The Nowhere Office

We begin a brand new series this spring with the wisdom and optimism of one of the great legends in HR practice, strategy, and thought leadership: Josh Bersin. Josh is often cited as one of the leading HR and workplace industry analysts in the world. Most recently, Bersin launched the Josh Bersin Academy, the world’s first global development academy for HR and talent professionals at all levels and across all industries. You can listen to the beginning of this interview and then head for more content and additional material to The Nowhere Office with Julia Hobsbawm on Substack.

The third special programme in association with PwC UK to look at developments around AI at work and in society, timed to coincide with The World Economic Forum in Davos in January 2024 and asking the question: are we at a fork in the road in terms of AI and its impact on the future of work? Co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern were joined in studio by Kevin Ellis, the Alliance Senior partner of the UK and Middle East of PWC UK and Gina Neff, director of the Cambridge University Minderoo Center For Technology and Democracy.

We end 2023 and series five with an interview with Dr Gleb Tsipursky of Disaster Avoidance Experts, also known as "The Office Whisperer" by chief executives for his ability to help them navigate and negotiate flexible working and he explains his approach to Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern at the end of another turbulent post-Covid year in the world of work. A Fully Connected production, edited by Kevin Hirshorn.

An important and evolving topic at work is diversity, unconscious bias and how to have a harmonious workplace in an increasingly conflict-laden world outside of work. Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern are joined by the acclaimed business psychologist, co-founder and senior partner of firm Pearn Kandola whose books include Racism at Work: The Danger of Indifference

In this episode, the genius behavioural expert and advertising guru Rory Sutherland, Vice-President of advertising Group Ogilvy joins Julia Hobsbawm (co-host Stefan Stern is away) and Aled Maclean Jones of series 5 partner Ashore.io to discuss the dark and stormy challenges of flexibly working over, appropriately, Dark and Stormy cocktails…..A Fully Connected Production, edited by Kevin Hirshorn.

Join Julia Hobsbawm in discussion with Roy Bahat, head of Bloomberg Beta, the first venture capital firm to invest in AI at work as far back as 2016. In a wide-ranging discussion covering trade unionism, technology and innovation and the philosophy of work including the question: what will the last job be? A Fully Connected production co-hosted with Stefan Stern and edited by Kevin Hirshorn.

Meet ‘proptech’ guru Dave Eisenberg of Zigg Capital, the New York based global investment firm at the intersection of real estate and technology, and quite a bit in between. He spoke to Julia Hobsbawm in Manhattan about AI trends at work, why we still need an office but how it’s changed, and what the jobs of the future may look like. Co-hosted with Stefan Stern, a Fully Connected Production.

Joining Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern today in the second of our AI specials brought to you in association with PwC UK is Azeem Azhar, Global Futurist and AI expert who hosts the Bloomberg Originals series Exponentially, and whose newsletter Exponential View is one of the first technology watchers turn to for the latests twists and turns in AI. Azeem is Co-Chair, Global Futures Council on Complex Risks, World Economic Forum and we also get a response to his current take from Ben Higgin, PwC UK’s Head of Technology & Investment. A Fully Connected production.

A special programme in association with PwC UK to look at developments around AI at work and in society, linked to the UK AI Safety Summit hosted at Bletchley Park, England at the beginning of November 2023. Co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern were joined in studio by Ben Higgin, Head of Technology & Investment PwC UK, and Alice Thwaite, technology ethicist and philosopher to ask just how different this moment is in the story of technology in society and at work, how risks and rights can be managed alongside growth opportunity.

In this episode co-hosted by Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern, Julia goes to California to the 2023 Implications of Remote Work Conference hosted at Stanford University by the Hoover Institution and Stanford Institute for Economic and Policy Research Conference (SIEPR). Guests include Professors Steve J. Davis of Hoover Institution; Jan Brockner of University of California, Irvine; the future of work consultant and Linked In ‘Top Voice’ Brian Elliott; and Emma Goldberg, the acclaimed reporter on work for the New York Times.

