The $100 million signal: Why EY is rewarding human judgment in the AI era

7 September 2026Leave a comment

One of the clearest signs that artificial intelligence is changing the economy may not be a new model launch or another round of layoffs.

It may be a bonus scheme.

EY US has announced that it will invest $100 million in employee rewards for people who develop future-focused skills, strengthen the firm’s culture, drive innovation and deliver exceptional client service. The programme recognises qualities such as business acumen, judgment, adaptability, leadership and collaboration.

At first glance, this sounds like a sentimental return to “human skills” in response to the rise of AI.

It is more interesting than that.

EY is not choosing people over technology. Technology adoption is explicitly part of the programme. The firm wants professionals who can use advanced technologies to turn disruption into opportunity, while also contributing the qualities that make those technologies useful in the real world.

That combination tells us something important about the emerging Personality Economy.

This is not a bonus for being nice

The phrase “human skills” can easily become vague. It may suggest that companies are now rewarding kindness, empathy and good communication instead of expertise.

That is not what EY’s announcement actually says.

The official programme focuses on three levels of contribution: everyday leadership, transformation that produces measurable results, and game-changing impact on the organisation. It rewards people who learn quickly, experiment, collaborate, innovate and connect technology to meaningful outcomes.

In other words, EY is not paying people simply for being human.

It is paying attention to how people behave when the old rules stop working.

That distinction matters. The value is not in possessing a personality. The value lies in what someone does with their knowledge, character and judgment when faced with uncertainty.

A technically brilliant professional who cannot recognise a flawed AI output is a risk. Someone who can identify the problem, ask better questions, explain the consequences and take responsibility for the final decision is considerably more valuable.

The technology may have produced the first answer. The human still determines whether that answer deserves to be used.

Knowledge is becoming a weaker signal

For decades, the Knowledge Economy rewarded accumulation.

Degrees, certifications, years of experience and specialist knowledge were useful signals. They indicated that someone had invested time in learning a particular field. They also helped organisations decide whom to trust.

AI is weakening some of those signals.

A growing number of people can now access high-quality explanations, research, analysis, translations, code and first drafts within seconds. This does not make expertise irrelevant. It does make the mere possession of information less distinctive.

The question is shifting from:

What do you know?

to:

What can you recognise, decide, explain and take responsibility for?

This is why judgment becomes so important.

AI can compare documents, summarise regulations, generate options and identify patterns. But organisations still need people who can decide which problem is worth solving, which trade-off is acceptable, which risk matters most and what a client actually needs.

The most valuable person in the room may no longer be the one who knows the most facts. It may be the one who knows which facts matter.

The Personality Economy is not about charisma

The term “Personality Economy” can be misunderstood as a celebration of personal branding, extroversion or social-media visibility.

That is too narrow.

Personality, in this context, means the recognisable way in which someone applies knowledge. It includes their standards, instincts, communication style, values, courage, curiosity and ability to create trust.

Two professionals can have access to exactly the same AI tools and produce completely different outcomes.

One may accept the first plausible answer. Another may challenge the assumptions, notice what is missing and ask a better question. One may hide behind the technology when something goes wrong. Another may take ownership and explain the decision transparently.

The difference is not simply technical skill.

It is the human pattern surrounding the skill.

That is what makes the EY announcement such a useful example. The firm is not only interested in whether employees use AI. It is interested in whether they can use it responsibly, creatively and productively in a professional context.

The danger of rewarding “human skills”

There is, however, a risk in celebrating this development too quickly.

Human skills are difficult to measure. “Judgment”, “leadership” and “adaptability” can become attractive labels for decisions that managers already wanted to reward. A system designed to value personality may accidentally reward confidence, similarity or visibility instead of genuine contribution.

“Culture fit” is a particularly dangerous phrase in this context. It can mean shared values and constructive behaviour. But it can also become a polite way of hiring and promoting people who look, sound and behave like the people already in power.

There is another risk: turning human capability into a substitute for technical expertise.

An enthusiastic employee with a great attitude still needs enough domain knowledge to make sound decisions. A charming consultant who cannot understand the technical limitations of an AI system is not more valuable because they communicate well.

