Curiosity, Conviction & the Future of Work with Karam Tawfiq, Head Of Total Rewards & Ops at D2L

In this episode, HR leader Karam Tawfiq shares insights on the evolving landscape of human resources, the impact of AI on work, and the importance of authenticity and mentorship in career growth. Discover how to adapt, stay curious, and build genuine human connections in a rapidly changing world.

01:33 – Introduction and episode overview
02:01 – The production process and expectations for content sharing
02:37 – Reconnecting with Karam Tawfiq and his career journey
03:16 – Personal anecdotes and perseverance in podcasting
04:09 – Favorite music artists: Olivia Dean and Adele
05:09 – Midnight snack preferences: pasta vs. chicken nuggets
08:01 – Defining superpowers: caring as a fundamental trait
08:59 – Mentorship moments that shaped Karam’s career
10:19 – Hot takes on HR’s identity and purpose
14:48 – Karam’s career beginnings and unexpected career shifts
17:00 – Lessons from mentors and critical moments of growth
19:37 – The significance of mentorship and support in leadership
22:16 – Authenticity, curiosity, and staying true to oneself
24:06 – Experience vs. AI in building frameworks
26:15 – The future of work, AI’s influence, and societal impacts
29:37 – AI challenges and opportunities for HR and organizations
34:42 – Building genuine relationships and mentorship through support
38:17 – Curiosity about people and avoiding transactional interactions
42:43 – Understanding human motivation and egocentric behavior
45:21 – Societal systems that create transactional mindsets
46:55 – Concerns about AI reshaping roles and societal norms
50:28 – Continuous learning amid rapid technological change
54:06 – Strategies to stay grounded in the AI era
55:43 – Final reflections and appreciation 

Creators and Guests

Host

Martin Hauck

Co-Founder of The People People Group & Host of From A People Perspective

What is From A People Perspective?

A podcast about fascinating professionals, how they got to where they are and where they’re going from the lens HR, Recruitment and People Operations hosted by Martin Hauck.

Martin Hauck (01:33)
All right, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of From a People Perspective. I'm your host, Martin Hawk. And today, we're finally, finally talking to Karam Taufik. Thank you for joining the show today.

Karam (01:49)
Thank you, Martin. I know it's been a long time coming and it's, it's, don't know if it's your fault or my fault, but we landed, we landed the plane. got here. ⁓

Martin Hauck (01:58)
So background story for,

for folks here is like, we've known each other for years. You've been a member of the community for a long time. I've seen you, you know, just what a career progression you've had. I rigid, I was already excited to talk to you. Like after our first coffee, I'm like, we got to do a podcast. I would be so excited to do a podcast together. And then, you know, this was before Riverside was the thing, which is the software we're using today. And like, I had my microphone, it just didn't work. And like, I could see it on.

Karam's face. It was just like full on like, disgust, basically. What a waste of my time and the fact that we're still like chatting. I'm just like, you've been through the wringer. I think we've tried a few times and we finally made it and I'm excited for today.

Karam (02:32)
you

I'm excited to chat and you know, I'm happy to do it. What's great is it's the ease of conversation we've always had. And it's like, we're going to do this. We're going to have this conversation. We're going to talk about all things people ⁓ and go from there.

Martin Hauck (02:59)
So we don't need to break the ice, I like it. I like breaking the ice for the guests who are listening. So we're going to just jump straight into things. For whatever reason, the world is no longer full with robust music and you only get to listen to one musical artist or one musical album for the rest of time. What is that album, my friend?

Karam (03:21)
Well, it's funny that you asked that today. My current obsession is Olivia Dean. I've loved her for many, many, many, many, many years, but her latest releases for those of you who have not listened to it, ⁓ if you want to cry your heart out, she's great. Her voice is sultry. It's beautiful. Unfortunately, I missed her. She just came to Toronto. ⁓ I could listen to her for the rest of my life every day, all day. ⁓ Specifically, she has a new song called loud and it's just so powerful. And she takes you down to the

depth of emotion. ⁓ Now I sound like a sappy ⁓ person, but Olivia Dean, any day for the rest of my life. If it weren't her, I can give you a second answer. I know you asked for one and I'm cheating and know, rules are mentally stretched. It would be Adele. And then people are going to think, what kind of person is this? Adele and Olivia Dean, very deep, heavy emotional music, but it's sultry. It fills my soul, fills my cup. So that's what I love.

Martin Hauck (03:55)
Yeah.

No, that's fine.

love it. I'm not I'm gonna have to check out Olivia Dean. I've not heard I maybe I've heard her song. I just don't know what kind of deal obviously Adele is a legend. ⁓ What's your favorite Adele song?

Karam (04:30)
Yeah.

that's hard. You can't ask me that because I could, I could list a thousand of them. ⁓ water under the bridge is one of my favorite and then river Lee and river Lee is not a common one. but those would be my favorites. I, I've watched the Dells. It like Olivia Dean, like nobody knew them. There were these nobody artists and then became these blowout artists, Olivia Dean now more so than ever, but yeah, I think give them a lesson.

Martin Hauck (04:45)
Right.

Karam (05:03)
Well, give Olivia a listen specifically and let me know what you think.

Martin Hauck (05:06)
Yeah, no, I'm going to I'm gonna definitely gonna check it out. All right. Midnight snack time. What what are you what are you going for? You can't sleep for whatever reason you're like, I've decided that food is going to be a thing I'm going to do what what are you going for?

