office. During his tenure as CEO, he nearly tripled LinkedIn's revenue and grew the platform to record levels of engagement, with over 1.3 billion members. Ryan is also the co-author of Open to Work, a practical guide to future-proofing your career and mastering the most essential human skills in the age of AI. Sponsored By: Huel - Get over $50 in savings with the Discovery Bundle from Huel. Use my exclusive code YAP15 for 15% off at huel.com/yap15. Indeed - Get a $75 sponsored job credit to boost your job's visibility at Indeed.com/profiting Shopify - Start your $1/month trial at Shopify.com/profiting. Quo - Run your business communications the smart way. Try Quo for free, plus get 20% off your first 6 months when you go to quo.com/profiting Experian - Manage and cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reduce your bills. Get started now with the Experian App and let your Big Financial Friend do the work for you. See experian.com for details. Intuit - Start paying bills the smart way, not the hard way. Learn more at QuickBooks.com/billpay AT&T Business - Power your small business with reliable connectivity from AT&T. Switch today at business.att.com. Fabric - Protect your family with term life insurance from Fabric by Gerber Life. Apply today in just minutes at meetfabric.com/profiting ZocDoc - Stop putting off those doctors’ appointments. Find and instantly book a doctor you love today at Zocdoc.com/PROFITING Blinkist - Turn the world’s best nonfiction books into quick 15-minute reads or listens. Grab your free trial plus an exclusive 30% discount at blinkist.com/profiting Remitly - Transfer money internationally with Remitly, with no hidden fees. Use code BUSINESS to get a $100 bonus after you send $300 or more. New customers only. Resources Mentioned: Ryan's Book, Open to Work: bit.ly/RR-Open2Work Ryan’s LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/ryanroslansky Active Deals - youngandprofiting.com/deals Key YAP Links Reviews - ratethispodcast.com/yap YouTube - youtube.com/c/YoungandProfiting Newsletter - youngandprofiting.co/newsletter LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/htaha/ Instagram - instagram.com/yapwithhala/ Social + Podcast Services: yapmedia.com Transcripts - youngandprofiting.com/episodes-new Entrepreneurship, Entrepreneurship Podcast, Business, Business Podcast, Self Improvement, Self-Improvement, Personal Development, Starting a Business, Strategy, Investing, Sales, Selling, Psychology, Productivity, Entrepreneurs, AI, Artificial Intelligence, Technology, Marketing, Negotiation, Money, Finance, Side Hustle, Startup, Mental Health, Career, Leadership, Mindset, Health, Growth Mindset, Startup, Business Ideas, Growth Hacks, Career Development, Money Management, Career Podcast

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Hala Taha?

  Today's episode is sponsored in part by HeyGen, Shopify, Life at the Speed of Play, and Indeed. HeyGen helps you create AI avatar videos without constantly being behind the camera. Get your first three videos free at heygen.com/profitting. Shopify is the global commerce platform that helps you grow your business. Start your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com/profitting. Life at the Speed of Play by Mark Pincus helps entrepreneurs quickly test ideas and find the ones worth pursuing. Get two books for the price of one at GetMark'sBook.com/Yap. Indeed helps you attract, interview, and hire all in one place. Get a $75 sponsored job credit to boost your job's visibility at Indeed.com/podcast.

• 0:45Hala Taha?

  As always, you can find all of our incredible deals in the show notes or at YoungAndProfiting.com/deals.

• 0:52Speaker 01

  Every day I feel like I wake up and you look at the headlines and there's something new that's happening. Just go over the like last few months. ChatGPT was like super hot. It was all that mattered. Now it's like Claude. Then it's like Claude coworker. Now it's this open claw thing. And you're just like, oh, my gosh. Like every day I wake up and it's like there's some new thing in the world that's hot. My goodness, it's like the craziest thing I've seen in my entire career.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Ryan Roslansky is the CEO of LinkedIn. Leading one of the world's largest professional platforms, he's navigating how AI is shifting careers and the structure of work itself.

• 1:23Hala Taha?

  So tell me, you are sitting on the data of a billion people right now with LinkedIn. If somebody is ignoring AI, what happens to their career in the next three years?

• 1:33Speaker 01

  The average set of skills to do a job has changed by like 25% over the last few years. We expect it's going to change by 70% by 2030. So if you're not accepting the fact that like this labor market is changing, your role is changing. It's not okay to like stand the sidelines for this one. You have to get into the mix somehow.

• 1:52Hala Taha?

  You believe that the whole hierarchy of careers is about to shift. Can you tell us more about that?

• 1:58Speaker 01

  Everybody's job is a set of tasks. The large percentage of these tasks are the types of things that can be automated away. If your job is just a set of automated tasks, like you have to start thinking about finding a new job.

• 2:10Hala Taha?

  Open to work on LinkedIn sometimes have the negative connotation like you're desperate for a job. Talk to us about what it means to actually be open to work.

• 2:18Speaker 01

  If you have that green banner on, you are 27% more likely to get hired. Open to work more than anything is a mindset shift.

• 2:26Hala Taha?

  Help us understand how the future is shaping in terms of how people will actually get hired based on their skills, not necessarily their titles, and what LinkedIn is doing to help support that.

• 2:36Speaker 01

  I think, you know, first and foremost, you have to.

• 2:39Hala Taha?

