Why Your Degree Isn’t Enough: The Skills You Need in 2026

Galen Low: Whether we like it or not, the workforce is transforming rapidly, and expectations are transforming with it. But keeping up with the skills that keep you relevant as a professional feels like a full-time job in and of itself. So how do we learn and grow at the pace of disruption? On the one hand, there's no shortage of free knowledge out there.

We could binge watch YouTube and subscribe to a hundred Substack and hope for the best. On the other hand, tangible credentials like certifications, MBAs, and college degrees have stood the test of time. But they're still expensive and lengthy to get, and their curriculums are not necessarily up to date.

So what's the right balance to learn at speed in the age of AI? To explore that, I brought in two higher education leaders who are disrupting the education and training space. We'll be talking about what skills are in demand today that weren't in demand a few years ago. We'll be exploring proven strategies for having a learning regimen that helps you develop new skills at the speed the market demands them.

And we'll be talking about what employers, governments, academic institutions, and individuals can do to ensure equitable and affordable access to learning so that the tide lifts all boats, not just the ones that have privilege. Hope you enjoy the episode.

Welcome to The Digital Project Manager podcast—the show that helps delivery leaders work smarter, deliver smoother, and lead their teams with confidence in the age of AI. I'm Galen, and every week we dive into real world strategies, emerging trends, proven frameworks, and the occasional war story from the project front lines. Whether you're steering massive transformation projects, wrangling AI workflows, or just trying to keep the chaos under control, you're in the right place. Let's get into it.

Alright, today we are talking about how to develop in-demand skills at the speed that industries are being disrupted, and whether the tried and true models of university education and continuing studies still even makes sense for professionals who need to make a fast pivot.

With me today, our two leaders in the higher education space, Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich, and Charlotte Bencaz from New State University. Sasha and Charlotte have both spent decades working with all different types of higher education institutions. They spent years at the table sitting in the same endless meetings about making college more skill-based, more responsive to employers, and more efficient.

But change wasn't happening fast enough, so they built it themselves. New State University is an AI focused faculty founded and faculty owned institution. They are deeply invested in the quality of their university and believe that it is time to innovate. Sasha and Charlotte, thanks for joining me today.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Thank you for having us.

Charlotte Bencaz: Glad to be here.

Galen Low: I'm really excited to dive in. It's so nice. I've loved our conversations leading up to this. You know, we've been doing some prep. We've been diving down a whole bunch of different rabbit holes. It's a topic that's really important for me. So I do hope that we zig and zag, but the project manager in me created this wee little roadmap for us today.

So, to start us off, I just wanted to like set the stage by hitting you both with like a big hairy question that my listeners want your take on. But then I'd like to zoom out from that and maybe just talk about three things. So firstly, I wanted to talk about. The state of entry level and intermediate jobs and what skills are in demand now that weren't in demand three years ago.

Then I'd like to step through the practicalities of acquiring those skills in 2026 and what tactics you've seen work for folks that you've helped. And lastly, I'd like to just get your take on the future of equitable access to skill development and how you foresee the changes we'll see to our workforce over the next three to five years.

How does that sound to you?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Sounds great. Five years seems a long way away right now. Five years.

Galen Low: Get that crystal ball out. Yeah, maybe I'll walk that back a little. We can like look down, you know, the horizon of like a year to two years. Things are moving so fast that it's hard to know. So I thought that I'd start with just like one big hairy question.

I've talked to a lot of people who've kind of like scoffed at the university model. Some of 'em are claiming that like ChatGPT is the new MBA. They're asking themselves, yeah, why would I bother? It seems like slow, it seems irrelevant and it seems unnecessary, so I thought I'd ask, is the traditional model of university degrees and continuing studies still relevant in an age where AI and other disruptive trends are changing what work even looks like every day?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I would say sort of, kind of, it depends, so just for a lot of clarity, it depends on who you are, what your goal is. For most working professionals, I think a traditional model outside of certain fields like healthcare or if you wanna be a lawyer, there are some pretty traditional route. But for those of us in fields like project management, product management business, probably not as applicable.

Now we know we need something faster, more on demand, more networked, more modern, more mobile. Right.

Galen Low: I love that. Yeah. And I, and you know, in the intro I kind of, I referenced it, some of the like modernization conversation within academic institutions and higher ed, like they've been going on for a while.

Do you feel like AI and like the disruption in the market is like now forcing their hand? Or is it, are they still, you know, sitting around that table trying to decide how to modernize?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I think there are many more conversations about modernization going on. Unfortunately, most large institutions, even small institutions, they have a ton of technical debt and not enough project managers frankly.

Or people with the right skill sets to help them sort of build for the future. And so in many institutions, you're just not seeing the kind of change, even if they want it to be there because of their technology, their processes, and their structures. And that's why we were, you know, when we went to start this endeavor, we had some conversations, well, do you buy a failing institution and try to completely redo it?

We were like, no, we wanna start with the art of the possible. We wanna start with the blank sheet, all new tech, build it so that it can be super relevant and super affordable because like people are done with the tens of thousands of dollars of debt, like they're done with it. We were done with it too.

Galen Low: It's such a brave and bold move. I was reading something online again. Don't quote me on this, but the post was talking about the fact that, you know, the advent of electricity didn't change the factory model for like decades. Mostly because all of these factories were built, you know, to run on steam or gas or what have you.

They literally did have to start from the ground up and it took a while to like realize that it took a while to unlearn the old habits. They were institutions in their own rights, but the real change started when they were building from new, like a new factory. So I can see that, you know, being a parallel where yeah, universities, colleges like higher ed, like they are institutions and some of them, you know, are like hundreds of years old.

They are culturally something that we think of a certain way in terms of esteem and prestige and like, you know, the cleverest bunch of humans you can get together and yet, you know, totally hear you in fact, like, I think you touched on two points, like speed and affordability, right? Like so like access and actually being able to make it work financially.

