Your Hiring Decisions Are Costing You Millions & Slowing Growth in the Age of AI with Angela Geffre

In this episode of the Human Capital Quantified Podcast, host Sandy Fiaschetti sits down with Angela Geffre, an industrial-organizational psychologist and Head of Human Capital at GrowthCurve Capital, to discuss why people decisions are not just “soft” business issues but measurable drivers of value creation in private equity-backed companies. Angela shares how her background in industrial-organizational psychology shaped her approach to human capital, talent assessment, leadership decisions, and AI-driven workforce planning. Key Takeaways: Human capital directly impacts value creation: Angela explains that GrowthCurve Capital pays close attention to talent because portfolio companies cannot scale without the right people in the right roles at the right time. Private equity needs more science in people's decisions: Industrial organizational psychology brings data, prediction, assessment, and structured thinking into areas that are often treated as intuition-based decisions. AI is reshaping work, not eliminating human value: Angela shares examples of portfolio companies using AI tools like Claude to analyze job descriptions, employee data, tasks, and automation opportunities. Still, human judgment remains essential for validation and decision-making. Bad senior hires are extremely expensive: A wrong executive hire can delay value creation by 9 to 12 months, affect investor returns, slow down teams, and cost roughly $1 million or more when recruiting fees, lost time, and business disruption are considered. Chief people officers are critical in PE-backed companies: Angela explains why GrowthCurve prioritizes placing a strong CPO early in the ownership period to support change management, leadership alignment, recruiting, performance systems, and talent strategy. Episode Timestamps: [00:00] – Trailer [00:55] – Meet the Guest & the Role of Human Capital [03:30] – From People's Decisions to Value Creation [07:00] – Building a Scientific Approach to Talent [10:30] – AI, Job Analysis, and Org Design in Practice [14:30] – Will AI Replace Jobs? [17:30] – The Real Cost of a Bad Executive Hire [21:11] – Why Chief People Officers Matter Early [23:28] – What a Human Capital Leader Actually Does in PE [28:00] – Hot Takes: Intuition vs. Evidence in Hiring [31:42] – Magic Wand for Better People Decisions [34:41] – Advice for Early-Career Human Capital Professionals [37:05] – Why IO Psychologists Belong in Private Equity 🔗 Connect with the Guest, Angela Geffre: 👉 LinkedIn:   / angelakgeffre   🔗 Follow Guest’s Company, GrowthCurve Capital, on: 👉 Website: https://www.growthcurvecapital.com/ 👉 LinkedIn:   / growthcurvecapital   🔗 Connect with the Host, Sandy Fiaschetti: 👉 LinkedIn:   / sandy-fiaschetti   🔗 More from Lodestone People Consulting: 👉 LinkedIn:   / lodestone-people-consulting   👉 Website: https://www.lodestonehr.com/ 🔗 Follow the Podcast: 👉 Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... 👉 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1oDeRJK... 👉 YouTube:    / @lodestonepeopleconsulting