  Yeah, fam, LinkedIn data shows that by 2030, 70% of the skills required to do your job will have changed, and that shift is already happening, which is exactly why today's episode matters, because we're breaking down how AI is reshaping the way that we work and what you need to do right now to stay ahead. And boy, do we have the perfect guest for the topic. Ryan Roslansky is the CEO of LinkedIn, sitting on career data of over a billion professionals worldwide. So when he talks about where work is heading, it's worth listening up. His new book, Open to Work, is a survival guide for this exact moment. And today, he breaks down how to identify what AI will automate, how to build your oneness, and why human skills are now the hottest commodity on the market. If you want to future-proof your career,

• 3:25Hala Taha?

  make sure you follow this podcast if you haven't yet, because the future of work isn't coming, it's already here. Ryan, welcome to Young and Profiting Podcast.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  So excited to be with you. Thank you.

• 3:35Hala Taha?

  I am so honored to be speaking with you today, and I can't wait to talk all about careers and how AI is reshaping careers. So tell me, you are sitting on the data of a billion people right now with LinkedIn. If somebody is ignoring AI, what happens to their career in the next three years?

• 3:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, well, again, it's such a pleasure to be with you. Huge fan of the show, and you're right, by virtue of... You know, the activity that's happening all day long on LinkedIn, the companies that are posting jobs, the people who are applying for jobs, updating their profile. There's a tremendous amount of really unique data that we see flowing through the ecosystem. What skills are hot right now? I don't know what a company is hiring for. How is the labor market changing? And, you know, to your point, there's some real unique like signals right now that we're seeing. And it's not all doom and gloom, quite frankly. I mean, on one hand, I will say that, you know, the average job right now, which if you take a job as being a set of skills to do a job, you've got a job, a set of skills, my data, a set of skills. The average set of skills to do a job is changed by like 25% over the last few years.

• 4:39Speaker 01

  And we expect it's going to change by like 70% by 2030. So if you're not changing your job, it's changing on you. So there's like this change going on on one hand. On the other hand, we're actually seeing AI create a lot of net new jobs. I mean, there's a, you know, across the platform, we actually see 1.3 million new, you know, AI jobs being the platform that didn't exist even a year ago. So a lot of data center jobs, um, you know, data, AI, data annotator jobs, forward deployed engineers, all these roles that are actually being created because of AI. I think the most important point to where you started is like, hey, look, if you're not accepting the fact that like this labor market is changing, your role is changing, new roles being created, like there's a whole new economy being be being created around AI.

• 5:24Speaker 01

  Like you're missing out. It's, it's not okay to like stand the sidelines for this one. You have to get into the mix somehow.

• 5:30Hala Taha?

  Now, I know with AI, if you're missing the boat on learning right now, everything is changing so fast that you can end up really far behind. Can you help us understand why it's so important to actually start learning now? And why, you know, you'll miss the boat if you don't start now?

• 5:46Speaker 01

  I mean, I have to tell you, even it's like every day I feel like I wake up and you look at the headlines and there's something new that's happening. And if you just take, I mean, just go over the like last few months and, you know, you and I both spent a lot of time thinking through this, but you know, chat GPT was like super hot, you know, like six weeks ago, it was all that mattered. Then all of a sudden everyone's like, oh, wait, now it's like clock.

• 6:06Hala Taha?

  Yeah.

• 6:07Speaker 01

  That's all that matters. And everyone's like, you know, Learning and paying attention. Then it's like cloud cowork is like, you know, that's the thing. That's all that matters. And then all of a sudden it's like, oh, now it's this open claw thing and all you're just like, oh, my gosh. Like every day I wake up and it's like, there's some new thing in the world that's hot. And, you know, I mean, it's, you know, it's my job. It's part of your job to really be on top of these things in order to survive and thrive and, you know, kind of understand where the world is moving. Uh, I can only imagine what it's like for any professional in the world trying to like, keep up with it as well. Um, and it, it, you know, it's, it's, it's unique. It's a unique time. It's a different time. It's, you know, it's not status quo. But the point is you have to like, try and keep up with it and you have to pay attention and it's difficult and

• 6:49Speaker 01

  sometimes confusing, but in order to, you know, anything from run a company to, you know, start your career. These are things you have to know and pay attention to. Um, but yeah, my goodness. It's like the craziest thing I've seen in my entire career.

• 7:03Hala Taha?

  I've been really, you know, getting super interested in AI. And one of the things I'm noticing is like, you've got to spend a lot of time building it, right? Putting in the memories that I want it to have, getting skills and processes and like dumping my brain so that it becomes my second brain. So I think the other part of it too, is like spending the time to actually develop your AI. Because if somebody's been working in AI for two years and it's ingested all their emails and all their Slack messages and Fireflies and it's you've trained them on all your skills, that person's going to be so much more ahead than the person who just is starting to create their AI.

• 7:41Speaker 01

  Such a killer point. By the way, I mean, this idea, and I think so many people out there. Um, who are like, yeah, you know, I, I've used AI or I dabble in it and maybe it's not that great, or maybe it can't do what I'm trying to do. It's quite funny because you haven't put the time and effort to, you know, really set the context or train it. Or put in the time and effort to make it understand what you're actually trying to accomplish. I think you're spot. One of my like best hacks is actually, I'll just, you know, like open up Copilot on my phone and just, you know, talk to it. And like, I'll just talk for like 20 minutes, providing a ton of context. Like, here's what's going on in my day.

• 8:16Hala Taha?

  Yeah.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  Like, this, this. But it's all a means to an end. Like, the next question I have to ask to get, you know, an answer out of, it has all that context built into it. So continuously building that up, I think, is a really important thing.

• 8:28Hala Taha?

  Yeah. So, talk to us about how AI is so much different from other tech shifts that we've seen, from smartphones to electricity. You guys, you and Anish are co-author, you're calling it a work shock. Why is it so shocking?