I think those. Two really strong facets that change the conversation around a university level education. Like is there any other sort of component that you see driving the foundation of New State University that makes it different? Like what are the other factors that have kind of differentiated it from, you know, the world that you came from in higher ed?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: So one of the key things is that we believe that all learning counts, right? So if you've learned something professionally that matters, if you picked up something in a certification that matters. But in a traditional university environment outside of some very specific, you know, like an Army Corps of Engineers certification or something very specific, usually there does not exist a full recognition of what someone is bringing.

And so we do that in two ways and we. Wanted this as a baseline for what we're doing is like core respect for people's skills and abilities that they bring to an educational endeavor. And part of what we're doing is creating a structure around that, right? So that there are sort of these skills and competencies that are built in.

But most people come to education with some skills and competencies. Or transferable skills, right? And we wanna honor those. And then that also helps accelerate someone's path to their credential. And then we also have our own microcredentials. So you can start with something very small and then you can still stack it into a degree.

And that was really important to us. That we were being a good steward of people's learning wherever it came from. So I would say that is the first thing. And then the second thing is we've both been in systems where you almost have to fight the admission system, not because anyone wants to make it as complex and difficult and lengthy as possible, but 'cause there are systems and financial incentives set up to make admissions lengthy, complicated, multi-step.

When you want to get something done, you wanna get it done now, you don't wanna get it done over the course of six weeks and then wait another four weeks to start a semester. So at New State University, you can literally come apply, get accepted, and start classes on the same day. It's based on what you need as an individual, not what an institution's processes were built over time to accommodate.

Galen Low: I love the philosophy that you're saying of like adding in, like you don't come to the table with a blank slate. And also as you learn, you accrue, you don't suddenly know a thing, you know, on the day of your graduation. Like you actually build along the way.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Right, exactly.

Galen Low: When you like unpack these things, you're like, oh yeah, gosh, of course.

But like these institutions have been built a certain way. They're designed around, you know, like, yeah. The sort of like post-secondary model where you're like, okay, you just came from high school. You only know high school stuff and therefore let us teach you from that high school point into, you know, being a professional adult and contributing member of society.

That's not really how people do it these days. But folks are returning back to school. They are going to school later. They are getting experience before they go to school. I think that's really great. Tell me if I'm wrong about this, but I feel like you both like have also consulted with businesses on how they drive professional development.

And maybe I'll throw this one at Charlotte. I'm wondering like when you say something like New State University, is it still kind of like an icky response from folks to be like, Ugh, university, that's not what I need. I just need people to like learn stuff. Okay. Is that something you encounter?

Charlotte Bencaz: I think it's a nice compliment that we have the short term just in time learning, that we have found through personal experience that a lot of businesses need.

Right? They just need it fast and now. And then the fact that can count towards your personal learning goals as you continue. And if that's supported by your employer and your business, then that's great. And if that's something that you wanna come back to when it's right for you, then we support that too.

So the flexibility that Sasha spoke to is really unique in terms of really giving the power to this. Student to make those decisions. I would say too, Galen, that one of the things that we learned from engaging with businesses who are looking for educational partners is that they really appreciate the applicability, and that's exactly the way our classes are set up.

So you have engagements with projects that you're working on. You have things that you're solving, you know, during the day at your desk and then at night on your laptop, and there's connective tissue there that, you know, Sasha's the researcher. But I know there's been some proven studies on the fact that is an enhanced learning experience.

That I think businesses and individuals appreciate. The final thing I'll note is that we're making sure that community is a big part of what we are building at New State U. We have a private community that all of our students and faculty and alumni, we even have some alumni who have joined, and that's a permanent resource for them, you know, as long as they'd like it.

And what we do is talk about, wow, this is crazy. AI news or wow. This has completely changed my job. Potentially. What are we gonna do about that? And there really is a spirit both in the class with the faculty members as well as in the community of, let's figure this out together.

Galen Low: Boom. Yeah. I love that applicability.

I like that community is almost like it helps education operate at the speed of change. Because before anyone can build a course about it, we can be talking about it and sharing information. And in a way, you know, Sasha, like you were saying, we all come to the table with knowledge and experience and even just peer sharing, not even necessarily from like, you know, the professor that's still super valuable as well.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Absolutely. Because people bring so much to the table. They really do. And we're forced now. And for those of us who are giant geeks, it's fun, but we are forced to learn faster than ever before. Right? And we learn so much together. Like, oh, check out this thing that we just figured out. Because we not only teach AI in business, we are constantly.

Improving how we run our operations. So that's part of how we drive this extreme affordability is by not having layers and layers of administrative processes, right? We use AI to run our business effectively and efficiently. Out punch our weight class, as we like to say. And that's what we teach too.

Like here is a practical thing that you can apply today to improve your life tomorrow.

Galen Low: I love that. And it's like dog food that you're eating. That's how you run your business. You're already doing it for yourselves.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Yes, absolutely.

Charlotte Bencaz: I was gonna say, Sasha and I use the community for our business problems as well.

Galen Low: There you go. That's awesome. I wondered if I can zoom out a little bit because you know, as I mentioned, education and professional development, it's important to me, it's an important topic. But I wanted to kind of like touch on and emphasize the context of like, why is it important now? So here's my little runup.

My runup is like, for the past few months, my feed. It's been full of all this. Talk about the fact that there's like no more entry level jobs, like entry level jobs are gone. Certainly there is data showing that there's like fewer junior roles that are available, and I think the knock on effect is that there's just a lot of people.

Competing for the same jobs. 'cause now you have, for example, new grads fighting one another to get jobs that are not entry-level jobs. They're kind of more in the intermediate space and also they're competing with mid-career folks who are trying to pivot their career or the folks who have like been impacted by a layoff.