Karam (05:20)
You're adding me out to the world on this one. ⁓ The number one thing I think if it's a midnight snack and I'm like craving it, I don't have a sweet tooth. I'm a savory person. So one of two items, a big bowl of pasta and like, I'm going to be very specific here. ⁓ Pomodoro, like think of a tomato, sugo sauce, simple fresh basil, some fresh Parmesan. It's like,

Martin Hauck (05:37)
You

Karam (05:47)
It's just you pull it out of the fridge, you warm it up for a minute or two. It's just perfect. It's sultry. It holds that soul. the other one is, and I think we could all agree to this one. I know everyone doesn't love McDonald's, but how can you say wrong? Anything wrong about chicken nuggets? ⁓ I would do an order of chicken nuggets for sure.

Martin Hauck (06:08)
⁓

man, that's like saying you like classical music, but also you listen to, ⁓ I don't even like, like techno remixes of kids nursery rhymes. Like that is the breadth of that's wild.

Karam (06:24)
What

classical music to sum 41, right? You get the whole spectrum of music. And I think I'm the kind of person who I love experience. I love change. I quite adaptable. So I like different things. And so you get this really big juxtaposition. And the answer I just gave you, I gave you, Hey, I love pasta, some sultry homemade, fresh made pasta to let's just go get Nick nuggets from McDonald's. Let's keep it simple.

Martin Hauck (06:52)
Yeah.

Karam (06:52)
And sometimes

you kind of have to find, it's funny, you're getting a piece of my personality. You have to find what works. And sometimes you need that classical music, the pastable. And sometimes you need the nuggets. ⁓ Just quick, easy, on the fly, dirty nuggets. And they're perfect.

Martin Hauck (07:08)
What would you say your superpower is?

Karam (07:12)
I hate this question. ⁓ And I hate this question because. No, I hate this question for for the purposes of and hates a strong word, but for the purposes of what is your superpower? What is anyone's superpower? I think we all have talents and gifts. I think. I think the one thing that I hold true and it stayed consistent, whether professionally or personally, because I.

Martin Hauck (07:14)
You

Just coming back, you're just going to leave the podcast. Screw this.

Karam (07:41)
pretty authentic, think you know that very direct. I think care. I think caring is my superpower. And sometimes when you have a superpower, it actually can also be your weakness because you care too much. And it's about learning to take a step back. That's something I'm continuing to work on. ⁓ But caring, caring would be my superpower. I care deeply. ⁓ Everything I touch. I read something years ago. ⁓ And it's funny. It was from

Martin Hauck (07:52)
Hmm

Karam (08:10)
the world leading interior magazine. And it was talking about like everything I touch, I want to make it more beautiful. And it kind of stuck with me as a phrase. Everything I touch, I want to make it more beautiful. And whatever your interpretation of beautiful is, is up to you. But so what I've always tried to do is put care in the things I do. So hopefully they're a little better than I left them and, and I can walk away from it feeling, feeling good about it.

Martin Hauck (08:16)
Hmm.

It's funny, I was letting members in so that we have like 30 people that are waiting to get into the people people group. And every morning I go in, I was in New York last week or earlier this week. So I didn't get to that. So people have been waiting for a couple days. People used to wait for months. But now we've brought it down to a couple days, which is fantastic. But the person's LinkedIn profile said I leave people and companies better. And there's like an HR person, obviously. And her headline was I

Karam (09:00)
it.

Martin Hauck (09:05)
I like leaving people in companies better than when I found them. And that's my goal. And it's like, that's, that's kind of what you, you talked about. ⁓ Yeah, a couple more. So yeah, didn't like the didn't like this strength or superpower question. ⁓ In terms of what what do feel is your hottest take on the profession that you've chosen?

Karam (09:30)
It's it. Where do you want me to start? I have so many opinions. I think let me summarize in like a couple of ways before I go on a tangent because I can ramble. We were once upon a time in an anecdote, the paper pushers of 1990 and somewhere along the line, they said, OK, HR, you get a seat at the table now. And then they said, let's rebrand you and call you people and culture. And then it was. What the hell actually are we?

Martin Hauck (09:41)
Yeah, yeah, that's fine.

Karam (10:00)
What do we actually do? And then you have this idea from employees and actually a lot of my friends, peers, colleagues, like you can't trust HR. They're there for the business. And we sit in a very interesting intersect. We ourselves are employees of the company and we are there to support management and the vision and the strategy. But we also have to support the employee engagement, keeping people engaged, thinking about programs, thinking about how the world of work is changing.

And then we sit in this weird intersect where are we an employee? Are we, who are we in this organization and this Marco chasm? And I always tell, and I teach a lecture. I teach the global business management program from time to time. And I always tell the students, I'm like, you kind of play a teetering line. You're there to support management. You're there to support the business to move forward. And your interest is to protect the business. That is part of the function of the role. Let's call it what it is.

Martin Hauck (10:58)
Mm.

Karam (10:59)
But the other function is you are nothing without your people. So how do you marry those two? And that always becomes a challenge. And that's why you sit here and you're like, I could be pragmatic. I could be rational, but it goes back to and compensation is my bread and butter. There's the science to comp. We talk about compensable factors and then there's the art to comp

Who is Martin, right? And yes, Martin is the senior manager of recruitment, for example. But what does that actually mean? ⁓ Yes, I can define his role and I can look at the market data and I can say he should be making X number of dollars, but who is the person and how is he contributing to the team success driving those behaviors? Now I'm going on as tangent, you're asking like, what is HR and what is your hot take on it? I think there isn't one answer that's correct, right?