• 8:41Speaker 01

  I think in my career, I've probably been through like three or four massive, you know, transformations in technology. Um, you know, like you said, from, um, you know, mobile, social, AI. And this one just feels like it's moving at a much faster pace. Um, there's also such uniqueness in the technology, which is, um, it's very, I kind of, it's almost like purposely built to be a little bit difficult to understand. Like, I don't care who you are, how smart you are, what you've studied. You know, these models operate in ways that, you know, none of us, you know, truly understand.

• 9:24Speaker 01

  And they're evolving in ways that aren't like technology of the past. There's just a lot of uncertainty in it. And it's moving faster than anything that we've ever seen. So, you know, you know, people don't like uncertainty in their lives. Companies don't like uncertainty when they're trying to navigate a company. Markets don't like uncertainty when they're trying to predict where the future is going to go. So it is this shock right now amongst this like really uncertain, you know, new technology, which, oh my goodness, feels so unique and so powerful. And when you really get to do what you want it to do, it's like, wow, this is a game changer. Um, but a lack of clarity on actually, you know, how it works. And then the fact that, like we said before, every day you wake up and it's like, oh, wow, something new exists out there that I didn't even think could be, uh, you know, existing in this world.

• 10:08Speaker 01

  So it's a, it's a crazy time.

• 10:10Hala Taha?

  I think we have no choice but to embrace it if we want to have successful careers, right? We've got to just learn about it, get experience with it. So, uh, from what I read in your book, you believe that the whole hierarchy of careers is about to shift. So, for example, knowledge work, a lot of it, a lot of our tasks can now be automated by AI. And pink collar and blue collar work is becoming more valuable. Can you tell us more about that?

• 10:36Speaker 01

  I mean, I think the general framing is, um, Again, everybody's job is a set of tasks. And I've been doing this thing recently where I'll tell someone, hey, just imagine that you're not allowed to use your job title anymore. Not that your job's gone, you're not getting fired, but you can't talk about yourself in this job title. But you have to go into work, you have to explain to someone what you do all day. And you have to sit down at your desk wherever you work and actually do the job. As a means to an end to understand what am I actually doing every day? And you realize a couple of things. Number one, I'm probably doing a lot more than my title actually suggested I'm doing, quite frankly.

• 11:17Speaker 01

  And number two, it gives you a framework to say, okay, here are the things that really matter inside of my day to day work. When you're able to understand that, and you know, maybe for a typical job, there's 10 to 20 tasks that matter. You can then start to take control and understand whether or not, you know, the large percentage of these tasks are the types of things that can be automated away. And Anish and I in the book talk about it in three buckets. Like bucket one, highly automatable tasks. Bucket two, the types of tasks that AI can really help you be more productive by using them. Bucket three, not super likely to be automated through AI. And when you take a look at your job, if your job is just a set of automated tasks, like you have to start thinking about finding a new job, quite frankly. Most jobs are not that.

• 12:00Speaker 01

  But that's the framework that we start with to understand kind of how this pulls together. Then looking at a set of jobs is just as tasks, you start to realize, wow, like these bucket two tasks, things that AI can really help you do, you know, uniquely better and automate. And maybe, you know, maybe I was historically a, you know, a product designer or a product manager and didn't really have a lot of great, you know, coding skills. But now all of a sudden I have this AI that gives me that superpower of all these coding skills. Then the actual market completely starts to change and flatten. So one of the things we try to do at LinkedIn is to be a little bit ahead of that curve. We used to hire for, you know, four or five roles separately inside of the software development process. You know, graphic designer, product manager, product marketer, front engineer, backend engineer.

• 12:47Speaker 01

  What we've learned is that we can equip people with a set of AI tools that can actually allow you to be really good in a lot of those tasks. So we've started a new role at LinkedIn. It's just called Builder. And we're doing it as an entry level role into the company. You know, Associate Product Builder. It's a combination of all those things that used to be these horizontal or kind of like vertical skills in the company into one role. In order to apply for that, I don't really care if you've gone to college, if you've studied anything, I want to see what you actually know how to build using these tools. The application process is like, show us what you've built using AI.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  And it's a way to really start to evolve what roles look like, giving people a lot more ability and autonomy to, you know, take agency in their role in their career, but also to really play ahead because now you can move, as a company, we move a lot faster when instead of having to like go through five different steps to get something done, someone has that ability to move much quicker as like, you know, one person with all these tools. For a product like LinkedIn, there is no shortage of features that customers want us to be building. And so by empowering people to do much more, it's like, oh my gosh, all of a sudden we can start to build many more things, get things done quicker, respond to a customer request much quicker. So it's really exciting, but it requires to rethink the entire way that like jobs exist in the company.

• 14:10Hala Taha?

  Yeah, I imagine that hiring is going to be so much different because what you're going to concentrate on are the skills that AI actually can automate, the bucket three that you were talking about. So you actually have these five Cs, five capabilities in your book, which are all the things that AI can't automate and the types of human skills that we should really be concentrating on. Can you break that down for us?

• 14:33Speaker 01

  So the thesis there is, you know,

• 14:37Speaker 01

  If a lot of people have an AI tool that they have access to, they can do a lot of what we've historically maybe called hard skills. Create an Excel spreadsheet, or some sort of coding, or et cetera. Then that becomes a little bit more democratized. And what becomes more valuable and important are the actual unique human skills on top of it. We've historically talked about that as soft skills. And when we call them soft skills, it kind of feels like, oh, they're not that important. Or, you know, no one needs to pay attention to them. Ironically, now they're probably the most important, in my view. And, you know, it's those uniquely human things, like an ability to sit here and have a conversation with another human being. Like just communication, compassion, creativity, courage.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  These things where to go above and beyond, to stand out, to really be effective in your job. Not only do you need to know how to use AI or the tools, but you have to be able to like get things done, communicate with people, you know, galvanize people to actually go and do something. Collaborate when things aren't easy or people aren't getting along. There are these things that I think are really going to make people stand out the more we can focus on them. And it's funny because I just think so much that everyone's talking about the AI tools and the AI skills. But those are going to become much more commoditized, democratized. So trying to figure out how to be great at these human skills, I think is going to be the key.