There's just a lot of people sort of fighting for these jobs. There's not this sort of entry level positioning anymore, which means everyone's kind of trying to jump up to the second floor and it's getting kind of messy. But I thought I'd ask regardless of the level, what skills and qualifications are being asked for in knowledge worker roles in general that maybe like weren't being asked for before and like is it only AI that's driving these changes or is it maybe more than that?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I think it's probably more than just AI, but I would also say probably mainly AI, right? Don't underestimate the influence of what part of this conversation AI is. A lot of those entry level positions were positions that essentially the tasks that you needed to do are tasks that Gen AI can do for you.

Now. Now, it doesn't mean that you don't need quality control on that. It doesn't mean you don't need processes behind that and nothing is just a magic pill or a magic bullet. But those were sort of the grounds on which entry level workers sort of cut their teeth, right? They learned the ropes, they learned their field.

You come out of an a traditional undergraduate degree. I'm doing air quotes because. What we do isn't traditional, but you come out of a traditional undergraduate degree with essentially a, like a knowledge set, right? A set of knowledge that you now have and some things that you can do. But employers wanna see that you can prove that you can do it right?

And so part of our model actually engages in creating work assets. That you can share, but it's so hard for people if they don't have the work environment. How do you create work assets? How do you prove your value? I do think it's a more competitive space. I also think it's weirdly bad at matching right now.

'cause sitting on the other side, it's also extremely hard to hire, right? You get a ton of applicants for roles that justifiably should not have a ton of applicants. But so many of them aren't in the right domain. Don't have the right background. Don't even speak the language of what you're trying to hire for.

And that is something that you need to prepare for. Right? And I think learning communities like what we have at a new state are designed to help with that. But. It's also just the reality that you cannot rely on your knowledge set that you gained. It's not a box that you can just pick up and take with you, right?

Flexibility more important than ever before, ability to learn fast. More important than ever before. Ability to work with AI. I cannot say this enough, you know, there's this sort of like meme that's going around that you know, AI won't take your job, but the person who works with AI will. We laugh at that, but I think it's totally true.

If you look at job postings, like the ones that mention AI have gone up like wildly over the past couple of years. There's even a hiring premium based on how much of the job like refers to AI or how many AI. Skills you say you have. And I think those are things that people need to be aware of and they need to be aggressive about.

Like now is not the time to sit back or like dabble. The era of dabbling is gone, that stopped last fall. It's time to be intentional about what you're learning and how you're learning it. And we even have like in our own operations, like I have an extra computer over there. It's working for me right now.

Like it's doing work for me right now, and I have another one that I'm about to set up. So we're gonna have a mini computer farm with all our agents on it, and you have to 10 x yourself. I'm laughing, but it's totally true. But you actually can do so much more if you are the person telling that story, you're gonna get the job.

If you are the person saying, oh, I played with this tool and this tool over here and I know how to use this. And that's the other thing is don't be a single brand skilled individual. Don't be like, oh, I only know Google Tools, but I'm really deep in Google Tools like that time is gone too. You gotta be able to use tools across the board.

You gotta be able to flexibly pick up something else. And that's a philosophy of, I think just work now. Like if you wanna be good at what you do and have the options that you wanna have. You gotta be aggressive about learning.

Galen Low: I like what you're saying about the fact that like you kind of need to like show more than you need to tell right now in the job market, in anyone's career.

Just saying that you can do these things or just like putting AI in your resume probably isn't good enough. I love that your programs actually include an opportunity to create something because that's exactly what I'd ask for as a hiring manager. I'd be like, cool, show me and walk me through how you thought about it.

I like what you're saying about, you know, that period of like kind of messing around and experimenting with AI and just seeing what sticks and kind of playing with it. That's over now. But also like AI skills are like pretty broad, like you just talked about, you know, your team of computers sitting there doing work, you know, unmanned, right?

Just kinda like doing stuff. And I just, it gets me thinking about how to unpack that skill. And maybe I'll throw this one to Charlotte. What professions are, and maybe we can take project management as an example, but professions in and around project-based work. To what extent do everyone need to become a builder that can like set up a whole, you know, farm of agents and like run a business versus just like.

Being able to open ChatGPT every day and prompt it to use it as a thought partner. Is there like a sort of upper and lower limit or like specificity in industry or profession where it's like, yeah. That's too much AI We don't need you to be an engineer. It's okay.

Charlotte Bencaz: Yeah, there's certainly gonna be guidelines, right?

That corporations are busy trying to implement how you can use it safely, which is important. Going back to the younger professionals, I think it's a really unique opportunity and I read some great advice. From one of the hundred Substack articles that I've read this week about, if you think about three areas where you're strong, and so if that's project management, it's gonna be project management, maybe design maybe a third skill that you know is a big part of that career interest.

And they said, and then figure out which one you're the strongest at. That one can be advanced even further, and that's where you get to the 10 x. You know, you can really build it. And so looking at advancing, like how can AI allow me to really advance in something I'm already strong at? Then additionally, you know, there's a lot of conversation around, especially with software engineering around the product team, the engineering team, the design team, and that's a great example of, well, every product person is gonna have AI guide them on engineering and design.

Every design person's getting high on the other two. And so it said. The places where there are ancillary or supporting fields that maybe you're not as strong at, use AI to strengthen that skill. 'cause that's just gonna make you more well-rounded as a professional.

Galen Low: I love that. I like it the way you're looking at it as like an augmentation of some of your core skills.

And I like that sort of rebalancing of the triangle. I was speaking to someone who works in go to market and software and so that trifecta was like marketing, sales, and customer success. And she was building a team of AI teammates as she would refer to them, that can help fill in those gaps. 'cause it's hard to find these unicorn roles where everyone's good at all three things, you know, the best at all three of these things.

