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Matt McFarlane

Thought I'd test out the new Claude HR skill... 

Guess our jobs are safe?

Building startup compensation practices 👉 Compensation Philosophy + Job levels + Salary bands.

After doing comp for a while, here's the 6 things I'd do immediately to get comp under control if I was a new Head of People.
 
I'm assuming you've come into a company where:
- Nothing exists
- You're the first people hire.
- There's <50 employees.
 
Yee-ha.﻿ Let's go.
 
1. Define a basic job level framework.
 
I'm talking basic basic.
 
Even something like: Jnr > Mid > Snr (+Founder = 4 levels).
 
That's all.
 
Just get a basic framework for distinguishing different role sizes. You can expand it later.
 
2. Level your people against the framework
 
- Jim = Junior
- Mary = Mid-level
- Tammy = Senior
 
Bonus points if you want to define the basis for putting them in those buckets (always good to have a rationale).
 
3. Build salary bands based on who you already employ (and pay)
 
Market data is nice but maybe not critical at this stage.
 
Instead: find the median salary at each job + level for the people you already pay
 
For example: junior software engineer.
 
See what the range is between lowest and highest paid.
Decide if it's too wide (20%+) or too narrow (<5%).
Congrats, you've got salary bands.
 
4. Define why someone is at the bottom vs the top
 
Important if you're going to mature these things. 

What dictates that someone is paid higher vs lower in your new band?
 
Don't have performance ratings or similar in place? Use something objective like tenure.
 
Not perfect, but a useful proxy in the short term (especially if you genuinely rate the people you've hired and kept).
 
5. Adjust your bands for hiring
 
Find your bands are holding you back in the market? Lift them.
 
Just remember to bring the current employees up with them.
 
Also make sure you're not accidentally compressing bands too close to one another, so lift the ones above and below, too.
 
6. Write all this stuff down (i.e. comp philosophy)
 
Help your people to understand how this stuff works.
- They'll appreciate it,
- You'll have more trust,
- And now questions can be answered a little more quickly.
 
Congrats, you have a halfway decent comp practice.
 
PS. let me know what is one thing you would add?

The best leader I ever worked with introduced themself with a ‘How to Work With Me’ guide. Here’s what it included — and why it worked so well.

I was new to the team, and so were they — I didn't know what to expect.
 
They didn't hire me — which led to feelings of:
- Would we get on together?
- Would they like me?
- What if they're a terrible boss?

But before we had a chance to connect over a call, something landed in my inbox and the inbox of each of their new direct reports.

It was a 'how to work with me' guide.
 
It introduced themselves and how they liked to work.

This was the first thing that set my impression.

- Not a flashy PowerPoint.
- Not a long-winded speech.
- Just a raw, honest doc.

The doc wasn't lengthy, but it was comprehensive — it covered things like:

• What they look for in their team
• How they like to communicate
• What great work looks like to them
• Their strengths and where they struggle
• How we could help them be better

They didn’t know us yet.

But this gave us immediate insight into who they were — and how to build trust and momentum quickly.

- There was no pressure to respond immediately.
- We read and digested it in our own time.
- And then we responded in kind.

That moment set the tone for our entire team culture.

We started sharing our own guides.
It encouraged us to do the same with our teams.
It scaled trust without needing synchronous time.

We talk a lot about onboarding processes and leadership styles.

Start here.

It’s simple, human, and unforgettable.

Have you ever received or written a ‘How to Work With Me’ guide?

I’d love to see your take 👇

If you're a People professional, your goal isn't to be liked, it's to be respected. Here's ten things I've seen teams do wrong, and the ten who get it right.
 
The true indicator of success in a People function isn't personal popularity, but creating a work environment that empowers its people.
 
Those that work work in People teams because they "like people":
 
1. Overpromise but under-delivers.
2. Give in to every demand.
3. Shy away from having difficult conversations.
4. Play favourites among people.
5. Avoids making tough decisions.
6. Avoids conflict at all costs.
7. Apply policies inconsistently, fearing backlash.
8. Side with popular opinion, not what's right.
9. Overlook performance issues.
10. Focused excessively on office parties and perks.
 
People professionals that earn respect:
 
1. Set clear expectations.
2. Take responsibility for mistakes.
3. Communicate effectively.
4. Balance employee needs with business goals.
5. Enforce policies fairly and consistently.
6. Handle conflicts professionally.
7. Supports addressing performance issues promptly.
8. Provides valuable, actionable feedback.
9. Develop effective training and development programs.
10. Uphold ethical standards at all costs.
 
