HP’s 2024 Work Relationship Index uncovered some disturbing trends among employees and their relationships with work. Among them, a whopping 50 percent of people report spending time on tasks they feel are completely meaningless. That’s a recipe for an unproductive, disengaged workforce. However, Antonio Lucio, CMO and corporate affairs officer at HP, believes the solution to this looming crisis might lie in business leaders finding a way to thoughtfully implement technologies like AI to alleviate the need for employees to work on meaningless tasks, while also striving to lead with empathy, first and foremost.

The industry titan joined the On Scope podcast to discuss his organization’s research and the solutions he and his team are working on to make employees happier, healthier, and more engaged.

Along with host Mike Berberich, Antonio covered some of the issues he feels are negatively affecting the company-employee relationship right now, what some solutions to those issues might be, how AI might be a means of driving employee engagement rather than a tool for replacing the workforce, and his advice for older individuals in leadership positions who are struggling with being more empathetic to modern day employee expectations and sentiments toward work.

On “Marketing News You Might Have Missed,” Mike and show producer Ryan Dinger discussed some good news for a change, highlighting an Ad Age report detailing how predictions of a huge falloff in ad sales and spend in 2025 might be overblown. However, the picture wasn’t all rosy, as forecasts suggest we’re not out of the woods on a potential recession just yet. As a result, Mike and Ryan opine on how now is not the time for marketers to rest on their laurels.

Are you looking to enhance your wellbeing and productivity at work? Then you don’t want to miss the Enhancing Wellbeing and Productivity in the Workplace 401 workshop, brought to you by the ANA’s Marketing Training and Development Center. You can learn more about the workshop and save your spot by visiting www.ana.net/productivity.

The On Scope team would love to hear from you! If you have a topic or guest idea for the show, you can email us at onscope@ana.net.