The strongest professionals will combine both dimensions. They will understand their field deeply enough to recognise errors, while remaining adaptable enough to keep learning.

The future is unlikely to belong to people with 100 per cent technical expertise or 100 per cent personality. It will belong to people who combine expertise with judgment, technology with responsibility and speed with discernment.

What organisations should learn from EY

The most useful lesson is not that every organisation should create a $100 million reward programme.

It is that reward systems reveal what a company truly values.

If employees are rewarded only for producing more output, they will use AI to produce more output. If they are rewarded for better decisions, stronger relationships, useful experimentation and measurable impact, they will be encouraged to use AI differently.

That requires organisations to make human contribution visible.

They need to recognise people who:

turn AI experiments into better business processes;
improve the quality of decisions rather than merely increasing speed;
help colleagues become more capable with technology;
identify risks that automated systems overlook;
translate complex outputs into clear advice;
build trust with clients, colleagues and stakeholders.

These contributions are often less visible than a completed task or a generated document. They are also more difficult to standardise.

That may be precisely why they are becoming more valuable.

The new premium is trusted judgment

EY’s announcement is therefore more than an internal rewards initiative. It is a market signal.

As AI makes knowledge more accessible and routine production more abundant, organisations will increasingly compete on the quality of human decisions around that technology.

The Personality Economy does not reward people merely because they are human. Being human is not automatically a competitive advantage.

The advantage comes from being recognisably, responsibly and usefully human.

The person who can combine knowledge with judgment. Technology with accountability. Expertise with empathy. Speed with the courage to pause.

EY is putting $100 million behind that idea.

The more important question is whether other organisations are prepared to change what they reward.

When a German Marketer Recognised Himself in My Story

10 August 2026Leave a comment

I recently gave a presentation to the international marketing team of a Dutch company that produces professional LED lighting.

The topic was content marketing in the age of AI agents. Or, more simply: what happens when your website is no longer only visited by people, but also by software acting on behalf of those people?

During the presentation, I shared something I had learned years earlier while researching international content marketing. Several experts had told me the same thing: Germany is a special case.

German buyers, they said, are not easily impressed by marketing language. They do not want vague claims, shiny promises or emotional shortcuts. They want proof.

If you say your product is more durable, they want to know how you measured that. If you say it performs better, they want the data. If you say customers trust you, they want reviews, references and external confirmation.

Then I looked at the German marketer in the meeting.

And he started smiling.

He immediately recognised himself in the description. When he researches a product, he explained, he hardly reads the promotional text on the website. He gets a quick impression, then goes looking for evidence. References. Reviews. Pictures. Videos. And especially the negative reviews, because those often reveal what is really going on.

For him, this was not scepticism for the sake of scepticism. It was how trust is built.

That moment made the presentation come alive.

Because the central point I was trying to make was that AI agents behave in a surprisingly similar way. They do not care much for slogans. They compare claims. They look for sources. They prefer structured information, technical details and clear evidence. They are not persuaded by a company saying it is the best. They want to understand whether that statement can be verified.

In that sense, the future of marketing may become more German than we expect.

After my presentation, the German marketer said the story had given him a real insight. It helped him understand why different markets sometimes have different expectations. What felt obvious to him was not obvious to everyone else. And what others sometimes saw as too much detail, he saw as the beginning of trust.

Later, he decided to hire me.

For me, that was a perfect little example of the Personality Economy.

The knowledge in the presentation mattered, of course. But knowledge is becoming easier to access every day. He could have asked an AI tool to explain international content marketing, German buying behaviour or agentic experience.

What made the difference was not just the information. It was the moment of recognition.

A Dutch marketer talking about German trust. A German marketer seeing his own behaviour reflected back at him. A business topic becoming personal, without becoming less professional.

That is what I mean by the shift from the knowledge economy to the Personality Economy.

In a knowledge economy, people hire you because you know something.

In a Personality Economy, people hire you because your knowledge becomes meaningful through who you are, how you think and how you connect it to their world.

AI can explain a concept.

But it cannot be you in the room when someone suddenly says: “Yes, that is exactly how I think.”