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• 19:11Hala Taha?

  That's H-E-Y-G-E-N.com/PROFITING. Heygen.com/profitting. I'm wondering how you imagine companies will level up their employees in these skills and also like hire for these specific skills?

• 19:29Speaker 01

  I think there's a huge market right now, by the way, you know, for anyone listening, if you're thinking about starting something like the, the education system, which, you know, to a large extent, has been built for a different era and is probably past its prime, has never really valued this ability to be teaching these, you know, softer skills. And if those are going to become the hot commodity, I think that as a society, it's going to be incumbent upon us to figure out how to ensure people have these skills. And it's not a lot of focus for people right now. I think you get them by practicing them like you would anything else. And there is some types of skills unfortunately you usually can't do alone. Like, you can't learn to be a great communicator, like, by yourself. You have to sit down and talk to someone, and be able to look them in the eye, and

• 20:14Speaker 01

  like, have a great conversation. I think that, you know, one, it's a mindset shift at a society level and at a company level to figure out how to like, really focus on this. And then, you know, I think upon that, we'll start to see these ways where, you know, hiring against those skills will be much more, you know, commonplace in terms of how it works. My favorite question right now, for what it's worth, anytime I hire somebody for, for LinkedIn, I have two favorite questions. Like, number one, if, if a friend or colleague of yours had never heard of LinkedIn before and asked you what it was and what it's for, what would you say? And sometimes you get like, really, really smart people, who have all these amazing, like, you know, technical skills, who are like, oh, I'd say it's like Facebook but for professionals.

• 20:58Speaker 01

  It's like, okay, that's one way to say it. But, you know, then you get people who are like, oh, well, you know, it's a great place, you know, to create economic opportunity and, you know, build your brand. And it's like, okay, wow, like, someone that can actually like, craft a story and communicate, shows me an ability to leverage and use some of these softer skills, EQ, communication, etc. And the second question I love to ask people that are interviewing, now everyone's gonna know these questions, by the way, but it's okay. Tell me about something that you created in the world that never existed. You know, maybe a school club, like, I mean, and like, I mean, not, not a company or an app, but like, anything that you built. And I'll usually get one of two answers. One is the like, oh, what do you mean?

• 21:43Speaker 01

  Like, what do you mean created that didn't exist? And I think that that's a, you know, that shows a lack of creativity or courage, or the thinking that, oh, the world just exists and I become part of it, versus I can actually have agency to create something. Or a lot of people who are like, oh, my gosh, let me tell you the list of like the thirty things I've created, you know, I started this club at school and then I did this other thing when I was in college and it's like, here's the app that I created to help my like parents do their thing. And it's like, okay, like, that's the mentality that you're looking for. So you can kind of suss out some of these, you know, more human skills in the process, but I think it's going to become much more commonplace moving forward.

• 22:18Hala Taha?

  Yeah. By the way, I love those questions. I'm definitely stealing them. I know LinkedIn has a coaching program and I know for middle managers, especially their role is going to shift a lot from, you know, just doing meetings and managing the team to actually coaching the team. Can you talk to us about that?

• 22:35Speaker 01

  So the first thing we try, and we've been trying, you know, for a couple of years now, and it's like really successful is, and people thought we were crazy when we did it, is we, we said every employee has access to a career coach and not an AI career coach, like a real human being career coach with the idea that, you know, going through a process like this, our company can only be successful if people are able to adapt to the transformation. In order to adapt, you need someone to help you figure this out. You need a coach, a mentor, someone you can go to with questions. It's not your manager to help you figure out like, am I doing this right? Wait a second, where are my skills lacking? Am I communicating correctly, et cetera, et cetera? It's been wildly successful. I think it's a really important thing that most companies, you know, should try and adapt as well. But I guess your second point, which is that this is all adapting and, you

• 23:19Speaker 01

  know, if your manager is just someone who thinks that their job all day long is to ensure you're doing your tasks, that job is going to become a lot less necessary moving forward. What's going to need to be there and be replaced is, you know, similarly, someone that can coach you to do your job better, that can coach you to handle conflict, that can coach you to ensure that the system is set up correctly and know how to make hard trade off decisions. You'll be able to do many more things with these tools than you ever thought was possible. And that's a good thing on one hand and a bad thing on the other hand, because all of a sudden, if you think about, you know, you're building a product and you have 10 people that can now do, you know, all these, you know, amazing things left and right that they didn't think were possible, at the end of the, there's going to become conflict at a certain point really quickly. So, you know, that manager's

• 24:04Speaker 01

  job now becomes ensuring how to get those people to work together correctly, ensure they're, you know, they understand the lanes that they're swimming in and then handle conflict, which is Inevitably going to become much more commonplace when people have much more agency to be building things. So, you know, people have to really understand that to succeed over the next, you know, couple of years, you can't be operating the way you operated historically in your career. And I think that goes for middle managers as well as, quite frankly, almost every role that exists.

• 24:34Hala Taha?

