Workhuman Live: Focus on What Matters at Work
Hello, humans!
Each year, we gather the industry’s best and brightest at the premier destination for radical ideas and divergent thinking. Over the years, Workhuman LiveOpens in a new tab has evolved beyond an HR conference – it’s become a movement for making work smarter, more connected, and more human. And it’s for you: the HR champions, the bold leaders, the changemakers, the visionaries of the future.
This year is no exception. Except there’s one exception: The world of work as we know it has forever changed.
It wasn’t just the pandemic that changed the world of work – it was the uncertainty that ensued.
For all the disruption to business, it’s been our people who have been hit hardest, and we’ve felt the downstream impact reverberating across organizations. The headlines speak for themselves: “12 Signs Your Employees Are Disengaged” and “Americans Are Working Fewer Hours Than Before COVID.” It’s enough for HR leaders to ask ourselves: Where do we go from there?
We focus on what matters really matters at work and why we work: purpose, connection, and growth.
Over the past year, Workhuman has kept a sharp focus on improving, advancing, differentiating, and innovating – productizing our use of key technologies like AI to serve the human needs of the people using them. Technology can feel antithetical to “human” but we’re proof technology doesn’t have to divide and separate us if it can be used to bring out the best in people and build human connection. After all, that is Workhuman’s core philosophy: We exist to prove that human connection is the most powerful force on earth.
And so, it’s only fitting that our theme for Workhuman Live 2025 is “focus.” Focus on what’s creating value. Focus on what drives your people. Focus on the future.
Let’s explore a few of the highlights I shared during my opening remarks:
The World of Work Is Changing – Because It Needs To
With employee disengagement remaining at record highsOpens in a new tab – and with trends like quiet quitting and The Great Resignation in our not-so-distant past – the key question on the minds of us all is: How can we assemble and energize our workforce?
HR leaders must find proactive ways to drive long-term growth and innovation while maintaining short-term business agility and responsiveness – addressing employee concerns, maintaining morale, and retaining key talent during times of economic change and uncertainty.
Tall order? You bet.
Now consider this: Nearly half (44%) of HR leaders in a 2023 Gartner studyOpens in a new tab reported “driving better business outcomes” as their number one strategic priority for HR technology transformation over the next three years.
More and more, HR leaders are being pressured to use their investment dollars strategically and to showcase how their investments have made a true impact on company culture. The scope of their work continues to increase – from a focus on retention to improving inclusivity while also increasing growth and development of talent skills.
It’s a perfect storm of complexity.
So, what’s the solution?
The answer is simpler than you may think: Give people a software platform where they can lift one another up. At Workhuman, we know how to do this better than anyone. We built a business around it:
Design employee recognition to capture and amplify human connections, to celebrate growth and achievement. We design with the end – you – in mind: the successes you need to measure, and the needs of the humans who work for you.
We can move HR to a new way of working that constantly ties the work being done back to the purpose and values of the organization – and connects the humans doing the work to one another. In a time of chaos and obscurity, this is a tool of alignment and visibility – at the speed we live in, on a global scale.
But don’t just take our word for it.
Food and beverage leader PepsiCo, which has a company mission to “create more smiles with every sip and bite,” partnered with Workhuman to build and scale a global recognition program that would ensure each employee felt motivated and inspired by the work they do. With more than 300,000 employees worldwide working to bring over 500 iconic brands, like Doritos, Quaker, Lay’s, and Gatorade, to consumers in more than 200 countries and territories, PepsiCo needed a global, scalable recognition solution that would benefit all employees – whether they were working from a laptop or at a manufacturing facility.
“In the first three years of the program, we’ve had over 3 million recognition moments that have been captured within the Workhuman software platform,” says Ken Wagner, senior director of global HR programs at PepsiCo. The initiative has significantly improved both employee engagement and connection, demonstrating the power of gratitude at PepsiCo.
But it’s not recognition alone that builds human connection – it’s technology that enhances what you already have, from the inside.
How? Let’s dive in:
AI Isn’t the Future of Work – It’s the Present
When people hear “AI,” most conjure up some sort of Stanley Kubrick-ian nightmare.
The fear is real – just ask Google:
There are a whole host of considerationsOpens in a new tab for this year’s most buzzed-about technology: AI’s high cost, the need for specialized talent, and legal and privacy risks chief among them. Couple those concerns with the already fraught dynamic between employees and employers, as evidenced by the continued disengagement that pervades the workplace.