Hiring for Heart: What a Dutch Plumber Teaches Us About the Personality Economy

28 April 202628 April 2026Leave a comment

While much of the debate around the Personality Economy focuses on tech founders, AI engineers, and media entrepreneurs, one of the clearest real-world examples comes from a thirty-person plumbing and installation business in a small village in the south of the Netherlands. Martijn Verspeek runs Installatiebedrijf Verspeek in Valkenswaard, and his new book “Goeiegast” (roughly:
“Good Guy”), co-written with journalist Eddy Buiting, has been the number one management book in the country for more than a hundred days.

What is a village plumber doing at the top of a management bestseller list? The short answer: he hires for personality, and everything else follows.

No salary talk. Still a waiting list.

When Verspeek interviews a candidate, he doesn’t mention what they will earn. He doesn’t ask for a list of certificates or push them through a standardised assessment. He simply tries to find out whether the person in front of him is a goeiegast or a goeievrouwke (a good guy, a good woman). Someone with the right attitude, humour and character.

The result is the kind of number every HR director quietly dreams about: a waiting list of more than thirty people who want to work there. In an industry that spends every conference complaining about the shortage of skilled technicians, a small company in Brabant has people queuing up, without knowing what the job pays.

“I think it’s perfectly normal to have a bit of love for your employees. The whole country is moaning that they can’t find people, and then I walk into companies where the director has a parking space right next to the front door while the rank and file get soaked when it rains.”

Why this fits the Personality Economy

The argument behind the Personality Economy is that once AI and digital tools make knowledge widely available, the scarce resource is no longer what you know; it is who you are and how you work with others. Verspeek makes the same argument from the other side of the labour market. Technical skill can be taught; a sense of humour, reliability, and genuine care for a customer cannot.

Elon Musk, from a very different corner of the economy, put it bluntly in a 2023 interview:
“The biggest mistake, in general, I’ve made, is to put too much of a weighting on someone’s talent and not enough on their personality. I think it actually matters whether somebody has a good heart, it really does.”

A Tesla founder and a Brabant plumber do not agree on much, but on this they seem to agree completely. Verspeek’s choices line up almost point for point with the traits Steven Bartlett and Simon Sinek describe in earlier pieces on this site:

Attitude over credentials. Verspeek hires people who fit the culture and trusts his team to teach them the trade.
Trust over control. There are no rules, only agreements. Monteurs drive identical vans, but every driver fits out the inside exactly as they like.
Relationships over transactions. Formal performance reviews are replaced by what he calls kampvuurgesprekken (campfire conversations) in which people talk like adults instead of being “judged” once a year.
Continuity over maximisation. He deliberately caps the company at around thirty people and aims for long-term health rather than growth for its own sake.

The PSV-inspired changing room is the most quoted detail; every employee has their own chair, their own locker, their own photograph on the wall, and work clothes that are washed by the company with their name on them. It is a small, almost silly thing. It is also a very precise signal: you are seen as a person, not as a pair of hands.

A sceptical look

It would be too easy to turn Verspeek into a poster for “hire for attitude and the rest sorts itself out”. A few honest objections:

Scale matters. Running a thirty-person family business in one region is very different from running a thousand-person company across several countries. Some of what works here works because the company is small on purpose.
Technical skill still matters. An installation engineer who is lovely but cannot wire a heat pump safely is a liability. Attitude is the filter, not the substitute.
“Culture fit” has a dark side. Hiring people who feel like one of us can quietly turn into hiring people who look like one of us. Any company copying this approach has to ask honestly who ends up on that waiting list — and who never applies in the first place.

Verspeek is well aware of the “small and on purpose” advantage. He says so himself in the book. That honesty is part of why the story is convincing rather than preachy.

What to take away from this

The Personality Economy is often framed as a response to AI: if the robots know everything, humans compete on character. Verspeek arrived at the same conclusion through something much older — a Brabant farmer’s common sense, as the Dutch would say. Look after your people, and they will look after your customers. Hire for who someone is, and worry about the certificates later. For HR, that points to a few practical shifts:

Rewrite the job interview around behaviour and values, not around the CV.
Replace the annual review with shorter, more honest conversations; campfires, not courtrooms.
Invest in the small signals (the changing room, the van, the name on the jacket) that tell employees they are individuals, not headcount.