  As you know, my show is targeted towards entrepreneurs. And one of the things that I've been teaching them for a long time is the importance of skill stacking. And how, as an entrepreneur, your stack of skills really is your superpower. So me, for example, it's like I started my career in radio, then I went into marketing and I hacked Twitter and I had a blog with a hundred girls and like knew how to galvanize and recruit and lead. And I turned like all those skills to become a top 100 podcaster and grow a network and all those things, right? And you've got a similar concept in your book called onliness. And I thought that was really interesting. And it's interesting how that's not only important for entrepreneurs now, it's important for everybody to be more employable. So talk

• 25:18Hala Taha?

  to us about this concept of onliness and how somebody can ensure that they've got a unique set of skills that's going to make them employable.

• 25:26Speaker 01

  Let me ask, I'm gonna flip it back on you. So, I mean, millions of people would probably love to have built what you have built, or to have the success that you have had. Why do you think that you have been able to do it?

• 25:43Hala Taha?

  I honestly think it's those five Cs that you are talking about. I think I have really great communication. I have really great curiosity and courage and just do stuff without really thinking about it too much. I just, I just do.

• 25:57Speaker 01

  And so that's the point. That is what is unique to you. And I imagine that, you know, having known you for like a few days now, there's a couple of other like really important things there as well that you are uniquely good at. But it's that understanding. Like, again, in a sea of where You know, skills become more commoditized. Like, what makes you stand out? If everyone at the push of a button can create a website, or, you know, create a mobile app, or, you know, do a lot of these things, like, what's gonna make yours be unique and stand out? What's gonna allow you to go and, you know, win the next customer? So, understanding that about yourself is the place to start. Like, what am I good at? And how can I use that to my advantage?

• 26:42Speaker 01

  My guess is, um, most entrepreneurs actually

• 26:48Speaker 01

  understand that deeply. In order to survive, you have to know what makes you unique. I think most people who are not entrepreneurs don't think like that often. And I think the world, you know, of the labor market's gonna be shifting a lot. You're going to have to be thinking more entrepreneurially about your career, no matter who you are. And so, you know, finding inside of yourself what makes you unique and really honing that, uh, evangelizing it, um, is gonna be the, the key to success. And, um, you know, that's why you, you, you can't just be like the same as everyone. You can't just be, you know, you know, the, the, the same as everyone trying to apply the job for the job and think you're gonna get it. You have to find a way to stand out right now.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  And the people that do that are gonna be the ones that succeed.

• 27:37Hala Taha?

  So, I, I read a story about you that you had a manager once that told you that you would never succeed without him. And Barbara Corcoran, who I think went on your podcast, told you something very similar. So, talk to us about your onliness and also the experiences that you've had that you think gave you the drive to become the CEO of one of the biggest companies in the world?

• 27:58Speaker 01

  I think what drives me are probably, uh, a few fundamental, uh, things. Some are unique and some are, you know, pretty commonplace, frankly. Like, number one, What matters most to me is that I'm working on something that has a positive impact on the world. Many people are out there building awesome technology companies, you know, awesome social networks. But the core of LinkedIn is that we build LinkedIn as a platform to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. And every single one of those words is chosen very intentionally. When we build good products at LinkedIn, people get jobs, they, you know, create, you know, connections with people that they, you know, maybe never knew.

• 28:42Speaker 01

  They start companies, they learn new skills. We're not a, you know, non-for-profit company, so like, there's also a business model tied to all of that. But we build it in a way that, you know, when we do, you know, well as a company, you know, people hopefully, you know, great, get good outcomes from it. You know, I always talk about, you know, I try and find opportunities that are where we sit at the intersection of doing good and doing well. And every single company in the world, you know, tries to do well in business. But when you talk about doing good, it's often an afterthought. It's, you know, it's the last line of the PowerPoint presentation, or it's the creation of a, you know, .org website on the side. But when you can seamlessly combine doing good and doing well in what you're building, I think there's real competitive advantage.

• 29:27Speaker 01

  And that like really resonates and matters to me. Number two, at least, you know, I think a couple of, you know, human skills that are really important for me are communication and storytelling. The amazing, you know, you know, large employee base at LinkedIn. Not only do we run this kind of social network at the core, we run five businesses that intersect through it. Being able to talk about LinkedIn as one holistic thing, instead of a bunch of five side load things. How people understand how they connect to the mission, how their work connects to the mission, how everyone is moving forward together. Helps to create LinkedIn as one consistent coherent thing, instead of like a, you know, just a massive mess where everyone's tripping over each other and can't get anything done.

• 30:07Speaker 01

  And I think fundamentally, that's a storytelling challenge, it's a communication challenge, which is, you know, how do you, you know, set the right frameworks? But also inspire someone to be like, hey, you know, you are this part of this thing that ladders up to helping people find a job. And wow, you know, you know, get up every morning and excited to do that one thing, you know, that makes you part of this bigger system. But we're all moving together as one. So again, I think for me, like, you know, you know, very vision driven. And then communication storytelling have probably been the most important skills that I've had to work on.

• 30:38Hala Taha?

  I want to touch on something that you were just alluding to, which is that AI is really leveling the playing field. And one of the things that you talk about in your book is how you're a really big proponent of hiring for skills and not necessarily titles. So help us understand how the future is shaping in terms of how people will actually get hired based on their skills, not necessarily their titles, and what LinkedIn is doing to help support that.

