When the market cheers layoffs, culture becomes your competitive edge.

On what's happening in the workforce right now — and what it means for the rest of us.

This week, Reuters broke the story that Meta is planning to cut 20% of its workforce — potentially 16,000 people — to help fund its AI ambitions.

When the news hit, Meta's stock went up nearly 3%.

Let that land for a moment.

The market celebrated. Thousands of jobs announced gone, and investors cheered. Meta isn't alone: Amazon cut 16,000 jobs in January. Block eliminated nearly half its staff in February. Atlassian cut 1,600 roles last week. The stated reason, again and again, is AI — the bet that smaller teams equipped with powerful tools will outperform larger teams without them.

Maybe that's true. Maybe it isn't. But here's what I know: this is not just a Big Tech story. The logic is spreading. And whether you're running a 12-person company or a 5000-person firm, it is going to reach you (if it hasn't already.)

Here's what I want to talk about. Not the fear. Not the headlines. But the thing underneath them that doesn't get said enough:

When AI is doing more of the work, when teams are leaner, when every hire counts more than it ever did — the quality of the workplace those humans inhabit becomes everything.

This isn't soft. It is, in fact, brutally practical.

I've spent 40+ years inside organizations, and I can tell you what the research confirms and what my gut has always known: people don't leave jobs, they leave cultures. They leave leaders who don't see them. They leave teams where they can't do their best work.

They leave places that reduce them to a function rather than recognize them as a full human being.

And they stay (they stay and they give everything, btw) when the opposite is true.

"People want to work somewhere that brings out their best. That's not a nice-to-have. In this moment, it's the whole game."

In a world where companies are shrinking headcount and betting on AI to fill the gap, the businesses that will win the talent they need are the ones that have built something worth working for. A culture that's honest. Leadership that actually leads — that holds the vision, stays present, tells the truth, and makes people feel like what they do matters. Teams that function like teams, not just collections of individuals sharing an email domain.

Because the talented person you want to hire, and keep, has options. They always have. But right now, in a moment when people are watching colleagues get laid off and wondering if they're next, they are also paying very close attention to where they put their energy.

What does this place actually stand for? Does my manager have my back? Do I feel like I belong here?

Those questions are not new. The urgency behind them is.

This is happening everywhere. In every industry, every city, every size of organization. The specific pressures vary by geography and sector, but the underlying human truth is universal.

You are not imagining the strain. You're not behind for feeling unsure about what comes next. The ground is genuinely shifting, and it is shifting for everyone.

The leaders and business owners who will navigate it best are the ones who stay connected — to good information, to honest peers, and to the conviction that how you treat the humans in your organization is not separate from your strategy.

It is your strategy.

Culture. Leadership. Team health. These are the building blocks of a business that can attract and keep the people it needs to do remarkable work, especially when the world outside is turbulent.

I've believed this for three decades. I believe it now more than ever.

The people in your organization are paying attention. The question is whether you are too.