HR is unique to the person and the profession and the part of HR you sit in. If you were to ask somebody in talent acquisition, their job is to really sell the role. Come to our organization and I'll tell you why. And their whole vision is really attracting people. That's what HR means to them. You ask somebody in comm, hopefully the answer is I want to pay people fairly and well for the job that they're doing. And I want to see them be rewarded for that. You ask somebody who's a business partner, they have to be empathetic.

They have to understand where people are coming from. But then they also understand there's business drivers. Like a business doesn't run on a Mickey Mouse clubhouse. have budgets, have evidence, we have tickets. And that's the truth. So balancing that line. What is HR? It was, we can take it back 20 years ago. It's I'm the psychologist, I'm the social worker, I'm the business partner, I'm the leader, and I'm the support. And we play many hats because we have to. And

Martin Hauck (12:25)
Hahaha

Karam (12:45)
And I think the hot take with HR, if I leave it with something is a lot of HR professionals come in and they think, it's just fluffy. It's the psychology piece. No, we need HR professionals that understand business, understand your balance sheet, understand where your strategic vision is going, understand what you're actually doing and driving as measures of success. And then how do we overlay those people practices? And until we can fully understand that mechanism, we can't actually support our business. And that's why you see some of the best people who

come out of HR who need HR have been in the business. Because they can marry where the business is sitting versus what the people need. And understanding both those sides. That's my hot take. And I think people a lot of the time will say, well, you have to really understand your people and then address their needs. You have to understand the business and the people and marry the two. And we lose sight of that. So my long-winded answer, there it is.

Martin Hauck (13:40)
No, no,

this is great. No, I love it that and so that's that's what we're getting today, folks. That's what we're this is just the tip of the iceberg. So let's let's start at the beginning. ⁓ How did you like walk us through like the initial parts of your career? Like, what was your first gig? And then let's fast forward to like the meat and juicy part. But what was your first?

Karam (13:49)
Thank you.

Yeah.

It's, it's so funny. If you would ask me 10 years ago, plus where I thought I'd be, I wouldn't tell you I would be here today. ⁓ I don't want to go back all the way to undergrad, but I think the story originates there. Once upon a time it was go to law school, finish a master's degree, do a PhD and all of that wonderful jobs. Worked at a law firm one summer.

I was finishing my fourth year undergrad thesis and it was like, okay, well there's two paths are very clear. And the April of that year rolled around and I was like, I'm not going to law school. I got in and not doing it. And research is boring for me. It's not my love. And then I was frozen and I was always a planner and I kind of looked at my mentor at the time, Jackie, I'll never forget her.

And I was like, Jackie, to do? She's like, you're good with people. You understand how practices and people and organizations work. You should go in HR. I was like, HR, the paper pushers? Are you crazy? I was like, that's not a rewarding, fulfilling career. They don't really impact anything. And my naive self, listening to myself then, my 22 year old self, and hearing myself now, I'm like, what a silly boy I was.

Martin Hauck (15:30)
You

Karam (15:31)
And that's the beautiful part about learning and growing in your career and taking that step back and being honest with yourself and saying, I, I funny, funny enough, I start all my lectures this way, or when I joined a new team, I tell them the story and I'm like, why are you sharing this? I'm like, cause I was so naive. I didn't know what I didn't know. ⁓ But I was always curious. And I think that curiosity kind of fed us to where we are today. So I was fortunate enough, a friend of a friend knew a friend that had this

random HR role. was at a small mom and pop firm, telecommunications, think about phone calling companies. Doesn't exist anymore. Clearly things have changed since then. Kind of did a mishigosh of HR things there. It was like no structure, not really following policy, you name it. And then I was like, okay, this is kind of fun, but I kind of want more. And a friend of mine was like, oh, Ransett is hiring a role.

Martin Hauck (16:12)
you

Karam (16:32)
And they're hiring a role for this HR. I forget the title of the time. Like you kind of were going to do the administration. You're to help with some of the payroll work. You're to do some of the benefits work and do a bunch of different things. was generalists starter entry level role. I was like, okay, like, don't know who Ransom is. I don't even know what this means. And you know, it's funny. You take all those steps back. That built the foundation to everything. Right. And

Martin Hauck (16:55)
Hmm

Karam (16:58)
landed at Ransdad and in there I had some amazing, amazing mentors and they were like, Karam, you should do benefits and Karam, you should jump at the cop and Karam, how about you do some ER work and Karam, like you understand systems analytics, help us with the simple mutation. And Karam, like, and I was like, I've never done any of this. I don't know any of this. and they're like, Karam, you should do your master's degree. And I was like, what? I never thought of doing a master's degree. let that vision and memory die.

Cause I was like, I don't want to do research. And I was like, there's a master's degree that doesn't focus on research. ⁓ and then all of that came together and it was every time they're like, do you want to do the work? I never said no. It took more hours on my day. It took weekends and nights. took learning, but it allowed me to learn a lot of the great foundational pieces that built on it. And then that kind of started to propel things. So you asked me.

Martin Hauck (17:33)
Hmm.

Karam (17:57)
where it all started and how we are getting there. That's where it started.

Martin Hauck (18:05)
love that you've said mentors so much. And I like when folks kind of pay homage and you obviously have. ⁓ I imagine the the mentions you've made of them are are just like, tip of the iceberg or just the surface you haven't meant. I'd be curious to just get a sense of like, is there any sort of like mentorship moment that like really stands out to you in terms of like this was like a crossroads?

moment and if it wasn't for this person, it would have been would have been here.

