What Executive Feuds Reveal About Organizational Culture

Happy Sunday!

Leadership feuds might grab headlines, but for HR, they expose something deeper and more dangerous. When high-powered partnerships collapse in public, like the now-viral clash between Trump and Musk, they shine a spotlight on what happens when ego outweighs alignment.

It’s a timely reminder: toxic dynamics at the top don’t stay at the top they cascade through culture, fracture teams, and leave HR to pick up the pieces. So what can we learn from the world’s most chaotic breakup?

⬇️ Upcoming in this issue

• 🚨 When Egos Explode: What Executive Feuds Reveal About Organizational Culture

• 📊 New Data | The May 2025 Jobs Report: Resilience Meets Risk

• 🤖 Microsoft’s Prediction for HR leaders on AI Leadership

• 🌴 Out of Office (Sort Of): Why Workers Can’t Fully Disconnect

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• This CPO merged her company’s HR department and IT departments and says it transformed their onboarding process

• The frontline is so disconnected, 46% don’t even know who their CEO is, finds Workvivo

🚨 When Egos Explode: What Executive Feuds Reveal About Organizational Culture

Executive feuds, especially the kind exploding across social media expose the fractures that were always there beneath the surface. The bitter blowout between Donald Trump and Elon Musk is a masterclass in what happens when alignment is transactional and ego outweighs everything else.

And while most organizations aren’t led by billionaires with private platforms and national budgets, the lessons for HR are alarmingly familiar and deeply useful.

Key Insights

• 🧨 Power without alignment breeds chaos
  Musk and Trump’s fallout shows what happens when leaders are united by ego, not shared values—HR must prioritize value-based alignment.

• 💸 Toxic feuds cost more than PR damage
  Leadership wars derail morale, succession plans, and strategy—often causing millions in talent loss and strategic drift.

• 🏭 Feuds fracture entire cultures
  Just like Adidas and Puma’s legendary split, interpersonal conflict can splinter workforces, reshape towns, and scar legacy brands.

• 🛠 Structure is the antidote to ego
  Strong culture, proactive mediation, and succession planning are HR’s best tools to contain toxic leadership clashes before they erupt.

read the full 763-word article here

📊 New Data | The May 2025 Jobs Report: Resilience Meets Risk

The May 2025 numbers show strength on the surface steady unemployment and rising wages, yet beneath lies a complex picture of economic tension, political shifts, and participation slippage.

While some industries are thriving, and purchasing power is inching up, other signals suggest a cooling market and growing structural vulnerabilities.

Key Insights

• 📉 Participation drop masks deeper employment decline
  Despite 139,000 new jobs, labor force participation fell by 625,000—hiding a sharper employment drop of nearly 700,000 people.

• 💼 Federal job cuts accelerate under new policy
  Federal government roles shrank by 22,000 in May alone—totaling 59,000 cuts since January under Trump’s efficiency agenda.

• 📈 Wage growth outpaces inflation for now
  With a 3.9% annual wage increase versus 2.3% inflation, real income is rising—keeping consumer power steady despite labor concerns.

• 🌐 Tariffs may fuel inflation, curb hiring
  Tariff policies could raise inflation by 0.4% through 2026, as predicted by CBO, possibly chilling job growth across key sectors.

read the full 435-word article here

😄 Comic Relief (HR Edition)

🤖 Microsoft’s Prediction for HR leaders on AI Leadership

Across industries, a new type of leadership is emerging: one that doesn’t supervise people, but intelligent agents. These AI-powered coworkers are beginning to handle everything from research to analysis, and the leaders of tomorrow will need to direct them as if they were human team members.

Key Insights

• 🧑‍💼 Meet your new boss: a human managing AI agents
  Microsoft predicts leaders will soon oversee teams of AI agents—delegating tasks, scaling productivity, and reshaping organizational structures.

• 📊 AI fluency gap divides leaders and employees
  67% of leaders understand AI agents vs. just 40% of employees—revealing a pressing need for upskilling and workforce-wide education.

• 🛠️ Redesigning HR from the ground up
  Agent-powered workplaces demand reimagined job roles, onboarding, and L&D—not just tool deployment, but full-scale transformation.

• 📈 AI literacy is 2025’s top skill—and rising fast
  Pairing tech fluency with human strengths like adaptability and creativity is now essential for meaningful career growth and retention.

read the full 829-word article here

🌴 Out of Office (Sort Of): Why Workers Can’t Fully Disconnect

According to new research, most workers are either skipping vacations or quietly working through them, hinting at a troubling disconnect between policy and culture.

When employees fake availability or sneak early exits, it’s a signal that the workplace doesn’t fully support true rest.

Key Insights

• 🧘 58% of employees can’t fully unplug on vacation
  Only 37% disconnect completely while off—many feel guilty or unsupported, staying half-tethered to Slack, email, or worse.

• 💼 Workload, affordability, and lack of backup block vacations
  28% can’t afford a break; 20% say work’s too busy; 18% lack coverage—creating barriers even before PTO begins.

• 📉 “Stealth” time off reveals cultural cracks
  34% pretend to work via messaging apps; 47% log off early—signs that downtime isn’t normalized or openly supported.

• 📣 Manager behavior shapes time-off culture
  When leaders model healthy detachment, it sends a strong signal—employees feel safer stepping away and productivity improves long-term.

read the full 847-word article here

Sophia Bennett | Editor-in-Chief | HR Insights Today