If last year was the Great Freeze, this week felt like the thaw you don’t want. Big employers moved from low-hire, low-fire to surgical staff cuts, with HR itself on the block. At the same time, a new class of AI agents is quietly swallowing entry-level work. You can call it efficiency. Your people call it a dead-end ladder.
The tension isn’t just headcount. Leaders are still pushing bodies back to offices while the evidence on hybrid efficacy remains patchy and painfully context-dependent. Add rising discontent and burnout, and you’ve got a brand problem disguised as an operating model.
Helping HR, talent acquisition, employer branding, and company culture professionals find careers worth smiling about.
Here’s where the signal lands: layoffs as policy, agents replacing rungs, attendance wars, and morale as the real KPI. We interpret the headlines and turn them into choices you can act on.
This Week’s Paper Cut's