Karam (18:43)
I feel like I'm outing him out of the closet because I haven't actually told him this ever. We'll do it here and now. He knows who he is. ⁓ Matthew is my mentor at Ransdad. And I didn't report to him in the beginning. kind of, because of different functions ended up reporting to him and he ended up overseeing comp and benefits. And that was kind of where I was leaning towards. Matthew had something.

that no other person showed me. The business will come to you and they will be tough and hard and harsh, direct and difficult and challenging and they'll poke and they'll throw a hundred different things at you. But what he was really good at is playing Switzerland. No matter the waves that came, he would kind of take it all in and say, wait a moment. What, what does this actually mean? And I watched him.

I watched him so closely and then I would always ask him like, okay, Matthew, I'm to do X, Y, Z. And he's like, Karam, did you think about C and D? He's like, pause here. And what he taught me and I give him credit to it is the moment of pause. You can action things and you can get them done. very action oriented and I want to drive goals, but just taking that moment to pause, take a step back.

sleep on it, have a glass of water. He had three funny rules. The first rule was go for a five minute walk. If it's frustrating, get up, go for a walk. Don't talk to anyone. That was a great piece of advice. Second thing is like come back and have a glass of water. Cause then you'll be able to like just take a second for you. And then three, if you're still feeling frustrated with the situation or you want to action it, but you're not quite sure how to handle it, sleep on it. And that's resonated.

And I am telling this on a live podcast that he's now going to hear that. And so I think those moments of advice kind of lived with me. And the one thing I didn't ever listen to him on and admit this is he's like, also like slow down in your career. Those moments will come. I was like, I hear you, but I know what I want. So I married the advice with my gut feeling.

Martin Hauck (20:56)
You

Hmm.

Karam (21:09)
I never lost the truth to my, to myself. think you're to get a lot of advice from different mentors and it's great. But you also have to stick true to who you think you are. I had leaders who were like, Karam, you're too young to be a director. You're too young to be a so-and-so. And I was like, okay, I'm going to prove you wrong. And it kind of also became an internal challenge. so homage to old mentors and taking that advice and wisdom because it builds on who you are.

Martin Hauck (21:15)
Yeah.

Karam (21:38)
But it's also saying true and authentic to who you are. I think it goes back to, we're looking at three beautiful pieces. It's like curiosity mindset, listening to understand. We've heard that adage for a long time in HR. And then the final thing is really like, and it's cliche, stay authentic to who you are, but find your voice. And that voice will actually tell you, Hey, this is what you're meant to do. ⁓ well, hopefully.

Martin Hauck (21:58)
Yeah.

Karam (22:07)
I think we all still figure that out. with a little, know, read the fine print, this may still change. But that's kind of how I look at it. to go back to circle back, Matthew was that shaping moment where it was like, wait a minute, I do have to think about things this way. I do need to step away from them. I need to take that moment of pause. And that kind of changed everything for me. Because now when you're in a room and a leader says,

Tell me about this. And you're like, I can't answer it. I kind of know the answer, but there's a lot more weight to saying, Hey, do you mind if I take that away? I want to give you a more polished answer around it. Let me take a few things away. Let me do a bit more homework. And that has actually more power to it than saying, I know all the answers all the time. I don't. And I think like, I have a lot of conviction in my voice. you know, you seem like, you know, all the answers. Nobody knows all the answers.

Martin Hauck (22:56)
Mm. Mm.

Karam (23:05)
I don't know all the answers. I always continuously learn. So taking that moment and saying, hey, let me take this away. Let me do more homework. Let me actually tap the subject matter expert on the shoulder to get more perspective. So I hope that answered the question. I know I went on a roll. ⁓

Martin Hauck (23:22)
beautifully, beautifully.

No, I love it. And and I mean, I think that's, I mean, if you don't have a mentor, and it's come up on the podcast a number of times since like best ways to go about getting one, why should you have one but like, I can't, you know, champion that or stress that enough, especially for the folks like now more than ever, if you're just earlier in your career.

And I think it's like an interesting thing because technically you have chat GBT or AI as a mentor as well. And that will, I want to hear your hot take on this because I know you've got one, but like it's totally doable. I use chat GBT myself personally, when I need some sort of like guidance on something in my personal life or professional life, or I need to send an email to be better or whatever the case might be. It was like

That's almost becoming sort of like a default. don't know if that's the case for like younger folks. I imagine it is. And so let's make that assumption. ⁓ What's your hot?

Karam (24:21)
Well, you don't have

to make that assumption because the studies are now showing that Jen Lee is actually using ChatGBT to answer like, I just got into an argument with my partner. Like how do I handle it? And instead of like ⁓ MIT, believe was it MIT? I don't want to misquote it on the podcast, but folks go, go Google it or use ChatGBT to find it. ⁓ Ironically, it was really talking about like critical thinking is kind of going away because we're reliant on the AI tool.

Martin Hauck (24:33)
Yeah.

BOOM ⁓

Karam (24:51)
And I think this is probably going to segue into your next question. So I'll stop here. It's really about like, where does AI play its role now? And I have a very hot take on where I think AI will take us. I will say in a way, I think.

Martin Hauck (24:56)
No, no, I want to continue.

Karam (25:14)
AI is going to change the way we do work. Here's the fun reality. Actually, nobody knows the answer on how it's going to fully change the way we do work. Everybody has ideas. There's a new AI bot every second day. There's a new one on recruitment. There's a new one on how to interview candidates. There's a new one on how to compose emails. There's a new one on like performance management. However, if you don't have the experience,

You can ask it all the questions you want. You can build the frameworks, but your past experience can help shape where you needed to go. Right. I'll give you an example. You are a comp expert, pre AI. Okay. You're building a new compensation framework for your organization. You would have hired a third party firm. You would have asked questions. It would help to build your job levels.