But to be able to say, cool, the best at this one thing. You know, some areas for improvement in these two, but also the ability to leverage technology, especially AI, to kind of fill in that gap and use it as like an augmentation and a partner.

Charlotte Bencaz: I think sharing examples, you know, trying to figure out these tools together.

This week we're really digging into Claude, I think next week is a mini perplexity computer. So just as they're introduced, creating that space where students and alumni and faculty members can help each other figure it out together. The article that went viral about the white collar jobs that are in jeopardy a few weeks back, I read a really great response to that.

That said. It's probably headed in the right direction, but that they would alter the advice that they gave, which is spend an hour a day on AI and they made a great comparison to the fact that is like a COVID to first, you know, six years ago now, right around this time we said. Just wash your hands.

Well, that's good advice. And yes, that's something important. And also it helps with a lot of things. Maybe COVID, maybe not, we'll figure it out. And so having that more guided path of applicability of how do I actually use this at work? That's what we're all about.

Galen Low: It's like the sort of the minimum apple a day kind of advice would be, yes, an hour a day of whatever, deepening your skill and understanding of AI, but actually more to be done than just that.

Like that alone is not it at the top of this, because I kind of asked a two-pronged question and you had said, yes, AI is kind of at the center of this, but it might not be the only thing. That is making, you know, upskilling and, you know, continuing education. Very important right now. I thought I'd ask just like what are some of the other factors and the variables that are, you know, driving this need to like upskill rapidly, even if it's not AI.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I do think part of it is the dynamic just over our overall economy and what's happening around the world I think is also part of it. But even without the AI piece, like the automation component. Was coming and accelerating anyways. Right. So I think also from an operational perspective, a lot of people conflate automation or sort of more dramatic looking improvements as something that was necessarily created by AI, even if it wasn't, you know?

And so continuing technology, just the capacity to automate faster, I think that was happening anyways. And then more self-service, right? So some of the, I would say general. High level tools that everybody can use, like calendaring. If you were a busy executive, you had to have an executive assistant to travel plan for you and to do your email.

And you know, there's nothing magical about a calendar link. Those have been around for a really long time, but they're just. More widely used now. So people were looking for more automation, more efficiencies, better workflows, just better business process, I think has been accelerating. But the AI is like with these sort of macro shifts is huge.

I also think AI though, is gonna power a second round of entrepreneurship in ways that we've never sort of. Seen before because like when Sam Altman said, you can just build the thing now, you know, people were like, I think also a lot of software engineers were really dubious about that. But you can just build the thing.

You can just build the thing now, and I mean, it doesn't mean it, the first thing that you create or an MVP isn't gonna be beautiful and seamless, of course not. But the barrier to entry for a lot of things just went down, right? And so for all of the fear that we have around like, okay, so they're not hiring as many entry level workers, because AI can do some of that stuff now.

So if you're trying to learn the stuff that AI can do for you, like that doesn't make sense, learn the things that AI cannot do for you. And it's not that your knowledge isn't valuable, subject matter expertise. Still matters because you have to know how to do the thing, how to troubleshoot, interrogate, think of all the possibles.

It's just instead of working with a separate engineering team or working with a separate business process team or whatever, it's you working with AI and then you can actually develop the tools yourself so it can autonomously do things while you're doing the next thing. Right? So I think the big thing is actually the big shift is not going to be the technology itself.

Absolutely not the technology. I have no worries about maybe a vague worry about Skynet coming eventually, but the technology does not concern me. What concerns me is what's gonna be the uneven adoption of AI and usage of it in business context. And that's what's gonna determine winners and losers over the next five years because AI adoption is widely variable and you can either be on the front end or the back end.

Galen Low: I really like that and I want to dive into that later on as well about just like access. But what I like about what you're saying is the sort of confluence, right? Like there are economic factors, everything from geopolitics, you know, the price of oil and all that. But also even just somebody who is like, you know what, I can't afford right now.

To have a paid subscription to ChatGPT, just to learn it. I could use the free version, but everyone online is saying it's not the same. Right? So I'm getting different results and so am I even learning something useful. And then there becomes this sort of economic driver. And then like you alluded to at the top, you know, the old institutional model, like people, they still have student debt from learning before, right?

The old models, that box that they got of, you know, the thing that was supposed to set them up for life, it's not like they didn't have, you know, a lot of available cash necessarily. To sort of, you know, dive into these tools and even what we're saying about like, the generalism of it, like don't deeply specialize in one thing, but also that means potentially spreading money around across all of these tools is like hundreds of new tools being introduced every day.

And it's kind of like, where do I even start and stop? I like the theme that we're kind of touching on, you touched on it earlier, this theme that like, human judgment's still gonna be needed. And you had mentioned about like software developers and like that sort of cringe reaction to be like, oh my gosh, everyone's gonna develop an app now.

Like not, oh my gosh, like, I'm gonna be replaced by people who vibe code good. But there's more to it than just typing code and going like, I want it to look like this. You know, there's like the architecture, there's, you know, the quality assurance, there's what have you. I thought maybe I'd ask you even, like, do you have a course in New State that's I don't wanna say like vibe coding, but like, almost wanna say like, systems thinking for people who are going to create an app.

But aren't gonna be coding. Here's some things to think about.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Yeah. So some of our AI courses actually have a lot about like the architecture and the data layers and how to approach those. And then we have all of these different tools that we send people to, to play with so that they get experience in a number of different things.

But I actually think it's so interesting because when you create these courses, you have to really think through what's evergreen and what's gonna change fast. And so that's where we have this community for. The things that are changing fast. That's where we put those live webinars and like, you know, we actually, I was just talking to a fellow who's gonna do a vibe coding one for us probably in the next couple weeks.