The fear is that AI will be an accelerant poured on top of all of this. Many jobs will be impacted by AI – we won’t sugarcoat it. Elon Musk is predicting the need for a “Universal Basic Income” as jobs are phased out and employment becomes obsolete. Even Bernie Sanders says we should switch to a 32-hour work week because of AI.
But what if there was a better way to think about AI? What if we, as HR leaders, focused on what AI can do for us instead of what it will take away from us?
The key is to think of AI as a “time machine,” not one that moves us through time, but one that creates it.
It’s a way for us to unburden ourselves from the monotonous work that eats up our time, allowing us to focus on what we as humans do so well: Build connections. Learn and grow. Find meaning, joy, and purpose in life, both in and outside of work.
Today, at Workhuman Live, we’re excited to unveil new AI-powered innovations – industry-first features and capabilities that will make your recognition programs smarter, faster, and more impactful.
Let’s have a look:
Workhuman iQ and the AI Assistant
“We have a lot of data – but we don’t know what it means.”
Ever felt this way?
Data, in and of itself, offers very little insight into people dynamics, cultural health, and employee performance and skills – it’s something akin to a needle in a haystack. Of course, you can run reports, analyze the data, and spend considerable time and energy generating actionable insights manually.
But, in an AI world, is there an easier way? How can you train generative AI to pull answers from the data directly, without the need for a team of analysts and engineers?
That’s where Workhuman iQ and the AI Assistant come into play. Grounded in Workhuman’s unique set of human data, Workhuman iQ and the AI Assistant function as your “sidekick,” proactively coaching you to monitor and improve the effectiveness of your recognition program and giving you full access to unique, previously hidden workplace insights.
In truth, we’ve been developing AI technologies for years on projects like Inclusion Advisor, which uses natural language processing to prevent moments of unintentional bias in recognition messages. And we have our own in-house experimentation lab and Workhuman IQOpens in a new tab, the industry’s most comprehensive AI-powered social analytics solution that provides an in-depth view into the employee experience.
But the introduction of the AI Assistant takes this one step further, arming your team with AI-powered talent and strategy insights in mere seconds.
Let’s look at an example of how it works – and how it can serve you:
Say you have a new team member named Alice, and you want to find her a mentor for public speaking and presentations.
The AI Assistant comes back with three names. You would have known the first two names: Joyce Jones and Esther Howard are power players. It seems obvious that people in consulting and account strategy who present all the time would be a natural fit for mentorship.
But the third name, Jenny Wilson – she’s unexpected.
You hadn’t thought of someone in product management. But she’s been recognized for internal stakeholder meetings, analyst presentations, customer presentation prep, and being the one who helps your frontline people get their presentations ready.
It’s incredible to think that AI could “meet this need,” reproducing your knowledge and decision making well enough to suggest the third name. Just incredible! The AI Assistant knew more than you – or even the collective insight of your organization – because it had been trained to interpret the data.
From there, you could go on to ask the AI Assistant what would be a good first meeting between Alice and Jenny, some sample meeting topics based on what Jenny has been recognized for, and so on.
The point is that this type of AI technology gets you out of the administrative fray and allows you to see further into the reaches of human capability than ever before. AI Assistant can help uncover hidden talent, reveal skills gaps, and take bias out of the decision-making process – and it can do it almost instantly.
It’s not about the future of work – this is the now.
Workhuman Integrations
The now of work isn’t just about leveraging AI technology to build more human-centric workplaces. It’s also about building human connection with work happening in many different places: remote, hybrid, and on-site.
Enter Workhuman integrations.
By injecting the power of recognition, Conversations, and Community Celebrations into commonly used enterprise productivity tools, we’re able to build cultures of connection and recognition wherever and however people are working. Our integrations enable Workhuman to be wherever users are, including critical workplace applications like Microsoft Teams, Outlook, Slack, Workday, and more, allowing real-time recognition to fit seamlessly into any workflow.
Now, we’re taking integrations a bit further, beginning with new capabilities in Microsoft Teams and extending into a full proliferation throughout the Microsoft 365 universe. To that end, we recently launched the Workhuman app for Microsoft Teams – a game-changer for elevating productivity, igniting connection and community, and creating a ripple effect of positivity and gratitude in the workplace.
The way it works is simple: Instead of switching from Teams to your recognition software platform, you can seamlessly navigate to the recognition icon within Teams, craft your recognition message, and hit “send.” The added bonus is that your team members receive the recognition award in the moment, making your genuine note of appreciation all the more impactful.
And that’s the whole purpose: To enable in-the-moment recognition.