Once you have actually your pay grades, then your job levels, then you would overlay market data. Then you would work with a consultant to maybe define your compensable factors, all that wonderful stuff. And you would talk to the consultant, you would do consulting hours. The consultant would give you advice on how to build that framework. What is the steps to do it? What do you have today? What are the gaps that you have and how to solve for them? The research, the literature, and all the playbooks are out there. AI can...

bring them together, but if you don't have the experience on the step-by-step process and you haven't gone through it before and AI is your consultant, it's great. But you kind of need a bit of the know-how previously. And I think where the generation coming into the workforce now is going to be at a massive disadvantage. The advantage is they are going to live and breathe AI. So they're going to know it better than the people within the organization.

They are already using it in their day-to-day life, right? However, there's no previous experience. There was never building the Compensable Factors from the ground up. Now I'm asking AI to build the Compensable Factors from the ground up. So I'm not critically thinking about what my organization values in the roles. I'm not understanding how the rules interact with each other. I'm just saying plug and play, plug and play, plug and play. Give me an answer.

And that's where I think what's becoming dangerous is the lack of critical thinking. It's, it's, yeah, I can spit out beautiful answers and paragraphs and storytelling and documentation. However, did it critically think of all the components on how the role may interrupt? How does it feed into our performance landscape? How does it actually play into who we are as an organization or a mission and values?

And those are the questions you have to kind of take a step back and think about it. Like, does this actually make sense? Yeah, this is a great framework, but there are many great frameworks that doesn't mean they apply to your organization. It's you'll have people in, and I'm to use one more example, Martin, excuse me, but, the Hayes grading method is the best method ever to do compensation. Well, no, it's not. You can use Aon Radford for your benchmarking. If you're a technology company, you have to look at your sector. You have to look at your size. You have to look at.

all these factors, but that comes with experience and time. You can teach it out of a textbook, the perfect formula, but it's not about the perfect formula. It's how does this perfect formula fit into the puzzle of this organization? And that takes previous experience.

Martin Hauck (28:53)
It's interesting because you're reminding me of this conversation we had. It was the dinner we just did in New York with

and one of the people I was sitting beside Neil, he was really just kind of like talking about human in the loop. And you hear that sort of phrase human in the loop, human in the loop, the part that I'm sort of like thinking about and freaking out about is what you touched on is like, okay, cool to have a human in the loop. But if the human in the loop doesn't have past experience, to your point, then then that guardrail or that safety net of somebody is

is missing. And we haven't to your point, we don't even know what the outcome of that is, because the more as time progresses, there will be more and more instances where people will be building frameworks, compensation frameworks, or building things, and they just stand them up, and it looks and feels like a thing that makes sense. And there will be challenges that arise from it that probably could have been avoided. And then

then on top of that, the crazy part to me is like, then is that person can use AI to solve that problem that arises from the thing. And again, it's like this vicious cycle of like this weird, like it's gonna change things. And like, I don't know, it's it's I don't have the answer, right. But ⁓ really, really cool perspective. I know we kind of did a bit of a side quest here conversationally, I love it. But do you want to get back to sort of

Just like fast forward us to where you are today. there any sort of like highlight real moments in your HR career that stand out ⁓ before it takes you to sort of ⁓ your time at D2L?

Karam (30:46)
I don't know if I can pinpoint one thing. I think they're aggregative, all the experiences. I homage to mentors like Jackie and Matthew and I can name, I should also throw in faith and I can go on and on and they're the ones that I don't mention are going to hate me. ⁓ but truthfully there has been, it's been a, a three-part formula. It's the great mentors and I have been

It has been the honor and privilege of my life to report to these people because of them. I am who I am. They were the ones that taught me to take a step back. Pause. They were the ones that were, Karam, you're so methodical, but don't forget your human side. And then they were the ones that said, don't let no be the answer. And that kind of

That one was the one that resonated most because I was like, I never take no for the answer just because that's policy doesn't mean you can't change it kind of person. So it was the mentors were the big part throughout all of it. And fortunately, I don't know how I got so lucky. Every organization had jumped into I reported to somebody great. And maybe it's part and parcel because I looked for somebody that I can learn from and part and parcel because

Martin Hauck (31:48)
Hmm.

Karam (32:13)
I'm a very curious person and I'll ask a hundred questions because I want to know how it all kind of works. And then it was really like, I looked at, we always use the analogy of the toolbox. was like, okay, I know this part of HR, but I don't have an understanding of this. What next role can I do that can kind of help me close that gap or understand.

Martin Hauck (32:34)
Mm.

What you said lucky and I and I appreciate and I understand where you're coming from with that. But let's just assume let's take luck out of the picture.

Karam (32:52)
Let's say I wasn't a lucky duck. Let's say I was an unlucky duck.

Martin Hauck (32:53)
No, no,

no, no, no, not that. It's just, ⁓ what do you think like getting? Yes, you worked with great people, but not people don't mentor people for no reason, right? It takes time. It takes effort. I guess for the folks listening that may be struggle with finding mentors or gaining mentors or even working or do you don't even know how to like begin that journey? What what

do you feel that you did? Or how did you approach things in a way so that you could become so lucky to have people willing and wanting to to mentor you? Like, what are what do you feel the recipe is as opposed to just, they just happened to report into amazing leaders? Like, maybe that's true. But there's there's got to be something to it.