So those sorts of things that are always emerging, we have a more live space for those, because you almost have to, but on the flip side, I would also say when it comes to like data layers and architecture and you know, APIs talking to each other and building themselves, like set your watch. Okay, five months from now you're gonna be able to prompt that too.

So we've had a very, I would say, strong philosophy on being first followers of technology. So we are not first movers, we're not bleeding edge, but when something is stable enough, we will move to that way before the rest of the crowd because it's coming. And for a lot of businesses, you don't have to be bleeding edge, like let someone get the kinks worked out of it, and then buy the thing.

I see so many businesses get into trouble by trying to also be engineering first, which not all businesses are good at. So you like learning the tools? I think critically important, and also knowing when you wanna get involved in what. Understanding like the architecture and the different layers and how things talk to each other is critical.

Just from a, how do you move data from point A to point B, right?

Galen Low: Is there like a threshold maybe that kind of you reach in terms of, like we were talking about uneven adoption. You could try and be at the bleeding edge first to adopt a thing first to build a thing for yourself. But in other words, even as new state, you have the threshold to be like, okay, now's the moment where we should actually maybe, you know, create some education around this to like smooth out the sort of like uneven adoption.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: So in terms of educational content that we produce, when something goes from being a maybe. Like this might happen. People might be doing that. We'll literally create content that week and update the courses, right? That's almost a daily occurrence. Well, now we have to do this thing, right? But that's part of the design of what we've created as an institution with these stackables, is that we can do that on the fly.

Like all of our systems are actually tuned so that. We can spin up new content relatively quickly. And then philosophically, as a small business, as women running a small business, we really wait until it's gotten over a couple of critical things like, you know, core security. I want to, you know, do you harm things?

Right. So we don't want anyone blackmailing anybody. We're gonna wait on that model until it's nice and stable. But then when things get to, I'd say like second level adoption, when it stops being like that initial two week fad, that's when we start doing it and with our established tools. New functionality with established tools we do right away.

Like we're immediately in there playing, what can it do for our financial modeling? What can it do for this or for that? So like the plugins that come with established tools right away. New tools. I would say definitely at least a couple of weeks past initial excitement.

Galen Low: I like that model.

Charlotte Bencaz: So Galen, the term we look for is the non-technical crowd, and that's when we're like, yes, that's us.

Galen Low: Like literally in the whatever press release.

Charlotte Bencaz: Yeah. I spent an hour last week trying to figure out clog code and I was like, no, I think I need to stick out. I cowork a little longer.

Galen Low: Yeah, it will get there.

Charlotte Bencaz: It will.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Yeah, it will absolutely get there. I was talking to a guy today about vibe coating who's since constructed, like this whole way of working.

I would say a somewhat unique model of working across a number of different platforms to generate like really good. Stuff, but not accepting just one tool, like working with one tool, extracting things out, triangulating that like we do, we use perplexity a lot to sort of triangulate accuracy of things and so they all have their place and you sort of have to know how to play across them to get you choreograph.

I know we're all saying orchestration, but I like saying choreograph, you're putting all of these pieces together. It's music, it's dance, it's moving bodies, all the things.

Galen Low: I like that. I like the word choreograph.

Charlotte Bencaz: An important component that we touched on a few minutes ago is having those critical skills in a certain discipline.

We really try to take a balance on that around, you know, you will learn core principles of project management. If that is your track. You'll learn core principles of leadership and business, if that is your track. So that you know the right questions and the right way to shape your interaction with an AI and then that's the piece that we're practicing together.

Galen Low: That's such a cool way to approach it.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Actually, project management is in every single one of our undergraduate degrees, we consider it a core discipline. True story.

Galen Low: I mean, honestly I do think it's gonna be important. All of these things that we're talking about, our transformative projects, you know, projects are the currency of change right now.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Yes.

Galen Low: So anyways, that's my soapbox. I wondered if we could like pivot into. Pivoting actually. So like for folks, you know, we've been talking about how to learn how to build skills, you know, the education system. And I think the reality is when we're talking about some of the economic factors, there are people working full-time right now, maybe even working full-time and like driving an Uber in the evenings, making ends meet, knowing that the job they're working might change dramatically or they might get laid off, or maybe they have been laid off.

And they need to sort of upskill and sort of make that pivot either into a new role or maybe even into a whole different industry because you know, the role they were doing is something that's very easily replaced by AI and it's already happening. What are some of the habits and like, I don't know, just like, tactics.

You've seen some of the people that you've helped wield successfully to like make a pivot when they are kind of already like at their limit in terms of capacity, working full time, you know, taking care of kids and they're like, oh gosh, okay, I need to like learn these skills We were talking about like the Apple a day thing, spending an hour with Claude, fine, but also we need to do more.

Like what is the more that you're seeing work effectively? What's the mix?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I don't know if Charlotte wants to weigh in on this 'cause we're both working moms with complicated lives and kids and everything. And I would have to say that Charlotte's probably one of the best, if not the best person I've ever seen in terms of being an aggressive learner.

Like I learn from Charlotte every day because she is an aggressive learner. So maybe, I don't know. Shar, do you wanna share a couple tips?

Charlotte Bencaz: Yeah, I mean, I read as much as I can and when you're on, like what? I've really learned it with AI, you know, we had the time during the pandemic where I started following epidemiologists 'cause they were talking about what's happening on the front lines, you know?

Same with healthcare. If you can read what some of those individuals are sharing. And start to incorporate their perspective into how you're thinking and how you're deciding how you wanna spend your time. That's really helpful. One of the things that Sasha and I often debate about, I would say is do you build it yourself or do you rely on maybe a tool, a business that has solved this problem already and in the true spirit, there's a compromise between those both.