The real currency in this profession isn't being liked, it's fostering an environment that enables employees to thrive.

What is one you would add to either of these?

Yesterday, ~900 people learned what to charge their clients as a HR consultant.

It's been the most uncomfortable part of my journey from in-house to a career that now earns me twice what my highest paid role ever did.

In this edition, I break down not only how to land on your rate, but the different pricing models I've used it for.

All in painstaking detail so you don't have to guess through it like I did.

And you can read it for free here: https://lnkd.in/gCrNXM-n

The god father of AI built a site that scores AI impact on jobs and, brb I'm going to re-skill as a Gardner.

Andrej Karpathy is one of the most influential AI engineers of the modern era — you can read more about him here: 

https://karpathy.ai/

He vibe coded a site that pulls US Bureau of Labor Statistics info and ranks their exposure to AI capability.

Check it out here:

https://lnkd.in/gYP-CXXy

HR Managers have an AI exposure of 7/10.

What's cool though is the brief description it gives on *what* will be disrupted.

And honestly, it's the parts I'm ok with being disrupted.

Check it out and let me know what you think and if you agree with its scoring.

I've rarely seen a careers page that actually made me want to apply.
 
- Stock photos
- Five values that could belong to any SaaS
- A culture paragraph that says everything and nothing
 
Meanwhile, the companies with real pull?

You hear about them because an employee jumps on LinkedIn and writes, "we just shipped this and I'm pumped"
 
If you're running the People function at a fast-growing SaaS and can't match Big Tech on salary, you know exactly why that matters.
 
The companies with pull have built something candidates already believe in before they've even applied.
 
In the coming edition of FNDN Series, I sat down with Lachlan Bradford, a brand and community builder in SaaS, and it reframed how I think about this for employees.
 
I'm breaking down the playbook in this week's newsletter.

Subscribe here (it's free): https://lnkd.in/gUTnpE_s

A lot of meetings could have been an email. Here's one of the best ways to filter the fluff.

One of the most powerful things I learned (way too late in my career) was how to become hyper efficient through meeting diligence. And there's one framework at the cornerstone of this.
 
It wasn't until I began working for truly remote companies that it dawned on me how much of an unlock it is to cull them wherever possible.
 
Historically, meetings were booked for anything and everything.
- Progress updates on projects/work.
- Regularly scheduled because someone decided it would be good to check-in.
- The ad hoc 'can I ask you something' that turns into a full blown half hour to an hour of your day - gone.
 
The fact is that these kinds of meetings kill the deep work necessary to deliver critical outcomes for you and your business. They distract you from true productivity, and harm your career in the process.
 
But then I was introduced to the POST framework — and we made it a pre-condition necessary for any meeting to go ahead had. 

The person who wanted the meeting had to include this acronym in the meeting request.
 
Here's what it stands for:

- Purpose: why are we having the meeting?

- Outcome: what goal should we accomplish by having this meeting?

- Structure: what are we doing in the meeting? Are we making decisions, or are we brainstorming something? what is everyone's role?

- Timing: how long is it going for and how does the agenda fit within this duration?
 
When you have to do even the most basic amount of work to even have a meeting you'd be surprised how many of the ad-hoc meetings fall away, and even the cyclical one's (each meeting needs to be justified).
 
Take this a step further.
 
If the meeting is a progress update, or is otherwise sharing information one-directionally, make it asynchronous and do it via written or video recorded update.
 
You'd be surprised how much faster things get done when you can read it and respond in your own time (with deeper thought or while listening at 2x speed).
 
It goes without saying that something like this needs to be adopted from the top down, but by piloting an approach and measuring the outcomes (reduced meeting time, improved output) you'd be surprised how easily the case stacks up to adopt this approach across a company.
 
Have you ever tried an approach like this at your company?

If Jeff Bezos says no team should need more than two pizzas, and AI means I’m now doing the work of a whole team — do I get both pizzas?

I speak to 100's of HR team's a year. Here's 5 steps the best ones are doing to embed AI.
 
Too many HR teams are either intimidated or overwhelmed when it comes to AI, and they're falling behind.
 
Instead, embrace the below steps and you'll be in the top 10% of People teams using AI.
 
1. Create dedicated, protected time
 
You can't just slap AI on top of your day job, or squeeze it in between meetings (duh).
 
The work you're doing today will always trump the deep focus time you need to be successful.
 
So carve it out, choose 1 of these:
- Commit 1-2 hours a day to AI, or
- Give 1 day a week to AI.
 