• 31:06Speaker 01

  The largest product that we sell commercially at LinkedIn is a product called LinkedIn Recruiter. It's used by millions of recruiters all day long to search the LinkedIn database to find candidates to come join their company. If you go back maybe like three or four years, the way that almost every recruiter would start their search is they would filter down by one of two things. Number one, where did this person go to school? Or number two, where did this person used to work? So basically, it's like, oh, you know, she went to Princeton, she must be good. Or someone that used to work at Google is probably smart. And when you filter down the LinkedIn member base by those two categories, you quickly go from a billion people down to a very tiny group of people. Then it's a very tiny group of people

• 31:51Speaker 01

  that everyone is trying to go and recruit. And that's not good for anyone. It's not good for these same people that are getting, you know, all the job requests. It's not good for all the members that, you know, are super qualified but are never getting reached out to. And these companies actually aren't hiring anyone because they're going after a tiny pool and competing after the same talent. So it's not a very efficient nor equitable, you know, use of the labor market on LinkedIn. Recently, we've switched it to in the recruiter tool, the first thing we ask you to do is to actually sort or search by the skills necessary to do the job. And that's it, not where did someone go to school, etc. When you do that, all of a sudden, you learn two things. Number one, there's a vast labor pool of talent

• 32:35Speaker 01

  that actually exists on LinkedIn. Not everyone is going after those people. And oftentimes, those people are the most valuable people that you never knew existed. So it's a much better, more efficient, more equitable way for the labor market to be running. The problem is, like, we can build those tools all day long, but human nature always goes back to, oh, well, that's cool, but like, where did she go to school? You know, or where did he used to work? So it's as much of a mindset shift as it is a tool shift. But I think we're making a lot of good progress on it. And ultimately, you know, being able to get hired for what you're good at, not who you know, where you went to school. I think it's going to be a really important thing for the labor market moving forward.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  And it's not just like the skills you put on your LinkedIn profile, but it's also the knowledge that you share on LinkedIn, the things that you share in the feed, the insights that you share. I can't tell you the number of times people get new jobs, you know, you know, part-time gigs, speaking gigs, or get invited to like, you know, come to a conference because of something they have shared on LinkedIn. And so, you know, your reputation, your profile is more than, you know, the things you type in statically on LinkedIn. It's actually the active conversations that you're continuously having as well. It's showing your work, it's showing what you've done. I think even now with AI, you see these people who like frequently are like, oh, like, look at this like cool app I did with AI. Or wow, like, taught Copilot to do this crazy thing. Or today I use like Claude Co-Work and have like done this thing.

• 34:04Speaker 01

  And you're like, okay, like, why are you sharing that? But these are the people that are actually, you know, getting reached out to for jobs because they're showcasing their ability to be, you know, innovative in using these AI tools. I think it's really, really smart.

• 34:15Hala Taha?

  Yeah, I think that's something in your book you're calling signaling, right? Can you talk us through the three levers that can help you get noticed?

• 34:23Speaker 01

  I think, you know, first and foremost, you have to ensure that you actually, you know, is weird or, you know, crazy as it sounds. Like, you have to establish your identity like online and put time and effort into it. You can't just like throw a profile up there, never think about it, and expect great things to happen. So that's number one. You have to invest in time and effort in your personal brand. Number two, I think that building a network around that is really important. I think networking has a bad rap. Sometimes it feels like, you know, like it's an old school way of doing things, or I don't want to have to go and like focus on this. But the way that, you know, people find opportunities, get things done is often through

• 35:05Speaker 01

  people. It's through who, you know, who can I reach out to to get help or who can I reach out to when they need help? I mean, one of the greatest things we see on LinkedIn is someone will ask a question. Sometimes it's really vulnerable to ask a question on LinkedIn, but like, then you'll see this community pile on with ways to help them. And I think that's really unique. And then last, you know, the evolution of of kind of like showcasing who you are and your identity isn't just this like static resume anymore. It has to be through unique knowledge and insights that you're sharing in the platform. Oh, my goodness, you don't have to be some crazy like LinkedIn thought leader or amazing, you know, creator like you. You can just be someone who's like, oh, like, you know, I saw a post in my feed and like someone had a question and I answered in the comment

• 35:49Speaker 01

  and like I, you know, I'm trying to help them out. Like just participating in the community is one of the most important ways to get yourself out there and, you know, kind of signal the market that, you know, not only who you are, but what you know how to do. So, you know, these are things that quite frankly, someone like you, or maybe the people listening to this podcast, like know inherently, but you know, hundreds of millions of people don't, you know, understand these things and how important it is to be intentional about, you know, yourself and your career. So I think those are really important things to work on.

• 36:20Hala Taha?

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• 37:04Hala Taha?

  Friday, go to Shopify.com/profitting to start your free trial. That's Shopify.com/profitting. Go to Shopify.com/profitting today to hear your first

• 37:16Hala Taha?

  What's up Yap fam? If you're building a personal brand, you already know how hard it is to stay consistent with content when you're also trying to actually run your business. I love creating content, but realistically, I'm not trying to sit in front of the camera every single day. I need time to work on my business. But the problem is consistency matters. The more people see your face and hear your voice, the more familiar you become. That's why HeyGen has been such a great tool for me. You can record just 15 seconds of footage, create an AI avatar of yourself, and use it to make videos on demand. So instead of constantly filming from scratch, you can create more content, stay visible, and keep showing up without making your entire life be about generating content. And you guys know I'm always looking for tools

• 38:01Hala Taha?

  that give entrepreneurs more leverage. HeyGen is definitely one of those tools. Thirty million people already use it, from solo founders to 85% of the Fortune 100. Your first three videos are free at heygen.com/profitting. That's H-E-Y-G-E-N dot com slash P-R-O-F-I-T-I-N-G. Heygen.com/profitting.

• 38:29Hala Taha?