I would say for those that are really balancing. It's tough, and so making those critical decisions on what's right for you and what do they say, which glass you can drop outta one hand, that's really critical. One of the pieces of feedback that's been really helpful from our students so far has been that we've set up our learning so that they can do it in bite-sized pieces.

Of our first graduates shared that, you know, while she was waiting for her pasta to boil for dinner, she did a lesson and then, you know, after dinner she had 20 minutes free time that she could come right back to it. Other people talk about, you know. Public transportation and hey, maybe we'll all have some Waymo cars drive us around and we can learn in the backseat.

So there's ways that people are finding to make it work with their life. And again, you know, we have a more flexible environment, we have more tools, we have more at our fingertips that we can use to help to make us more efficient.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I also think, learning is a habit, right? And so the more you start sort of revving that engine, our brains are sort of going to be intrigued by novelty, right?

And so you're gonna want to learn more. But one of the things is like the bite-size pieces. Like do a podcast. We have podcasts in artwork. Do a podcast like this to learn something. Put little things in so that you get acclimated from a learning perspective. You need to have some sort of structure to hang new knowledge and skills on.

And so you just gotta start that, right, start the process of learning. But then also, Galen, don't let me get started on this because we get a lot of questions about like. How did you start a new university? Are you independently wealthy? And the answer is no. I am independently thrifty, and so I have some very strong feelings about, I also live in Cleveland, so I am not worried about Manhattan prices or you know, west coast housing, but everyone makes choices in terms of how they spend their money.

There's the story of like the three Russian brothers, right? Have you heard this one?

Galen Low: I haven't.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Only I have heard this one. So there's three brothers and the king of the kingdom cannot decide which of his three sons he should leave the kingdom to. So he gives each of them an equal amount of treasure and he says, go out and do your best and come back, and whoever does the best will receive the kingdom.

So the first son goes out, he comes home and he walks up, he has nothing, and he said, you know, I spent my five years, I became a merchant. I sold mangoes. I'm sure it wasn't mangoes in the original story, but I did great. I got a lot of money, but I was in a shipwreck on the way home and I lost all of my treasure.

So he shows up penniless. The second son, comes back the week later. He also is walking up. He actually has a crutch. He's worse off than when he left and the second son says, dad, I don't know what happened. I went away and I did this amazing thing. And he was, I think he was a minor or something. He owned diamond mines, but on the way back he was beset by Rob.

They took all of his things and he ended up with nothing. The father's very disappointed, but is like maybe my youngest son will be okay. He comes up nothing. He's got nothing. He's just walking up the driveway and the king thinks he has truly failed as a father, but it turns out he spent all his treasure learning and so he had all of the wisdom and skills and abilities that he needed.

To actually lead the kingdom to prosperity, and it is about priority. You have to invest in yourself right now because there's no such thing as career security anymore. Like the best investment you can make is in your own skills.

Charlotte Bencaz: I'll just add to that too, especially, you know, we are women in the workplace.

Women have a lot more on their plate domestically, just through statistical evidence. You know, some families get it right and that's awesome. We're all striving to get there. But having the foresight to prepare yourself is really important because women are going to be disproportionally affected. Even with some of the recent studies we've seen released by philanthropic, they're saying that a lot of jobs that are traditionally held or statistically held by women, especially women with high school degrees.

Are going to be some of the first ones affected. And so we've gotta invest in ourselves so that we can continue to be the financial engines for our families.

Galen Low: That's a hugely good point. And actually I want to combine those two things because you know, on the one hand we've got this story of three brothers.

I think it's a really good talking point because A, they had wealth, which is not something that everyone right now has. And you know, investing in yourself versus putting food on the table is a strain. And we could be on a path. Maybe I'll ask you the question. Are we on a path where for a time there's just gonna be the wealthy, privileged people upskilling and getting the jobs and making the pivots and the folks who are maybe not so well off just getting pushed further and further down, you know, into lower jobs instead of the promise where AI kind of pushes them up into more empowered jobs?

And if that's the case, like what? Do we need to do as businesses, specifically as employers or as educators? How can we support more equitable access to this training, assuming we don't have this treasure trove from our family that we've been sent out that we can spend on learning and you know, what is our responsibility to the economy and to the workforce?

So that, Charlotte, what you're saying is that it doesn't decimate a certain disproportionate demographic, a minority. Women especially like, yeah. What needs to be done to avoid the outcome of Rich Get richer and that's the only people who end up doing well.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I mean, it is a problem. And actually that whole tale is a very privileged tale.

Actually. This is one of the things that we really founded this university because of, we are very concerned about the middle class. This goes beyond like any one institution. This is an imperative for our country, is that we need a strong middle class. And it is being whittled out. Some people are doing very well.

A lot of people are right on the edge, right? And so we need to make sure that people who are right on the edge or people who are just not willing to get more debt right now, my goodness, like people have so much debt and that's why us. Like that's why we started this was because we believe that people should have a truly radically affordable way to get a credential and skills, because it shouldn't have to cost you $40,000 to get an undergraduate degree.

It shouldn't, it doesn't have to. And it just needs to be a different model, you know? And there are choices that need to be made. One of our MBA students was like, well, you can just try it, because it's like the cost of my Hulu subscription and my cell phone. If you can get real skills, college and credentials at truly affordable rate, you actually can create it now because of the technology behind it.

And it's not just, you can do it, we should do it. If we don't do it, we're not doing the right thing as a country, right? It shouldn't be the choice between debt or job. You should be able to have a good job without mortgaging your family's future for it.

Charlotte Bencaz: I'll also add Sasha that time is definitely a factor there.

Galen, when you were asking the question, a lot of what I have read has talked about a K shaped economy, and so. Either you're going up because you're incorporating these skills and you know your money's working for you. If you happen to be independently wealthy or like you said, Sasha, those people that are right on the edge, that's a real risk of going down the cliff of the opposite end.