If you need to drop something to make this happen, do it. This must be higher priority than at least one thing you're team does or it won't get the attention it needs.
 
Protect the time, remove distractions — go into deep focus and spend it doing one of the things in the next step.
 
2. Time box it
 
If you're just starting out, commit to doing a short term blitz and then work out how to embed it longer term.
 
Here's a format you can steal:
 
6x week sprint:
 
Weeks 1-2: Focus only on learning/immersing yourself in what's possible

Weeks 3-4: Focus on testing the tools you saw in weeks 1-2

Weeks 5-6: Move from testing to actually building (what to build is covered in step 5)
 
3. Curate learning, don't create
 
There's so much free content available on using AI that you'd be crazy to spend money on it.
 
- Greg Isenberg
- Ruben Hassid
- Jeff Su 

These are just three (from dozens of) creators I love, who share genuinely actionable insights on embedding AI.
 
Spend time watching and seeing what can be done - this will get your brain subconsciously thinking about AI solutions for your team.
 
4. Empower your team
 
The key message here is: 'remove friction'
 
Time is a friction (tackled in step 1), but the second biggest one I see, is money.
 
Don't let budget be a blocker here.
 
If you're CEO wants you to embed AI practices (and you should to quit if they don't) — then securing a small budget is a no brainer.
 
There's so many tools - give your people a chance to trial a bunch of them and see what works.
 
Then:
- Keep the ones that work
- Remove the ones that don't
 
Don't make a big procurement process block game changing improvements.
 
5. Start small when building
 
Don't try to boil the ocean.
 
You won't be able to replace a HRBP in a week.
 
Instead, start small.
 
Pick the smallest workflow/process/interface under your remit, and start there.
 
Use your success here to build momentum and move up the value chain.
 
Don't let overwhelm and intimidation stop you from becoming a more effective People team.
 
Tell me, which step do *you* think is most important to embedding AI in People teams?

Even though my team smashed his team in the Great Debate on Pay for Performance, I actually agree with a lot of what James A Seechurn has to say.
 
So much so that after reading his book, I reached out to have him on the FNDN Series.
 
The book is 'What Pay Costs'.
 
It's incredibly good. The kind of book that makes you annoyed you didn't write it first.
 
I thought I grilled him for over an hour, poking holes in his idealistic views on how pay can work.
 
But actually, I just nodded along.
 
If you think most of the pay practices you see at work feel a bit broken — whether as a people professional, as an employee, or as a manager — this one's worth your time.
 
Subscribe to the FNDN Series to get a digest of the conversation, and a link to the full episode where we break it all down for you.
 
Join 5,500+ startup Heads of People here (it's free!):
https://lnkd.in/gUTnpE_s

Over the past 2 years I've been gradually refining my newsletter, written specifically for startup Heads of People. Lately, the investment has been paying off.

If you're the Head of People / CPO in a scaling company (50 to 500 people) 
👉 This is for you (it's free): https://lnkd.in/gUTnpE_s

Paying employees more money won’t motivate them.
 
But HOW you pay them will.
 
Here’s why
+ 4 steps to motivate your employees (without paying them more):
 
Employees don’t disengage because they want higher salaries.
 
They disengage because they see unfair pay practices.
 
When two people do the same job but one earns significantly more:
 
- Creates a lack of clarity on how pay decisions are made
- Makes pay feel random, not earned
 
But here’s where something interesting happens:
 
Double Demotivation Theory.
 
Double Demotivation Theory says there are two ways pay can make employees disengage:
 
1. People who believe they’re earning less than they should lose motivation.
 
That's the obvious one, but here's where it gets weird...
 
2. People who are being paid MORE compared to their peers ALSO lose motivation.
 
Now, this proves ONE thing:
 
It’s not just about more money. It’s about TRUST.
 
If people don’t trust the system, no amount of raises or perks will keep them engaged.
 
Fixing motivation doesn’t start with throwing more money at people.
 
It starts with paying fairly.
 
Here’s 4 steps to start paying fairly + keep your people motivated:
 
1. Have a clear, structured approach to pay
2. Make sure employees understand how salaries are set and why
3. Be transparent. Even if you don’t share every number, explain how decisions are made
4. Benchmark pay regularly. Ensure internal pay aligns with market rates — and that pay gaps aren’t eroding trust
 
TL;DR
 
Motivation doesn’t just come from bigger pay checks.
 
It comes from people knowing they’re being treated fairly.
 
People aren’t just demotivated by being underpaid.
 