  What's up Yap gang? I recently had Gary Vee on the podcast, and he told me something that really stuck with me. If you've got sales DNA, you've got to be paying attention to live selling because it's one of the biggest opportunities right now online. And that really got me curious, so I checked out an app that he told me about called Whatnot. I jumped into a live show and I instantly got it. The seller was showing products in real time, answering questions in the chat, and building a real relationship with the buyers. It didn't feel like boring shopping. It felt like a community. Whatnot is the largest live shopping marketplace in the country. And for entrepreneurs, the results are really hard to ignore. Sellers on Whatnot can sell up to 10 times more than traditional marketplaces. And the number of sellers making over a million dollars a year on the platform has doubled. So if you've got products to sell

• 39:14Hala Taha?

  and you're looking for a new way to reach customers, search Whatnot, W-H-A-T-N-O-T, in the App Store. Download it and you can start selling right away. That's Whatnot in the App Store. I have to ask this question because... I am a teacher of LinkedIn. I'm one of the biggest creators on LinkedIn. And one of the things that I've been noticing is that there's a huge shift in video. For a long time, we've heard that LinkedIn is focusing on video, but the impressions didn't show that. Now, suddenly, my videos are getting a lot more impressions. And then also, I am a part of this new monetization program, which is really exciting, where brands can basically find my profile and ask me to do sponsorships with them, which I love. So talk to us about your features, what you guys are focused on,

• 40:00Hala Taha?

  what you're pushing, and then also how creators and people on LinkedIn in general are going to make more money on the platform. Like, what are the ways, like, how are you thinking about it?

• 40:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'll say, you know, we are a little bit unique in our approach. And that uniqueness may sometimes cause us to be a little bit later to the party than some of the other networks, you know, if I'm being super transparent. You think about LinkedIn as a platform where people find opportunity and make money. You know, like I said, every minute on the platform, you know, 50 people in the world will start a new job because of LinkedIn. It is the, you know, largest labor market in the world. It is where, you know, nearly every company trying to hire someone is actively doing it. And, you know, on the flip side, everyone getting a job is getting the platform. So people all day long are getting jobs through LinkedIn.

• 40:56Speaker 01

  Historically, we focused on, again, the efficiency of that labor market. And it's typically for, you know, a lot of, you know, you know, knowledge and more and more like, you know, frontline roles, but not, you know, unique, you know, like, platform-based roles like creators. You look at the data, and right now, there are 4 million people whose full-time job on LinkedIn is creator. I mean, they're not making their living on LinkedIn. They're making a living somewhere in the world or trying to as a creator. And, you know, I think we've really kind of woken up to be like, oh, okay. Like, you know, we need to ensure this audience can be successful and create an opportunity on LinkedIn as well. And so

• 41:37Speaker 01

  You know, we, you know, we, we, you know, we're trying and like really kind of investing in the tools that can help people, you know, showcase themselves, you know, not through what is historically on a professional platform been, you know, like long form text, like that's what people like, you know, it's like, oh, it's like now it's like short form video or any kind of video. And when we, we put video on LinkedIn, we get like two reactions, you know, and number one, you know, these, you know, folks that have maybe, you know, are a lot further along in their career or, you know, senior executives, companies are like, oh, wait a second, like, you know, LinkedIn's not a place for video. That's where you go to these other platforms, like no video on LinkedIn, Ryan, please. And then like the younger generation is like, thank you. Finally, like, my goodness, like I can like showcase who I am now that you actually have video. And so we kind of see this.

• 42:20Speaker 01

  It's just like the world of work, like, you know, different generations working together are kind of like manifesting themselves on this platform. I think more and more video was like, you know, to your point, starting to catch on. Great. Now if someone like you is going to be investing your time and effort in sharing your amazing, you know, knowledge and insight with the community to help them be more productive. You know, we now have to invest in the platforms and the, the policies and the programs to help you be more successful on LinkedIn. You know, when you do something, it's like we hear these advertisers who are like, oh my gosh, like, how do I meet this person? How do I work with this person? And it's like, okay, well, you know, we're the largest like B to B like advertising platform on the internet as well. How do we help connect these people? So that you can actually, you know, make a living off it as well. So we're investing more in actually, you know,

• 43:04Speaker 01

  creation of opportunity on the platform, which, you know, creation of opportunity has always been the purpose of LinkedIn. On the platform is a new thing. Receiving creators, we also see it quite frankly, in a, in a role that is just exploding right now on LinkedIn, which is around, you know, data annotation or, you know, human AI evaluation. And the way that a lot of these AI models work is the following, like if you're, if you're an engineer working on one of these large language models, like here's your day, you maybe pick a topic like, I don't know, you know, Cardiovascular health, okay? And, you know, your job is to make sure the model is really good at cardiovascular health. So you maybe write 100 prompts, you feed it to the model, you get responses back.

• 43:48Speaker 01

  But you need to know whether or not the model is giving really good responses about cardiovascular health. So the next thing you have to do is go and try and find someone who's an expert in that to kind of look at this and be like, oh yeah, that's right, that's wrong. And, you know, that's been a market that's been moving now for a couple of years and really kind of, you know, growing. And now we have that on LinkedIn, which is that, oh, now a cardiovascular surgeon on LinkedIn can, you know, make money on the side by looking at, you know, some of these prompts in the model output, grade them, get it back to that engineer at one of the model companies who can then use that to retrain the model.

• 44:21Hala Taha?

  Oh, cool.

• 44:22Speaker 01

  And, you know, a lot of what, you know, people may not be totally aware of is the reason that a lot of these models are so amazing, what they do is because at the end of the day, there's a lot of human judgment and evaluation happening underneath them. So there's a real marketplace for that as well, which is now starting to grow on LinkedIn. Again, to your point of like, how do we create more opportunity on the platform itself?

• 44:39Hala Taha?

  Yeah, so cool. And I'm just so excited for all the things that LinkedIn is doing. I've been such a fan of the platform for like 10 years now.