But if you think about. The K right here is where we are, but we are gonna get way over here where it's gonna be harder and harder to catch up. And so taking the investment, you know, maybe this is the summer that you spend your vacation money for learning. You know, maybe there's some sacrifices like that you wanna invest in yourself while time's still on your side.

Galen Low: I like that. I like the K model and I think you're right. We're sort of at that big bang point and it can go either way. I totally hear you Sasha. I know that the onus of education is sort of, you know, individual right now. Like gone are the days where an employer is like, cool, we're gonna put you on a path.

We want you to get your MBA, so you know we're gonna pay for it. Some of that is becoming rarer and now it's kind of up to the individual to like learn. I think that, yeah, governments especially should be involved in making education affordable. I think that business models like yours are pivotal.

And I do wanna underscore this because, you know, I think we've been talking about it all the way through, but like you raise a good point that you both said, okay, yeah, podcast. And like, you know, there's YouTube, there is, you know, little sort of micro learning that you can do for free. And I think some people would say.

I don't need a university, anything. I'm just gonna like fill my cup with podcasts and substack and you know, that's fine. But I think something, Charlotte, I think you've touched on it earlier. There is like the tactical on the job stuff and then there's like the beyond as an individual and your credential and you're like sort of.

Certifiability of like certain skills and certain knowledge. And I think that's kind of like a good middle point to be like, cool. It's hard for me to say that I've watched thousands of hours of YouTube and now I know what I'm doing. Like please hire me. And actually, I've gone through a program where there are mentors and we do hands-on work and we have a community where we learn from one another and it's just more tangible.

And it translates across jobs, not just like in one scenario. I wondered if maybe we can look out into the future. 'cause I do like that sort of KS shape model. It is kind of terrifying. It could go sideways, but I'm just wondering, you know, like we've been seeing things, my feed right now is full of that screenshot from Aaro about club usage in certain industries and what is likely to be impacted.

Everyone's like, oh, I guess it's time for me to like become a truck driver because, you know, it looks like logistics isn't being as impacted right now in terms of like just looking out maybe not too far, two or three years. Does our workforce like shift entirely? Is everyone kind of making a pivot? Will we slosh about like liquid in a vessel or is it one of those things where yes, there's disruption but like you can kind of stay on a broader path and like navigate within that?

You don't have to like suddenly become a Walmart greeter or suddenly become a farmer or suddenly just make a huge card pivot into a different career. Yeah. Maybe I'll leave that broad and wide open. Like what are your thoughts on the future of the workforce?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I actually think Charlotte and I are gonna have different answers, so I'm gonna let her go first.

Galen Low: Okay. Okay. Okay let's do it.

Charlotte Bencaz: So with truck driving, I would pay attention to what is happening with autonomous vehicles. There's a ton of progress right now, and there's a really interesting conversation just this week about. Kind of coming to an acceptance that the autonomous part might be better than the human part.

And, you know, you can think about shifts that truck drivers have to work, you know, the, just the conditions that they're under. It's a really hard job to have and to perform well on. So if a machine can do it better than. We have tons of other ways that you can use your time, right? Let's get to solving the problems that really are gonna affect us.

So I wouldn't say truck driving. That's one I've seen on a list. I also think that manufacturing and the trades, we've gotta pay attention to the advances in robotics. Because that is something that I don't think is on a lot of people's radar, because it might be in that 2, 3, 4 year range, but apparently, according to Elon Musk, there's gonna be more robots than we can even think of.

So that's something that we've gotta confront. One of the examples that I heard lately is what if you know you had a plumbing issue under your house? Maybe there could be the robotic part with a camera that goes under, and then you as the lead plumber advise them on what to do or identify the problem and then you know, you can get on a solution.

And so that interaction is gonna be really interesting. I think AI is gonna touch all of our jobs at some point.

Galen Low: That's really insightful and a good sort of like, don't try and run for cover recklessly to something that maybe you're not great at, just because you think it's safe. And that's not like doom and gloom, it's just to say that it's gonna get impacted.

Charlotte Bencaz: We dunno what's safe yet. We're trying, there you go. We're using evidence. But you know, there's a lot of talk about. Universal basic income, universal high income. That's as you get five and 10 years out, it gets really fuzzy and the world may look very different. So I personally appreciate that side of it because if we can pivot and spend more resources, especially human resources with the people and caring for people, that feels widely under serviced at this point.

And so I really like the idea of building towards a community where we can get back to our roots on taking care of each other.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: I am a little bit, I don't know, I don't think jaded is the word. I don't know. I was promised autonomous vehicles as of 10 years ago by Elon Musk, and I still have to sit like in a relatively crappy Uber.

If you get into the airport too late. And I also don't think it's gonna be truly Skynet. Hopefully not. But I do think that the issue is not gonna be the capacity. Yes, robots are going to exist. Yes, we are going to have these amazing tools that we can do all this stuff with AI and it will take years for organizations to adopt these.

And in that timeframe, other things will be happening, other things will be improving. So I saw a video last night on how advanced some ports are right now, like just the robotics in terms of offloading and unloading carts and everything. And then there are other ports where literally they have negotiated, so only humans can be crane operators, right.

So the uneven distribution of how that technology is adopted is so widely different, but also moving giant trucks around in a confined area, in previously established roots that are highly repeatable. It's very different than driving the curves of West Virginia, which I have gone over those hills. It's hard to do like on caffeine in a regular sized car.

So I think that the truth is gonna be a little bit messier and in between. I totally agree with Charlotte that it would be wonderful to get to a place where we can spend more time on the human edge of it, but I do think adoption is going to take longer and be. Clunkier. I also think that we're maybe not the bleeding edge, but we are trending towards the cutting edge because of what we do every day and what we listen to and how we interact.