Karam (33:41)
It's a two part answer and I say it all the time. And people need to remember this. I tell the students I teach this, I tell everyone around me.

It's not about what people can do for you. It's what you can do for people. And my approach to all of it has always been, I'm going to work hard. I'm going to support you and make you look good. And I'm going to jump in where I can. And what that does is people say, Hey, wait a second. This person isn't reaching out to me because they want this job or they want this opportunity or they want this connection.

this person actually wants to work with me and build a genuine authentic relationship. And out of that, that genuine authentic relationship, it doesn't become professional. It becomes a friendship. You built friendships with these people. And as you build friendships with these people, the day comes, you say, Hey, you're not, it's not about cashing in anything or a cookie jar. I did this. So you, I owe you a lot of people approach this mentorship thing to like, I did this for you to do this for me or like,

Martin Hauck (34:51)
transactional

thing.

Karam (34:52)
If

you help me the transactional nature, it's really just about being authentically a person who is good and is doing good work. And along the way you have conversations and say, Hey, I see Matthew, you're struggling with building this. actually am really good at Excel. Let me help you with that. And then out of that, you say, Hey, you saw me work on these three projects. Do you have any advice for me on how I could have handled it differently? And that person says, yeah, I actually like, you could have approached this different.

And then that kind of becomes in and of itself an organic mentorship relationship. What people need to remember. I think every day is an interview, whether it's, whether it's somebody you don't know or the person who's serving you your lunch. You don't know what that person is going through and they don't know what you're going through, but

Martin Hauck (35:38)
Hmm.

Karam (35:51)
the first interaction impression you make is going to sit with them for maybe a lifetime. And they may change the impression of you and they may not, but that impression actually drives the change in the conversation, the relationship nature. And people always think mentoring is let me send in LinkedIn posts and be like, hi Susie, I see that you're the head of HR. Let me like connect with you. That's inauthentic. It,

Martin Hauck (36:14)
Bye.

Karam (36:20)
It shows this need of like, I need a job. And we've all been there where we need that next job, that next role. Like we want to grow our careers, but to be forceful about it, to be like, talk to me, talk to me, talk to me, talk to me in mail, in mail, in mail. That's not building a genuine relationship. I, I use this. I'm like, you go to a conference, you don't go, Hey, what do you do? Let's do coffee. You say, Hey, I actually like kind of looked you up.

You've had a really cool background in recognition and you've built this really cool platform. Why did you build it? Like what was the inspiration? People love talking about themselves, but you also have to be super curious about people. I think a lot of people make it about themselves. I don't want to talk about me. I think that's why I pushed this podcast for so long. I actually don't enjoy talking about myself. I like talking.

Martin Hauck (37:01)
Hmm.

Karam (37:16)
anyone who knows me and all my peers are going to hear this. They're like, Karam, come on. You love to talk. I do. I love to talk, but I'm actually more curious in people than I want them to be curious in me. And then I think that kind of, once people feel comfortable and they feel heard, they actually just genuinely want to gravitate towards it. And then that kind of fosters this beautiful relationship. And then either you become the mentor or mentee and then vice versa. As time goes on,

you start superseding the people that mentored you. And then you start supporting them in roles and opportunities. And it's like, it's so funny. I am not a cosmic energy person. I don't believe in signs and all of that, but it's like, it's really the output you give, right? If you're positive and you have positive intent and you mean well, it will come back to you. It's just not.

Martin Hauck (38:03)
Yeah.

Karam (38:11)
in a time that you thought in this timeline, it will come back to you when it makes sense. ⁓ That's really it.

Martin Hauck (38:16)
I love that.

I love so it's funny that you say that like I'm not a cosmic energy person, the amount of people I've had cosmic energy conversations with on this podcast and in per like in New York, you know, met a consultant who's like an acting CEO for companies and whatnot. And then somehow like I heard I caught one thing. And they do like reiki healing and all this stuff. And I know that's not what you're talking about. But

there is something to be said if if you boil every experience down into I can approach this positively. Or I can approach this from a place of frustration, anger, whatever the energy that you're putting out there. It's it's it's it's true. I'm sorry, but it's true. Like whether you want to get into the woo woo side of things or not. I just did a podcast with someone else as well recently. And again, it was just like we talked about the woo stuff for a little bit and I

Karam (39:10)
I love how you're

calling it the woo stuff.

Martin Hauck (39:13)
It isn't it though, right? Like it's the thing we can't put our finger on, but we all collectively agree to an extent that

Karam (39:22)
Can we talk about instead

of the woo woo stuff, the human? Humans want to be heard and understood. It has this whole like energy and positivity. It's really like people genuinely want to be heard and listened to. Not like, how are you Martin? How are your daughters? good. Okay, great. Thanks. That's transactional. That is not, how is Martin doing?

Martin Hauck (39:27)
⁓

Yeah.

Karam (39:50)
You look calm right now and you look relaxed with your hat. But genuinely, how are you doing, Mark? Like, I know there's like you always are working on this and that and you're a very busy person. How are you doing? And tell me about it. Like, how are things going with the people people group? It's not like, your daughter's good. Good. Great. ⁓ amazing. We should do lunch sometime. That is disingenuous that that it's like, OK, do you know how old my daughters are? Do know how long I've been married to my wife?