They’re demotivated when they see OTHERS getting UNDERPAID. 
 
Pay fairly -> build trust -> drive motivation.
 
What’s one thing companies you'd like to see companies do today to make their pay practices feel more fair?

This is the most powerful tip I learned for growing a personal brand on linkedin:

You can just say stuff.

Block cuts 40% of workforce because AI - Stock pops 20%. Atlassian cuts 10% of workforce because AI - Stock drops 7%. 

Does the market think they should have gone deeper?

Or something else?

Building the world's first HR for HR app making HR easier, together. Human Experience + Artificial Intelligence. Ask. Learn. Validate. Come say hi 😄

We’re pioneering a new era of HR - where professionals have the time, tools, and support to lead. 

Mak by Humaneer is your AI-powered productivity partner, purpose-built to reduce admin and unlock strategic impact. Built by HR, for HR, we combine intelligent automation with the power of a global community so no one has to go it alone. This is how we deliver on our promise: less admin, more impact.

Kimberly Burns

I’ve been a bit quiet on here lately. 

It’s felt strange to open LinkedIn and talk about work, AI, HR strategy, or anything business related when so much is happening in the world. I found myself not knowing what to say, and then just saying nothing at all.

Yesterday I was talking about that in a group chat, about how weird it feels to post when everything feels uncertain or heavy, and someone said something that made me rethink how I am (or am not) showing up. 

She said, “People need community now more than ever.”

And she’s right.

It’s possible to hold two thoughts at once. To care deeply about what’s happening in the world, and also recognise that people still need support at work. That HR professionals are still showing up every day, supporting leaders, employees, families, organisations, often carrying uncertainty themselves.

When times feel unstable, connection matters more, not less.

We built humaneer to be a space where HR people don’t have to hold everything alone. A place to think out loud, to sense check, to feel understood by people who know the weight of the role.

If you’ve been feeling a bit disconnected, unsure, or just wanting to be around people who get it, this is your invitation to connect. 

Community isn’t a distraction from what’s happening in the world. It’s how we stay steady inside it.

If you’d like to join us, my DMs are open. If you are already part of the humaneer community reach out if you need anything. 

And lastly, a huge thank you to Ruth Kent who reminded me that community matters 💛

We’re pioneering a new era of HR - where professionals have the time, tools, and support to lead. HR matchmaker- reach out and say hi!

There are a lot of webinars right now about “AI tools for HR.”

This isn’t one of them.

We’re not talking about prompts.
We’re not running through a list of tools.
And we’re definitely not doing a “Top 5 AI apps” demo.

This conversation is about something much bigger:
What happens to the HR role when AI starts doing a lot of the work we’ve traditionally owned?

AI is already drafting policies.
Screening CVs.
Summarising investigations.
Writing job descriptions.

And it’s improving fast.

So the conversion we want to have isn’t what tools should HR be using.

It’s:
What skills should HR professionals be building now?
What parts of our work become more valuable?
And how do we position ourselves for the next version of the profession?

Next week I’m hosting a conversation with Helena Turpin (GoFIGR) about exactly that.

Helena Turpin has mapped AI’s impact task-by-task across thousands of roles, including HR. She can show where automation is happening and where human capability is becoming more valuable than ever.

Between that research and what we’re seeing through the humaneer community and building Mak, there are some very clear signals emerging about where HR is heading.

We’ll talk about:
• Which HR tasks are most exposed to automation
• Which capabilities are quietly becoming premium
• What skills HR professionals should be developing now
• How to future-proof your career and your team

📅 Wednesday 18 March
 ⏰ 12–1pm AEST

Register here:

Open article: The HR Skills That Survive AI · Zoom · Luma by luma.com

The HR Skills That Survive AI · Zoom · Luma

I keep seeing posts about AI wiping out entire jobs, so I’ve been trying to understand what’s actually changing underneath all the noise.

I went down a rabbit hole this week reading an economics paper about how AI changes work. Not jobs, the actual shape of the work we do. Yes, an economics paper 🤯

The argument was that work isn’t really a role, it’s a series of steps, and AI rarely replaces the whole thing at once. It starts by doing a few steps reliably, then everything around those steps reorganises. The change spreads through the workflow rather than replacing the person.

It made me think about what we see every day in HR.

The value of AI isn’t just the moment you ask something. It’s what happens next.

A complaint lands, a performance issue pops up, someone resigns, or a leader asks a slightly uncomfortable question. From that moment you don’t just need help with the question, you need support through the process.