The knowledge economy rewarded what you had studied. The Personality Economy rewards how
you treat the people around you. A village plumber has just sold more than a hundred thousand
copies of a book making that point. Maybe it is time the rest of us listened.

Elon Musk’s Dojo 3 Call: Technical Meritocracy Meets the Personality Economy

22 February 2026Leave a comment

Elon Musk posted a strikingly simple recruiting message for Tesla’s restarted Dojo 3 supercomputer project:

“No résumé. No degree. Just send 3 bullets of tough technical problems you actually solved to AI_Chips@Tesla.com (mailto:_Chips@Tesla.com)”

Within hours the post garnered thousands of likes, hundreds of replies, and a flood of speculation. Some celebrated the purest form of meritocracy imaginable; others worried about signal-to-noise ratio or suspected it was mostly performative. Yet beneath the hype lies one of the clearest real-time demonstrations yet of how the Personality Economy is infiltrating even the most elite engineering domains.

Why this format is personality-first (even in hard tech)

Traditional semiconductor/AI-chip hiring pipelines demand:

PhD or elite master’s degree
Years at NVIDIA / AMD / Google TPU teams
Long publication list or patent portfolio
Polished LinkedIn + referrals

Musk’s method discards almost all of those signals in favor of one question: “Show me you have already solved difficult, real problems with AI tools.”

The three-bullet constraint forces extreme conciseness and clarity—skills that correlate strongly with:

Ability to prioritize what matters (judgment)
Capacity to explain complex work simply (communication & emotional intelligence)
Evidence of self-directed learning and iteration (adaptability and learning speed)

These are exactly the traits Steven Bartlett and Simon Sinek highlight when they argue for attitude and learning velocity over credentials. In a world where Grok, Claude, Gemini, and open-source models let anyone accelerate prototyping, the person who can quickly turn vague goals into working silicon or training runs becomes irreplaceable.

Dojo 3 context: why the bar is so high yet so open

Tesla quietly shelved earlier Dojo ambitions after the AI5 chip design wrapped, then quietly revived the program in late 2025 with the explicit goal of building the world’s highest-volume AI training chips. That means Dojo 3 engineers must solve problems at the bleeding edge of:

Custom interconnect fabrics
Extreme power density
Software-hardware co-design for trillion-parameter models
Cost-per-FLOP at planetary scale

Yet Musk is betting that the fastest path to those breakthroughs is not poaching the usual suspects from the usual pedigrees, but casting the widest possible net for people who have already proven they can wrestle hard technical reality using today’s AI assistance.This is the Personality Economy logic applied to frontier hardware: AI has democratized access to simulation tools, code generation, optimization literature, and even architecture exploration. What remains scarce is the combination of grit, pattern recognition, taste in experimentation, and willingness to fail repeatedly until something works. Those qualities do not reliably appear on a CV.

Counterpoints: when pure attitude isn’t enough

Skeptics rightly point out risks:

Volume of emails could overwhelm recruiters (though Tesla likely uses AI filtering + human spot-checks).
Self-reported bullets are easy to embellish or outright fabricate.
Certain chip-design subtleties (e.g., analog layout parasitics, foundry process quirks) still require deep tacit knowledge that only comes from years on the floor.
Team composition needs balance: visionaries + fast learners must be paired with domain veterans who prevent reinventing broken wheels.

The site’s earlier pieces on hiring for attitude consistently note this tension. The strongest outcome is rarely 100 % attitude or 100 % pedigree—it is deliberate complementarity.

What this means for the rest of us

Whether or not you are aiming for Tesla’s AI chip team, Musk’s experiment is a loud signal:

Document your real problem-solving stories now (GitHub repos, blog posts, Twitter threads, short Loom videos).
Practice distilling complex work into three crisp, outcome-focused bullets.
Treat AI as a co-pilot that amplifies your curiosity and persistence, not a magic shortcut.
Build a public trace of how you think and iterate—because in the Personality Economy, your demonstrated character and learning velocity increasingly serve as your primary credential.

The knowledge economy rewarded accumulation.

The Personality Economy rewards what you do with what is already abundant.

