How AI Is Changing Who Gets Promoted | Ximena Paul, Nala

Ximena Paul (0:00)

As somebody managing employee, you need to understand that whatever is that you're feeling, they're feeling as well, which is right now overwhelmed everywhere. People are feeling anxiety, fear. So I think when you think about leaders in one year or in five years, they need to have criteria, ethics, creativity because things are going to change, but they need to be good decision makers and they need to be people with a lot of empathy because the human brain is not wired to deal with this level of uncertainty, but it is what it's happening. And as a manager, you've got to be managing those emotional as well.

Brooke Gramer (0:28)

Welcome to the AI Movement Podcast. The space where modern entrepreneurs and founders come to stay current and navigate their next move with AI together. I cover the conferences, sit with the people leading this shift, and I bring it all here. Broken down, without the hype, whether you're building something, pivoting your work, or trying to keep ahead ethically. You are in the right place. Let's get into it. Hello everyone and welcome back to the show. I'm your host, Brooke Gramer. And today I'm sitting down with Himena Paul. She's the CEO and co-founder of NALA. It's an AI-powered HR platform that helps companies manage performance reviews, talent reviews, succession planning, and workforce planning to talk about how AI is changing the way companies hire, develop, and lead their people. Jameena is originally from Chile and has spent the past four years building NALA with what started as a simple tool for HR teams has now grown into a platform that helps leaders use data to make better decisions about their people and prepare for how their teams may need to change. In our conversation, we talk about how AI can make employee reviews more fair and useful. What skills leaders will need as teams become a mix of people and AI agents. And why do we believe AI should support better decisions instead of making those decisions for us? This episode is for leaders, managers, HR professionals, and anyone wondering what skills will matter most as our workplace continues to change during the AI movement.

Jimena, thank you so much for being on the podcast. Looking forward to having me here. It's a pleasure to meet and connect with you.

For listeners who may not be aware of your work and all the amazing things you're up to, could you just do a quick intro about yourself and how you're at the intersection of artificial intelligence today?

Ximena Paul (2:24)

Okay, perfect. So my name is Jimena. I'm the CEO and co-founder of Nala. So Nala is an AI-powered platform that helps companies run performance review, talent review, succession planning. So a lot of complex processes that companies do to identify top performers, decide who they're gonna invest, and especially how they're gonna get ready for the future. So within NALA, we're in the intersection with AI very deeply because as a tech company, of course, we're very AI driven and we use it on our everyday basis, but also like from our customer perspective within our product, we need to be able to deliver and make sure they're getting the top-of-the-notch technology.

So it's it's two things. So very AI right now. Everything is about AI.

Brooke Gramer (3:10)

Everything. Yes.

So so many things to dig in. The HR industry is getting deeply impacted. And I can tell people are applying to jobs more than ever and have the AI-assisted powered search and support. But can you share a little bit more about what NALA does and how it's like an HR tech platform specifically for the workforce and what are the key benefits of it?

Ximena Paul (3:32)

Okay, so within the HR space, uh there's different things. So you have what when you're applying to a job, there's systems that will help you either get interviewed or apply for a job, or it will help companies identify better candidates. Then you have systems that will help companies do like the the hard HR, meaning um payroll benefits, uh, employee relations, things that you have to have and they need to run smoothly and there's a lot of liability if that's not happening.

Brooke Gramer (3:59)

Right.

Ximena Paul (3:59)

And then you have uh things that companies do around um making sure people have the tools to do what it is that they need to do, and processes that help them identify top performers for low performers and also identify where are the gaps so that they can invest in talent. So Nala would be on the third one.

So uh usually clients that come to us, it's because they need a software and a partner that will help them scale processes around performance review, talent review, succession planning, which is usually how a company identifies top talent and also prepares them for whatever they think the future might see. And in our case specifically, companies that have large or uh complex operations uh and they have multiple locations, so that's why when they come to us, it's because whatever they're doing now, it's not scaling with them. That's where we come.