AI First with Adam and Andy

As AI investments accelerate across the enterprise, many organizations are simultaneously pursuing workforce reductions and operational restructuring. In this episode of AI First with Adam and Andy, Adam Brotman and Andy Sack examine recent layoffs at major companies including Meta, Coinbase, Oracle, and Block, and discuss what separates strategic AI transformation from simple cost-cutting.

The conversation introduces the concept of AI “scaffolding” or an organizational “exoskeleton” the systems, workflows, governance structures, training programs, and AI-enabled processes that support meaningful business transformation. The hosts argue that organizations must build these capabilities before making significant structural changes if they want to preserve institutional knowledge and maintain operational effectiveness.

Using Meta’s creation of new roles such as AI-focused organizational leaders and builders as an example, the discussion highlights the importance of redesigned workflows, workforce retraining, agentic systems, and AI proficiency programs. The episode offers practical insight for executives navigating AI adoption, organizational redesign, and the evolving relationship between technology investment and workforce strategy.

What is AI First with Adam and Andy?

AI First with Adam and Andy: Inspiring Business Leaders to Make AI First Moves is a dynamic podcast focused on the unprecedented potential of AI and how business leaders can harness it to transform their companies. Each episode dives into real-world examples of AI deployments, the "holy shit" moments where AI changes everything, and the steps leaders need to take to stay ahead. It’s bold, actionable, and emphasizes the exponential acceleration of AI, inspiring CEOs to make AI-first moves before they fall behind.

Andy Sack (00:00)
it was meta that really, which prompted this episode, which was their announcement, they're laying off 14,000 people and while doubling their AI CapEx.

And the thing that caught our eye in the press release was they're inventing roles like org lead and AI builder. And

You know, it's those reinvented roles which signal org change, reorg teams, redesigned workflows, and basically retraining. And all of those things are important elements of

sort of supporting a company going through an AI transformation.

This is AI First with Adam and Andy, the show that takes you straight to the front lines of AI innovation and business. I'm Andy Sack and alongside my co-host, Adam Brotman, each episode we bring you candid conversations with business leaders, transforming their businesses with AI. No fluff, just real talk, actionable use cases and insights for you.

Welcome everyone to today's mini episode. There's been recent news of layoffs in a variety of companies, Block, Meta, what was the third one, Adam? Coinbase. And today we didn't want to...

Adam Brotman (01:12)
Coinbase. Coinbase?

Andy Sack (01:17)
focus on the layoffs, but we wanted to use the layoffs as a gateway to talking about what we think is a really big concept scaffolding or exoskeleton when it comes to AI transformation. So with that, let's get into it. think, ⁓ it was block, Oracle, Meta and Coinbase all have laid off thousands of employees in the last two weeks.

And we wanted to focus on the distinction between, in the case of Block and Oracle, those layoffs seem to be, we're not at either company, we don't have inside knowledge. Both of those companies seem to make the layoffs and just part ways with the employees. Whereas with Meta,

⁓ It seems like they've attempted to have some continuity even though they're doing the layoffs, they seem to be building up the scaffolding around in advance of any departing layoffs. And I think when it comes to the AI transformation,

departing employees that are laid off, a lot of knowledge walks out the door. And it's for that reason that scaffolding is so important to the AI transformation process. I'm curious, Adam, if you have any comment either on what you mean by scaffolding or around these layoffs.

Adam Brotman (02:32)
Yeah, it's interesting, not because of AI, but Starbucks also just announced, my former employer just announced a bunch of layoffs as well. I have to read their press release or whatever to see if they mentioned AI. But the point is that when you're doing big layoffs like,

you know, there can be danger to the business itself and the customer experience because, you know, are you sure that you've got everything covered? Right. So if a company is bloated and I just didn't need so many people and this isn't run leanly, then sure. Like layoffs make sense. if it's in fact that the company is operating relatively efficiently, but you just need to save money or think you can save money because of AI.

then that's a different story. And you better make sure that you actually are operating with AI properly first, right? Because it's not a no-brainer just to sort of start using AI and all of a sudden it's like, oh, we can just let people go. What we mean by scaffolding is, have you sort of thought about your workflows, how they connect to your data, how they connect to your people right now, and then how those things can connect to AI?