Do you understand the responsibilities on top of the people, people group that I'm taking on? And it's like, no, I don't because I didn't care to ask. then I don't actually, do I actually even care about the person? And that's what we need. It's that human connection and it's human connection on top of rational operating. That's my HR brain kicking in. That's my analytical brain kicking in. And it's, it's those two.

Martin Hauck (40:30)
actual

No.

It's like actual genuine curiosity. As opposed to the how do I get ahead? And it's so it's it's funny because I don't know what it is. Maybe I'd be curious on on your take on on this. ⁓ But there, for some reason, every the default approach of an individual is I need this.

Karam (40:47)
Yep.

Martin Hauck (41:12)
Right? Kind of what you were talking about versus how can I help you or how can I learn more about you? And it's like, I don't even understand why that is the default state. And like, sure. I've played that card myself in the past. I didn't find it to be successful. So I changed it pretty quickly. But yeah, I guess, I don't know. Do you have an answer to that? Like why is the default state like very egocentric versus the, like

Let's just approach this from curiosity. Let's just be genuine and authentic.

Karam (41:48)
I don't want to answer this because this will be live in public, it's, humans are narcissistic. We, we care about us, right? Like at the end of the day, it's that analogy of you're in the airplane, you put your air mask on first, because if you can't put your air mask on you, can't help the person next to you. And that's all fine and dandy. However, I think like we need to remember that

I don't know what you're going through. I don't know what anyone's going through, but if you can just operate from a place, you ask the question like, why did people like, I do know this person who's hiring for the job. Can you connect with them instead of approaching the sentiment with, I'm kind of curious for exploring new roles. I did see a few things. Do you happen to know anyone here? Like, can I talk to you about it beforehand? People don't want to invest that time and effort. want that quick.

easy fast response get me the solution.

Yeah, you could approach it that way. How well is it working for you? And then we can talk about this at Nausium, but at the same time, we can talk about this podcast and tell them how to approach it. Some people are still going to approach this inauthentically. They're going to approach it like a form. I'm building a connection with you and I don't... Do you actually care? And you can actually see people's care by their body language, by how they're communicating.

Martin Hauck (43:07)
yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Karam (43:20)
by their intent and I think I go back to I Can't speak for anyone else but I can speak for myself and how I want to operate. I want to always operate in a curious mindset because it breaks down that defense of like judgment or like I want something out of you I don't have an answer for you and I can openly and honestly say that I do not have an answer for you on that why do people operate that way it's maybe because

Martin Hauck (43:32)
Yeah.

Karam (43:51)
We're narcissistic. Maybe it's because we're very eco-centric and driven. And maybe it's just out of necessity. I need a job to make money because I'm struggling. then maybe it's just, I actually have never had these opportunities and I'm trying to, and this is the only way I know how I've been told how. And maybe it's the playbook we tell people. You have to think about it at the start of anyone's life. We tell you to go to school. We tell you to do, good grades. We tell you to grow in your career. And we tell you to...

collect money and titles and all these wonderful things in our lovely ecosystem. Is that really a formula to success and happiness? And so maybe it's embedded in the system that we've created. And so it becomes a transactional nature. What can you do for me so I can do something?

Martin Hauck (44:42)
Yeah, I mean, it's fair. It's like, that's a pretty wild, wide question. So to, but I appreciate that take on it. I'm curious. What?

what's capturing your attention now professionally? Like what is what are you either keeping an eye on or or worried about? And you know, we don't have to go into the AI side of things because we went we we double clicked on that a little bit already. And if you want, we can go down that path. But I'm just like, from your vantage point, and like I've always had a ton of respect on for for like any conversation we've ever had, I just always to your point, you said it earlier, like you speak with conviction.

And that's absolutely true. And I think it's like, that's one of your many superpowers is you do speak with conviction. And when you don't know something, you're clear and upfront about it, which I wish more people did. But what, like as a professional in this space, you're what's, what's, what's capturing your attention right now? Like what's got you most concerned about the profession?

Karam (45:54)
I know you told me not to double click on it, but it really is AI. We can...

The world of work is changing in a way that we haven't expected. And so those level entry roles that would have been done by a coordinator that would have then became specialist that would have then became manager that preliminary data entry work and analysis work. It can be done by AI now. So the foundations are going away.

As we lose the foundations of teaching people how to come into the workplace, how to show up for work, how to work and interact with colleagues.

What I'm most interested about, we all talk about it. What is going to happen to roles? Will roles exist? What will structures look like? Everyone's curious about that. I'm curious about that. What I'm actually most interested in is how is this going to affect our behaviors as a society and as a business?

And we can use a drastic hypothetical in which call it 20 years from now. Let's use that as a placeholder. could be sooner, it could be later. Let's use 20 years because I don't want to scare people on the podcast. In 20 years, there is no blue collar jobs. There is no office jobs. AI can build an agent as a comp specialist, as a talent acquisition specialist, as a business partner, as, as, as, so forth.

We can create those personas. It sounds like a real human. looks like a real human. It talks between each other. It can problem solve all blue collar jobs go away. What are organizations anymore in 20 years from now? Are they AI pushing tools back and forth speaking to each other? Are they, I actually don't think as it goes back to behavioral psychology.

We cannot take on the amount of data points that are coming our way today. We can't, we are just not built that way and we haven't evolved to really be able to adapt to this. And so I think the thing that keeps me up at night, it kind of ties to organization in the world is where are we going? What does this look like? And so let's say none of us have jobs anymore, which is perfectly okay.

