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Want to upskill for an AI future? It’s time to get emotional
A letter from editorial director Lisa Smosarski.

Trend-spotters have identified 2025 as the year of ‘human-centric’ leadership in work (I mean, tell me it’s almost 2025 without telling me it’s almost 2025…). Although this seems like another daft way of pointing out the obvious – that humans need a human touch from their bosses – it’s fascinating that, in the end, it could be the advance of AI technology that finally makes us recognise the true value of human kindness in management and embrace that kindness as an essential tool in doing business, and not just as a tactic saved for the progressive or naturally empathetic. As AI and technology rapidly develop to support and take over so many of our tasks (think admin, productivity, asset creation, work distribution, project oversight or even knowledge centres), it is leaders with the power to connect, motivate, inspire, emote and work empathetically that will really make the difference to how successfully a business – or how we as individuals and teams – will flourish alongside these new tools.

So, if you’re thinking about how you want to upskill for an AI future or build up your own team or culture, it’s time to get emotional. Here are three ways I’d recommend to get started.

  1. LISTEN: How coaching can transform managers into human-centric leaders. A great explanation of what human-centric leadership actually is.
  2. READ: KIND: The Quiet Power Of Kindness At Work by Graham Allcott, including a quote by moi. A brilliant introduction to kindness at work drawing on psychology and neuroscience as well as management theory and business research. Graham shows how kindness helps to encourage productive and positive work cultures.
  3. WATCH: Simon Sinek’s Understanding Empathy video. The workplace guru explains the importance of empathy.

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Work smarter: up your Excel skills
Acting digital content director Ellen Scott shares insightful hacks to make work that little bit easier.    

This is going to sound incredibly nerdy, but there are few things I’m more impressed by than someone knowing their way around a spreadsheet. I think it’s because my own Excel skills have never been that great. I’m always having to google how to create options in a cell or ask someone why my percentage formula isn’t working. But that’s not surprising – like so many of us, I’ve never had Excel-specific training and haven’t spent any time sharpening my ability.

Today’s Work Smarter isn’t a solution to that (if your job requires you to be an Excel whiz, your workplace absolutely should be providing training), but a way to dip your toe into the spreadsheet game. Think of it as a low-effort way to learn some quick tricks that will wow your easily impressed colleagues.

First off, a keyboard shortcuts cheat sheet. I’ve listed a few that are worth knowing below, but I recommend bookmarking this image shared on X.

  • Ctrl + A = select all contents of a worksheet
  • Ctrl + space = select the entire row
  • Ctrl + shift + % = turn a cell into the percentage format
  • Alt + N + V = insert pivot table
  • Ctrl + shift + & = apply a border around a cell

While using keyboard shortcuts is impressive (to me, at least), to really deepen your knowledge spend some time upskilling. LinkedIn Learning has multiple excellent courses on both Excel basics and more niche uses for the platform. One other option that’s worth considering: ask your workplace if they’d be up for buying a Microsoft Copilot license – that’ll give your Excel AI capabilities so you can automate all the faff.  


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