We dip back across the ocean today with our Series 5 partner Ashore.io to discuss with founder Aled Maclean-Jones what working in a hybrid way out of both office and home means. We also discuss generational shifts in work with Eleanor Mills, founder of Noon, the website for midlife women. Join co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern for a lively fun discussion this episode. Lots of laughing! Series partner: www.ashore.io

Our US theme continues in this exclusive podcast interview with Professor Juliet B. Schor, the economist and sociologist who advocates the four day week, and who predicted many of the moments the workplace is experiencing as far back as 1992 with her seminal book The Overworked American. She joins Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern in a wide ranging and deep diving discussion looking at the underlying factors behind what it means to be a working American today. This new series of The Nowhere Office is in association with Ashore.io

The 5th series of our podcast which looks at the past, present and of course the future of work begins with an American theme to tie in with Labor Day 2023. Our guest is Rob Sadow, Co-Founder and CEO of flexible working tech tool company Scoop, a Top LinkedIn Voice on Flexible Work and founder of the acclaimed Flex Index who joins Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern to pore over the latest data and opinion about the adoption of hybrid working.

A one-off special between series, a long conversation with Kevin Ellis of PWC, Chairman and Senior Partner of UK and Middle East who is candid on all aspects of the return to office and hybrid working dilemmas, challenges and opportunities he sees in the post pandemic moment. It’s all about Culture, Talent and Networks he says to Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern.

In this final episode of series 4, recorded on the third anniversary of UK lockdown from Covid-19, co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern are joined by Tim Oldman and Allison English of Leesman, the world leader in measuring and analysing the experiences of employees in their places of work and they discuss the new project The Hybrid Future, a new longitudinal study into how the workplace is changing and with it society.

How fair is work? In the third in a special series in association with Prospect, the leading British union for professional skilled workers The Nowhere Office co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern talk exclusively to Baron John Hendy KC, one of the UK’s most prominent employment barristers who has made landmark case law over five decades before being joined by Philippa Childs, Deputy General Secretary of Prospect, heading up Bectu, to discuss the history and contemporary aspects of a fair workplace. Has digital working made life harder or easier for those in and outside offices? Plus perspective from Prospect’s Andrew Pakes, Deputy General Secretary and Director of Communications and Research. A Fully Connected production executive produced by Julia Hobsbawm.

Join us in New York for this edition of The Nowhere Office as we see how get an exclusive tour of real estate consultancy Savill's Park Avenue office refurb for hybrid working from Vice President Gabe Marans with soundproofed booths and the very latest gadgets to make an office as happy and workable as possible. Co-hosted by Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern. A Fully Connected production.

We go back to New York City for this episode, chiefly to talk to Helen Brocklebank, CEO of British luxury trade sector body, Walpole, as she explained to Julia Hobsbawm how talk of the changing nature of work affects every level of her sector. In addition we hear from some New York building representatives and exhibitors at NYBuildExpo to get a flavour of work's rebuild. Presented by Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern.

The workplace is changing, this is now undeniable. But how is it changing? In the second in a special series in association with Prospect, the leading British union for professional skilled workers co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern look at issues from desks to rights and regions with Alison McGovern MP, Shadow Employment Minister, and Member of Parliament for Wirral South, Adrian Wooldridge, Bloomberg’s Global Business Columnist, as well as Hafsa Begum, Prospect’s Head of Finance and Estates who takes us on a tour of the next generation trade union building, and once again perspective from Prospect’s Andrew Pakes, Deputy General Secretary and Director of Communications and Research and celebrated barrister Jamie Susskind of 11KBW chambers.

The Nowhere Office this week goes to the gym – MindGym, with an in-depth interview with Octavius Black CBE, co-founder and Chief Executive, one of the UK’s most successful entrepreneurs. MindGym is the largest behavioural science company in the world. It has worked with 62% of the FTSE 100 and 59% of the S&P 100, changing the way more than 5 million professionals think, feel and behave at work. Co-hosts Julia Hobsbawm and Stefan Stern discuss what does - and doesn’t work – when it comes to coaching, psychology and behaviour change at work and Octavius pulls no punches!