Do we all live in this utopic society, ⁓ that we're just like doing your passions and our loves and interests, your biking and hiking and swimming and, we're meeting in circles and talking about all those perspectives, or are we now the guard rails to the AI? I think that's the thing that's going to be really, really curious. And, nobody knows the answers. And I think like, if you listen to Sam Altman on an interview, he said,

If AI gets to a point where critical thinking for AI is better than the president of United States or better than a leader, then those leaders should step aside and let AI make those decisions free of emotion. But I think something people forget about AI, their machine learning, right? And they're overlaid on all this learning. They're learning from us and we are imperfect. So how perfect is your machine going to be? Right? Is it going to make that rational decision?

Martin Hauck (49:23)
Mm.

Karam (49:27)
Now I'm getting philosophical with you, of course. I think that's the thing that is most interesting to me as time has gone on, as we proceed forward, ⁓ because nobody has the answer. Everyone's just trying to catch up with the tool, trying to be the most innovative company, trying to embed AI, trying to change the experience for our clients or our employees while continuing the structure, continuing engagement, while continuing our

Martin Hauck (49:29)
No, no.

Karam (49:56)
our operating efforts, but where does it all go? Where is it going to net out? And I don't think we know. I think I usually you can kind of see patterns, but here I don't think we have a playbook. And I think we're all tossing and turning and tossing and turning because it's like, what happens next? ⁓ So I don't know.

Martin, to be honest, you asked me a question like, where do I see, I think at the very forefront of all of this, as practitioners in the field, I, whether people believe or not, are the, we are the part of the cell that continues to drive these changes and support them across an organization and partner with the business. So how are we as professionals continuously staying abreast of it?

And it is, I feel like every day I can wake up every morning and before I go to bed and read the latest and greatest, and then tomorrow there's something else. And so then with the insurmountable amount of information, where is the clarity? And that's where we run into a challenge. And that's, that's really what I'm thinking. It's like, with all this information, where is the truth? And I.

Martin Hauck (51:05)
or something new, yeah.

Karam (51:24)
I don't know how to define the answer yet.

Martin Hauck (51:27)
Is there one and this will be my this will be my last question. Is there one particular ⁓ thing that you're

as a result of this thing that's keeping you up? That's helping drive your helping you feel comfortable with it. Hey, I've got a plan. Like, here's this things that here's this aspect of the future that

concerns and worries me. What is it that you're doing? Is it just like, I just pay attention. I'm listening to podcasts about the future and just staying up to date ⁓ and aware of it. And if there's something like what what is that thing that you're you're doing to sort of like de risk it for

you?

Karam (52:11)
⁓ I think for me, it's, goes back to my initial, I'm always curious. So I, I love reading the latest and greatest, but in all that noise, you have to find some sort of center of gravity and clarity. So I think there's been two approaches I've taken. I have a lot of peers. So I always pick the ring with what are you doing? What's working? What's not working? What have you tried? What happens? You try it and you get their experience. Then you get.

the literature, it's like, the latest article from Forbes on the latest, you know, new ACMS that overlays AI. And it's so much better than Workday because it can do blah, blah, blah, blah. But then you have to ask yourself like critical questions like, okay, you're hearing all this noise. Is it actually doing what it's doing? Right. And luckily, unfortunately enough here at D2L, I'm the opportunity to sit on the AI enablement teams.

Martin Hauck (52:57)
Yeah.

Karam (53:05)
And we're really looking at tools and what are other industries doing? What is best practice? Where is everyone landing and how are people overlaying all of this? And then with that, you kind of start building your foundation. Like it's, it comes to a couple of fold. It's like, what's happening. Where are we going? What are we doing? What are we going to apply as an organization today? And how ready are we for it? Is that ready?

ready, ready assessment that we need to continuously do. And that's my answer. It's trying to be as informed as I can be in the areas that I can be that affect our worlds, asking questions from people around me to say, have you tried this? Like, Oh yeah, I built an agent. What did your agent do? I had to help. Did it actually work? Oh, actually no. The agent wasn't able to act as a business partner. They were able to ask standard employee questions. Okay. So it wasn't able to critically think.

Martin Hauck (54:04)
Hmm.

Karam (54:05)
look at the organizational problem. OK, so we're not there yet. ⁓ What other tools and avenues are there? And so those are the questions you have to ask yourself. And then let's apply some of them. Let's iterate. And now it's happening tomorrow. And tomorrow changes again. But it's also not to be reactive either, right? Taking that moment ⁓ to pause and think about it and then going from

Martin Hauck (54:25)
Yeah.

Amazing. Now this I'm glad we waited so long, because now we're gonna have this amazing trailer for the podcast that I didn't have at the time that we initially said, Hey, we should do a podcast. And you're like, Yes, let's do it. Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. ⁓ I had a blast on this chat. This was hopefully one of many episodes that we'll do together because I'm just a huge fan of you and your takes and your candor.

and your thoughtfulness. thanks so much for your time today. I appreciate it.

Karam (55:07)
Martin, you have to thank me, have to thank you. It's your time, it's your podcast, and thank you for having me on. I think I'm still learning from you too, and that's why I'm always curious asking you about, what are you doing? What's going on? Tell me about this. And it's really an honor and a privilege to be here. I think even getting the opportunity to talk for everyone out there, I still don't have all the answers. I may have a lot of tender. Please challenge my thinking. And if you do see this.

Martin Hauck (55:20)
you

Karam (55:37)
shoot me a message. happy to talk and I kind of just pick your brain. But Martin, a big, big thank you. And I look forward to the production of this. Thank you.

Martin Hauck (55:46)
Awesome. Cheers. Thanks, Karam