Since launch, Workhuman customers using the Teams integration have logged more than 7,000 recognition nominations and 14,000 engagements and interactions (e.g., liking and commenting on awards messages).
We’d call that a success, but let’s hear it from one of our early adopters.
R1 RCM, the leading provider of technology-driven solutions that transform the patient experience and financial performance of healthcare providers, has seen an 81% adoption of recognition across the organization, in large part due to the Microsoft Teams integration’s ability to embed recognition in the daily flow of work.
With the MS Teams integration, R1 has been able to send and receive recognition awards all within the Teams environment where employees are already meeting, collaborating, and working every day. “It’s been really wonderful for our employees, and they’ve really appreciated that sense of ease,” says Sara LaBelle, Culture Programs Manager at R1.
As a result, R1 has successfully fostered connections across a global community of employees – as well as driven ROI. Data analysis shows just four recognition moments a year for employees drops R1’s turnover by a whopping 10%!
How’s that for impact?
Admin Hub & Reporting
Let’s be real: For all the benefits of recognition – on both the individual level and on the organization as a whole – managing a recognition software platform can feel like another full-time job.
Just ask this guy:
Technology should be helping make the recognition program manager’s life easier – and it can.
With Workhuman’s new Admin HubOpens in a new tab, you can simplify your program management needs in one central place, taking control of your program – and your time. The end result? A streamlined experience that’s a catalyst for program success.
Here’s what it looks like:
Award Management: The Admin Hub is completely self-service: You can easily review and action recognition awards pending approval. All on your own time.
Delegation: Maybe you’re finally taking that trip to Jamaica or you’re covering for someone currently in Jamaica (Workhuman ExperiencesOpens in a new tab, anyone?). It’s easy to keep things moving by setting permissions and delegating responsibilities in Admin Hub.
Report Customization: It’s all about understanding recognition program effectiveness and value, right? That’s the beauty of Admin Hub’s reporting functionality. You can level up reporting dashboards with data visualization and customization while controlling access to information, right down to specific data sets.
At the end of the day, Admin Hub is a quality-of-life software platform, a way to free up time for what really matters at work: building human connections.
Final Thoughts
For 25 years, Workhuman has brought gratitude and human connection to the workplace through the power of recognition. That’s taken imagination, determination, and innovation – and it’s never going to change.
As we look to the future, we’re building on what we’re already known for.
In an era where AI takes center stage, we’re pioneering Human Intelligence™️ – actionable business insights fueled by the combination of unique, authentic, and robust recognition data; the latest advancements in AI; and the incredible experience and expertise of Workhuman’s community and thought leadership.
Our full portfolio of Human Intelligence™️ offerings equips leaders like you to propel your people – and your business – forward. It’s what will help you harness the collective knowledge of your organization, allowing you to find purpose and meaning in work, to learn, to interpret, to uncover insights, and to grow.
And it’s what will help fulfill our mission to make work more human for every person on the planet.
About the author
Eric Mosley
Eric Mosley is a visionary leader, author, speaker, and the driving force behind the Workhuman® movement, which focuses on transforming work through human connection and AI-powered recognition. As the founder and CEO of Workhuman, he has spent more than two decades pioneering a more human-centric approach to work, demonstrating how recognition, connection, and purpose fuel organizational success.
A global thought leader on the intersection of technology and humanity, Eric challenges traditional HR frameworks and advocates for a future where AI and emerging technologies amplify human potential. His work especially explores how organizations can harness the collective intelligence of their people, using recognition data and social insights to build thriving, inclusive workplaces.
Eric is a trusted advisor to some of the world’s most influential Fortune 500 organizations, guiding leaders on how to create workplaces that prioritize belonging, wellbeing, and human connection. He is also the pioneer of Human Intelligence™, Workhuman’s revolutionary approach to using real-time recognition data and behavioral insights to shape modern leadership and workplace culture. By capturing and analyzing organic moments of appreciation and collaboration from the Workhuman Cloud, Human Intelligence gives leaders deep insights into performance and culture that help them make more informed, ethical, and impactful workforce decisions.
A sought-after speaker, Eric has shared his insights on global stages, including Davos, Web Summit, AWS, and Workhuman Live. He is the author of "The Crowdsourced Performance Review" and award-winning co-author of "The Power of Thanks" and "Making Work Human". A frequent contributor to Forbes, his byline has also appeared in Fast Company, Harvard Business Review, The Huffington Post, Inc., and other leading publications, shaping the conversation on AI, leadership, and the evolving workplace.