And that's gotta impact how I think about the world, right? So I think you do want your educational institution or the, you know, whatever, I think you want them looking a little bit further ahead of where you are at that moment. 'cause it's gonna take time for you to do the thing. I don't think we're gonna see en masse like hundreds of thousands of people extra unemployed overnight.

I think there's going to be new things that are going to be discovered in terms of jobs and opportunities as these things go along. You only know that if you learn. That's it. There's no like easy button to getting a job of the future, right? There's a more efficient and less efficient and more. Costly and less costly way to learn things, but there's no option to not learn things anymore.

Galen Low: I really like that aspect of, you know, stuff still happens in between. We don't need to just like look too far ahead and be afraid in the meantime, like the timescale, it feels urgent right now. Definitely my LinkedIn feed feels urgent right now. It's like pivot on a dime. You must have figured this all out.

But I like what you're saying about the fact that actually part of the role of education or of an educational institu. Is to help you look just far enough ahead and maybe not necessarily too far ahead, not to kinda give you the panic, like what, you know, like what do you wanna do when you retire 22-year-old?

Like, like that kind of like thing where it adds pressure, but you know, in the meantime things do happen. And Charlotte, I think your point is well taken too. Like there is this opportunity to like return back to helping one another out with the human stuff. There's still room for the human stuff.

And we do think about these things as quite binary. It's like, will robots do work and we stop doing work? Or do we do work and robots actually, they're just gonna sit around and watch streaming services. Probably something in between, honestly, right? Like, and it's not as black and wedge as we make it.

There are things that we can do in the meantime. Learning is a part of it. And yeah, optimistically we'll have both. We'll have, you know, robot plumbers in the crawl space, and we'll have better connections together as humans.

Charlotte Bencaz: Yeah. And Galen, you know, there's, the psychologists are gonna be very busy in the next few years.

The change management advisors are gonna be very busy, right? As we roll this out to actual humans. One of the other things that I think, especially in America that is going to need to adjust is tying our ident. Two professions, and that's gonna be a really interesting migration to watch. But Sasha, I love what you are saying in terms of frame yourself as a learner, you know, frame yourself as a resilient professional.

I can teach myself, I have the tools. That I can adapt on a dime to whatever is gonna change in this crazy world. And so that's the piece of it that I think if we can center around maybe a different way of describing ourselves other than just, this was my major and this is my job that should be let healthier.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: And actually anti-fragile, right?

We're working on a focus on becoming a power worker instead of a knowledge worker. And so the concept of sort of anti-fragility. You can remake yourself in such a way, and the brain does this right? Neuroplasticity is a thing, and you get better at the neuroplasticity of your brain. The more you do it, you can gain things that gain from disorder as it will like when chaos happens, you'll be well prepared to be able to adjust, see opportunities and thrive.

Galen Low: Sasha, Charlotte, this was amazing. I love this conversation. I could probably go on for days, but maybe I should wrap it here. But just for fun, do you have a question that you wanna ask me?

Charlotte Bencaz: So, did you see anything, or have we talked about anything that you think is an important missing ingredient in New State U?

I just love your feedback from the field.

Galen Low: So you know, one of the things that is close to me and that we touched on is this notion of community. And I find that even though we like. Talk about community a lot as humans. 'cause we're like, yeah, we're humans. Community is a thing that we do. I would love to see more education around how to build a community, like effectively across cultures, globally, online, in real life.

I think people don't quite understand that. It's not just putting people in a bucket together and being like, go for it. Even some of the things that you mentioned about the way you run community is not just, you know, hope everyone has a good time at this party that we've invited them to, but actually like facilitating conversations, you know, curating topics and things like that.

I would love to see a course on that, like a sort of new state u. Course on community. I dunno. Have you got one?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Not yet, but wait five minutes. No, I'm kidding.

Charlotte Bencaz: That's great advice. We can look at that as an addition.

Galen Low: This is great. It's great to see your model at work. I love everything I'm hearing. I think it's a really important thing that you all are doing.

Equitable access to learning that is rapid, that's stackable, that is immediate and that is relevant and like actually working at the pace of change right now. And honestly I think for my listeners, I think they've got a lot of tips. New state or not right, like Substack to follow, you know, podcasts to listen to a different way to sort of create their mix.

So that learning is a habit and that it is about identifying as someone who learns continuously, not necessarily. Trying to learn once, take a left turn, and hope that's a safe place to go.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Absolutely. You're spot on.

Charlotte Bencaz: I would say, Galen, the way that you're managing the community that you've built and facilitating and leading conversations like this, maybe you can be the guest presenter in that class that we developed.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Yeah. Maybe you could be our subject matter expert now.

Galen Low: I did not plan this, everybody. No I would love that. It was an honor having you both on the show. Thank you so much. I'll include some links in the show notes. If you're listening or watching. I'll include a link to New state U in the show notes. And Sasha, Charlotte, like if people wanted to connect with you where can they go?

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: They can always go to our website, which is newstateu.com, and they can actually directly connect Charlotte or i'm at sasha@newstateu.com. Probably contact@newstateu.com is the preferred mechanism, but feel free to reach out to me directly as well.

Charlotte Bencaz: I would also say that we're at New State U on many of the social platforms.

Not all, because there's so, so many right now, but on most of them. And we've got a lot of really good conversations on our YouTube channel. So I would say that's a great place to start.

Galen Low: Awesome. Love that. I'll include all those links in the notes. Sasha, Charlotte, thank you again. This is really great.

Charlotte Bencaz: Thank you.

Sasha Thackaberry-Voinovich: Thanks.

Galen Low: That's it for today's episode of The Digital Project Manager podcast. If you enjoyed this conversation, make sure to subscribe wherever you're listening. And if you want even more tactical insights, case studies and playbooks, create a free account with us at thedigitalprojectmanager.com.

Until next time, thanks for listening.