If three powerful bullets can open the door to one of the most ambitious AI hardware projects on Earth, imagine what the same clarity and evidence could unlock in your own field. What tough technical (or business / creative / operational) problem did you solve lately using AI tools?

Steven Bartlett: The Poster Child of the Personality Economy

20 January 2026Leave a comment

In a world still clinging to the benchmarks of the old Knowledge Economy, Steven Bartlett stands as a loud, successful contradiction to the traditional rules of hiring. Bartlett, a 33-year-old British entrepreneur and the youngest-ever investor on BBC’s Dragons’ Den, recently shared a clear directive for modern leaders: “Hire people who are willing to learn quickly, have a great attitude and work really hard. Don’t just settle for education and experience.”

This philosophy isn’t just a trend; it is the practical application of the shift toward a personality-driven market.

Moving Beyond the “Knowledge” Trap

The traditional Knowledge Economy values specialized skills and degrees above all else. However, as the book The Personality Economy explains, the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and digital tools has made information and technical knowledge easily accessible to everyone.

Bartlett himself is a prime example of this decline in the value of traditional education. His CV lists his education simply as “Dropout”. Despite this, he launched Social Chain AG at 21 and took it public with a market cap of approximately $300 million by the age of 27. His success was driven not by a certificate, but by entrepreneurship, marketing savvy, and social media expertise—qualities that are difficult for machines to replicate.

Why Attitude Wins in the New Economy

When Bartlett argues for prioritizing “learning speed” and “attitude,” he is identifying the core components of the Personality Economy:

Emotional Intelligence (EI): The ability to build relationships and communicate effectively is now a key differentiator in the job market.
Adaptability: As technology automates data analysis and research, the human value lies in being flexible and creative in how we solve problems.
Authenticity: Bartlett’s personal brand is built on being a “media owner” and “media IP” creator. In this new paradigm, individuals are hired for their overall “package” of personality and experience rather than just their qualifications.

A Skeptical Look at the “Attitude Only” Approach

While Bartlett’s stance is compelling, a rigorous analysis requires us to look at the gaps in this logic.

The Measurement Gap: Education and experience provide a measurable baseline of discipline and foundational knowledge. How do we objectively measure “great attitude” or “hard work” during a 45-minute interview without falling into the trap of hiring for “cultural fit,” which can often lead to a lack of diversity?
Domain Necessity: While attitude is vital in marketing or social media, certain industries—like medicine or engineering—cannot yet bypass formal education for “willingness to learn.”
The Burden of Training: Hiring for potential means the organization must have the resources to train. If a company is in a high-pressure “scale-up” phase, it may not have the luxury of waiting for a “fast learner” to catch up.

Preparing Your Organization

Bartlett’s companies, such as Chapter 2, specifically focus on helping companies hire the right people more efficiently. This aligns with the advice for HR professionals in the Personality Economy: recruitment processes must evolve to assess soft skills like creativity and emotional intelligence alongside traditional qualifications.

By focusing on the unique human qualities that AI cannot automate, leaders can build teams that are not just knowledgeable, but truly irreplaceable. Steven Bartlett didn’t wait for the economy to change; he built his success on the very principles that are now reshaping the future of work.

Hiring for Attitude Over Skills

21 March 202521 March 2025Leave a comment

In today’s rapidly changing job market, the debate over hiring for attitude versus skills has gained prominence. Simon Sinek’s assertion, “You don’t hire for skills, you hire for attitude. You can always teach skills,” encapsulates this perspective. This approach emphasizes the importance of inherent qualities over specific competencies, which fits in the Personality Economy.

The Rationale Behind Hiring for Attitude:

Adaptability: Employees with a positive attitude are more likely to embrace change and adapt to new challenges, a crucial trait in dynamic industries.
Cultural Fit: Hiring individuals whose values align with the organization’s culture fosters a cohesive work environment, enhancing collaboration and morale.
Trainability: An individual with the right attitude is often more open to learning and development, making it easier to impart necessary skills.