You interpret what’s happening, decide what matters, plan the conversation, run it, write it up, and make sure future-you can defend it later. Right now that sequence is mostly manual and scattered across tools. Sometimes systems, sometimes email, sometimes notes, and very often the most trusted system of all, pen and paper.

Each step affects the next one. The confidence you bring into the conversation depends on the advice. The documentation depends on how the meeting went. The risk sits across the whole situation, not in any single moment.

What I’m noticing is general AI is genuinely helpful inside individual moments. But HR work isn’t a moment, it’s continuity. It’s holding context from the first question all the way through to the record.

That’s where we’ve been seeing the biggest value with Mak. Not just helping HR move faster, but providing consistency across the process so the outcome holds together.

The impact of AI isn’t job removal, it’s job evolution and closing the gaps inside the work itself.

I'm always open to chat about this stuff, if it interests you DM me 🙂

humaneer

I was scrolling LinkedIn this morning (as you do) and my friend Myriam Michel shared this visual. 

Each dot represents roughly 3.2 million people. The vast majority of the grid is grey, which represents the 6.8 billion people who have never used AI. The green section shows around 1.3 billion people using free AI chatbots. Then at the very bottom, the thin yellow and red strips, barely visible in comparison, represent the small fraction who are paying for AI or actively building with it.  

We talk about AI like it’s everywhere. In HR, we talk about it at conferences, in webinars, in strategy sessions. But when you look at the data, the majority of the world, and a large portion of workplaces, are still at the very beginning.

From the HR conversations I’m having every week, I see three groups emerging 👇

There are the cautious observers who are waiting for clearer governance, policy, or direction. There are the quiet experimenters who are using AI for drafting, sense checking, and workflow support but not talking about it loudly. And then there are the early builders who are embedding it into how HR actually operates, not just as a tool, but as infrastructure. 

The conversation has moved past are we going to use AI or not. 

It’s now about whether your HR function is building it's AI muscle now, while you still have room to experiment, or whether you’ll be trying to catch up later.

HR is already stretched, expectations keep climbing and from what we see most teams aren’t growing in headcount.

When it’s used properly, AI isn’t there to make decisions for you. It’s there to take some of the cognitive weight off, so you can focus on the judgement calls that actually need a human.

This image tells me we are still early. Which means HR has a window. A window to build confidence, systems, and capability before it becomes reactive and forced.

The question isn’t whether AI is happening. It’s whether HR builds the muscle now, calmly and intentionally, or tries to build it under pressure later.
 
humaneer

Apparently Claude just built a 24/7 HR department.

As someone building AI for HR, I thought I should probably weigh in.

Claude is an incredibly powerful AI engine. I use it daily. And with the new plugins and toolkits, you absolutely can configure it to help with HR tasks like drafting job descriptions, performance reviews or onboarding plans.

But we know that drafting documents isn’t the same as doing HR.

HR is interpreting legislation, navigating messy situations, weighing risk, preparing for difficult conversations and making sure the outcome works for the employee, the organisation and the law.

This is where the conversation gets a bit unrealistic.

Because yes, you can build your own HR assistant using tools like Claude. But then the real questions start. Who designs the prompts and workflows? Who keeps the legislation up to date? Where does the security sit? How do you manage sensitive employee data? Who checks the outputs are actually compliant? And who owns it when something goes wrong?

Most HR teams don’t have the time, the technical support, or the appetite to build and maintain their own AI system. We’re trying to run HR. Most days we barely have time for lunch.

That’s exactly why we built Mak.

Claude is a powerful AI engine. Mak is the HR system built on top of it. ANZ-aligned legislation, HR workflows, meeting capture, risk thinking, compliant documents and privacy controls all wired together so HR teams don’t have to build their own assistant from scratch.

What we’re actually seeing happen right now is the same shift we saw with software years ago. Generic infrastructure gets built first. Then vertical systems appear on top of it that are designed for the real work people do every day.

Claude is the infrastructure. Mak is what that infrastructure looks like when it’s designed specifically for HR.

Because HR teams don’t need another tool to configure. They need outcomes they can trust.

If you're in HR and don't have the time to experiment with generic AI tools, I'd love to chat with you. DM or comment and I'll reach out. 

Seriously, you don't have to do this on your own. 

Tagging a few people I know building AI tools so HR doesn't have too Helena Turpin Sam G. Emma Earley Careen Matthews Simon F. Matthew Knee Mark Lewis Lisa Lie Harrison Kennedy Kate Hemat-Siraky

humaneer

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