• 44:46Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 44:47Hala Taha?

  So I love it. Your book is called Open to Work. Now, Open to Work on LinkedIn, sometimes has a negative connotation, like you're desperate for a job and you've got this like little green badge and everybody knows that you're not employed. Talk to us about the mindset shift of what it means to actually be open to work.

• 45:07Speaker 01

  First off, we create, you know, Open to Work is a little green circle that exists on your LinkedIn profile that you can turn on if you want to signal to the community that you're open for work. We started it during COVID when, you know, the market was just, you know, really uncertain and going crazy and, you know, really reshuffling all over the place. What most people turned it on for wasn't just to signal they're open for a job, but to, you know, start a conversation with the community of other people who are maybe in a similar position. And again, like what's so important to LinkedIn or the job searching process is You're not in it alone. You know, there's a network of people around you that can help you out. Or when someone turns on that green banner and it's like, oh, my gosh, I actually know this person. I didn't know they were looking, but they'd be really good for this job over here. How can I help connect them to it?

• 45:52Speaker 01

  It's a really strong signal to the to the community. Just to like, set the record straight, like if you have that, you know, green banner on, you are 27% more likely to get hired. So it's a very, very valuable signal to the market. What I think is more important than anything at this moment in time is like the green circle alone. This idea that I need to be putting myself out there, thinking differently, leveraging my network, leveraging the community, adapting, learning new skills, is all that matters for the future of work and being able to navigate the transition that we're all going to go through, no matter what your job is in the world of AI. So open to work more than anything is a mindset shift on my careers in my own hands.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  I have to put it in my own hands and I have to adapt for the moment around us right now.

• 46:40Hala Taha?

  And I know that when it comes to the way that our careers are gonna change, a lot more people will be entrepreneurs, we're gonna be holding more jobs than we ever had before. And there's no such thing as a five-year career plan. Everything is just really experimenting and kind of going where you see the opportunity going.

• 46:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, I mean, for sure. I don't know if I want to talk about that. I learned, you know, kind of last night about, you know, you were no stranger to like having multiple jobs at once. And I mean, I think that's a lot of the way the market is going right now. And it's not about, you know, it's not about having multiple jobs, multiple job sticks, but like the experiences that you get when, you know, like you can't get experience fast enough right now and learning new things. So, you know, it's not about having a five-year plan. And I think that that's outdated career advice. But the best career advice right now is like, hey, over the next three months, what are the experiences that I want to try and learn and get to help, you know, kind of put those into my repertoire, my profile, so that I can go and do new and unique things?

• 47:42Hala Taha?

  Well, Ryan, it was such a pleasure to have you on the podcast. Your new book, Open to Work, I read it. It is absolutely amazing. If anybody is interested on how to level up their career in the age of AI, I highly recommend the book. So Ryan, thanks again for being on the podcast.

• 47:56Speaker 01

  Thank you all. I appreciate it.

• 47:58Hala Taha?

  Yeah fam, I'm so grateful that Ryan pulled back the curtain on where work is actually heading and gave us a real framework to navigate it. The bottom line from today is this: your job or career isn't under threat, so stop thinking about it that way. Your job is really under transformation. And the professionals who understand that shift will be the ones who stay in control and stay writing their own rules. Here's what I want you to walk away with. First, stop thinking about your job as a title and start seeing it as a collection of tasks. Sit down this week and list your top 10 to 20 tasks and weekly responsibilities, and start sorting them honestly into three buckets. The first: automatable. The second: AI-assisted, the tasks that you can do with AI.

• 48:40Hala Taha?

  And the third: the ones that are uniquely human, only you can do. That one exercise will give you more career clarity than any five-year plan ever could. Second, if you're dabbling in AI, that all needs to change. That is not enough. ChatGPT is not enough. Depth is the advantage. Spend 20 minutes every single day for the next several months, giving one AI tool real, detailed context about your actual work problems. Start uploading your documents, start creating skills, start feeding AI your world so it becomes your second brain. The people who invest in building out their AI now are going to be the ones operating on a completely different level.

• 49:23Hala Taha?

  I've started doing this and it's totally leveled up my game. I feel like I'm as productive as 10 people now. Thirdly, this is the one that's personal to me because it's how I build everything I have, is you've got to double down on your human skills. Now is the time to start investing in your communication, your creativity, your courage. Where are you weakest when it comes to your human skills? Start working on that right now. These are not soft extras anymore. These are your core product. This week, I want you to focus on your communication. We talked about how that's the number one job skill in demand right now. So I want you to initiate a real conversation, give somebody feedback, resolve tension, pitch an idea, practice communication like it's a skill because it literally is. The future belongs to people who know what

• 50:07Hala Taha?

  Makes them irreplaceable and then go all in. That is your work yap bam. And if today's episode opened your eyes, share it with somebody whose career you care about. Drop us a five star review on Apple, Spotify, Castbox, wherever you listen to the show. It genuinely helps us reach more listeners. You can also watch the full conversation on YouTube and Spotify video. And you can connect with me on Instagram at yapwithhala or LinkedIn by searching my name. It's Hala Taha. And a massive shout out to the entire Yap team. It's been an incredible year. We got nominated for seven different awards this year. We got best performing podcast at the Indie Podcast Awards. We got a huge nomination for best business and finance podcast at the iHeart Podcast Awards. We got a bunch of NYC awards nominations and wins.

• 50:52Hala Taha?

  I got a Webby Award honorary. I didn't quite get a nomination for a best business creator and so many great awards. So shout out to the team for all your hard work. Couldn't have done this without you. This is your host, Hala Taha, AKA The Podcast Princess, signing off.