Supporting Evidence:

Person–Organization Fit: Research indicates that employees who align with their organization’s culture tend to exhibit higher job satisfaction and commitment, leading to reduced turnover.
Soft Skills Significance: Attributes such as communication, teamwork, and problem-solving are increasingly valued by employers, often outweighing technical skills in certain roles.Reuters

Counterarguments:

Role-Specific Requirements: Certain positions necessitate specialized skills that cannot be quickly taught, making immediate proficiency essential.
Training Resources: Not all organizations have the capacity to train employees extensively, making pre-existing skills a practical necessity.
Measurability: Skills are often more quantifiable than attitudes, simplifying the assessment process during hiring.

Balancing Attitude and Skills:

While attitude plays a pivotal role in an employee’s success, a balanced approach that considers both attitude and requisite skills is often most effective. This ensures that new hires can integrate smoothly into the company culture while also fulfilling the technical demands of their roles.

Simon Sinek’s perspective therefore highlights the enduring value of attitude in the workplace. However, the optimal hiring strategy may involve a nuanced evaluation of both attitude and skills, tailored to the specific needs of the organization and the nature of the position.

The rise of social skills: A new era for leadership in the Personality Economy

3 March 2025Leave a comment

In today’s rapidly evolving workplace, the qualities that define effective leadership are undergoing a profound transformation. I notice that personality traits are becoming more and more important in the selection of leaders, and expertise less.

For decades, traditional markers of executive success—such as expertise in managing financial and material resources—dominated the criteria for hiring top-level leaders. However, as the world becomes increasingly interconnected and complex, organizations are placing greater emphasis on a different set of skills: social and interpersonal abilities.

The chart titled “Help Wanted: CEOs Who Are Good with People” captures this shift vividly. Since 2007, companies advertising C-suite openings have steadily increased their focus on candidates with strong social skills, while de-emphasizing operational expertise. This trend reflects a broader cultural and economic shift toward what some are calling the “personality economy,” where emotional intelligence and people-centric leadership take center stage.

Breaking down the data

The data, drawn from nearly 5,000 C-suite job descriptions analyzed by Russell Reynolds Associates, compares changes relative to the year 2000. Two distinct trends emerge:

Social skills on the rise: Job descriptions emphasizing social skills have seen a consistent upward trajectory since 2007, now surpassing a 25% increase compared to 2000. This includes qualities like emotional intelligence, collaboration, communication, and the ability to inspire and manage teams effectively.
Operational expertise declining: In contrast, job descriptions prioritizing operational skills—such as managing financial and material resources—have plummeted by nearly 40% over the same period.

The divergence between these two skill sets highlights a significant redefinition of what it means to lead in today’s world.

Why are social skills more valued than ever?

Several factors explain this shift:

The rise of team-oriented workplaces:
Modern organizations increasingly rely on cross-functional teams to solve complex problems. Leaders who can foster collaboration and navigate interpersonal dynamics are better equipped to drive innovation and productivity.
Globalization and diversity:
As companies expand globally, leaders must navigate cultural differences and build inclusive environments. Social skills like empathy and adaptability are essential for fostering trust across diverse teams.
The digital transformation:
Technology has automated many operational tasks traditionally managed by executives. This frees leaders to focus on higher-order responsibilities like vision-setting, relationship-building, and motivating employees.
Employee expectations:
Today’s workforce values purpose-driven leadership and meaningful connections with their employers. Leaders who can engage employees on a personal level are more likely to retain top talent and maintain morale.

What this means for aspiring leaders

For those looking to climb the corporate ladder, this data sends a clear message: technical expertise alone is no longer enough. To succeed in today’s competitive job market, aspiring leaders must cultivate their social skills alongside their technical abilities. This includes:

Developing emotional intelligence through active listening and empathy.
Building strong communication skills to inspire and align teams.
Learning how to manage conflict constructively.
Embracing diversity and fostering inclusivity in decision-making processes.

The rise of social skills as a priority in C-suite hiring therefore reflects a broader societal shift toward valuing human connection in an increasingly digital world. As companies navigate unprecedented challenges—from technological disruption to global crises—the ability to lead with empathy, authenticity, and collaboration has never been more critical.

For organizations seeking transformative leadership or individuals aspiring to lead, one thing is clear: the future belongs to those who are good with people.