And if you come up with a way to sort of connect all those in such a way that you create these sort of agentic capabilities at the company that would allow you to rewire how you're organized, how you process things, how you do your work that gives you improved results with less, potentially less people or different people in different places. And until you sort of put that in place, if you just like let people go and say, we're just going to use AI to be better. Like you run the risk of like less people

that are trying to do the same amount of work or more, and the AI scaffolding isn't in place. So that's why we're big fans of this idea of, don't you, if you can, get your act together quickly when it comes to gentifying as much of your workflows and your processes as you can, augmenting your current employees as much as you can, creating things like AI.

proficiency, communities of practice, maybe even like almost like an institutional brain. These are the kinds of things that will allow you as scaffolding to sort of know that like as you start taking risks with layoffs and reorgs and restructuring that you've got this protective scaffolding or exoskeleton in place before you've done that so that it kind of your business together. So that's our thought process on the scaffolding.

Andy Sack (04:57)
Yeah, I wanted to highlight, I mean, just to give people a sense, it was meta that really, which prompted this episode, which was their announcement, they're laying off 14,000 people and while doubling their AI CapEx.

And the thing that caught our eye in the press release was they're inventing roles like org lead and AI builder. And

You know, it's those reinvented roles which signal org change, reorg teams, redesigned workflows, and basically retraining. And all of those things are important elements of

sort of supporting a company going through an AI transformation. And we think it's the backbone of scaffolding, which is as you're trying to migrate from old workflows and old ways of work to new ones, you're going to need to be changing your organization and training people. Adam, any final comments?

Adam Brotman (05:55)
no, other than I'd say if, if you've been using AI, like a lot, like if you consider yourself fairly proficient, what we just said will make perfect sense. You're like, scaffolding. get it. Like, as in I need to sort of come up with these new flows and new processes. Like you just said, Andy, to connect it to data, connect it to an agent, make sure I got my prompts right. Like

iterate on it, let it fail a few times and correct it you know, in a way where it's a sandboxed you know, it's not integral yet. And I sort of ease into making it connected to my actual workflow. Like if you're using AI, like everything I just said makes sense. If you're not using AI a lot, like we're going to be like, what are you guys talking about scaffolding exoskeleton, like new work, new stuff. Like, I don't understand. Like I use AI to like, it's a better Google and it writes some emails and like, what are you talking about?

And it's like, I just want to make the comment on top of this to say, if you haven't heard us talk about it before, there is a completely different unlock and capability that can come from AI if you sort of put it together the right way. But it causes you to create these different organizational structures and different work streams. And that's why the exoskeleton concept makes sense. But if you're not using it a lot and you're using it as a

as our friend Keith says, a more expensive Google, then you're gonna be WTF. What are you guys talking about?

Andy Sack (07:14)
This episode's not going to make a lot of sense for you.

Adam Brotman (07:17)
Right.

Andy Sack (07:18)
Yeah, mean, I think it's a good point. And before closing, I think it's worth saying the term exoskeleton or scaffolding. It's useful because what it calls up is when you go to do tuck pointing on a building or remodel a building or paint a building, you actually see the exoskeleton or the scaffolding go up. And it's meant so that people can can rework and fix the building. When it comes to organizations, they're in the building.

Literally, the employees are in the building. And the exoskeleton is this is this support that allows you to change to start to change people's titles, organizations and the way and workflows. And you need that support, you don't want to just go and cut without having that exoskeleton or scaffolding in place. That's the main point. And we spend a lot of time working with our clients on that.

And we thought that the layoff, the news around these layoffs, which we think is going to come more and more, it was really the one about meta that we thought was worth highlighting and bringing many episodes to all of you.

With that.

Thank you all for listening to AI First with Adam and Andy. For more resources on how to become AI First, you can visit our website, forum3.com, download case studies, research briefing, executive summaries, and join our email list. We also invite you to connect with our AI First community, a curated hub and network for leaders turning AI hype into action. We truly believe you can't over-invest in AI learning. Onward.