The Impossible Job: Why Manager Training Keeps Failing, and What to Fix Instead
October 7, 2026 1:00 PM ET
Every HRBP owns manager effectiveness, and for many, it continually underperforms. The reflex is more training, a new competency model, better tools.
The argument of this session is that the reflex is aimed at the wrong thing. Over the last few years, the manager role quietly absorbed more direct reports, fewer layers of support above it, and a pile of work pushed down to the front line: performance, pay, hiring, coaching, engagement, wellbeing, return-to-office enforcement, and now AI adoption.
No training closes a gap that size, because it is not a skills gap. It is a role that no longer fits inside one person's week.
The different take: stop trying to make managers better at an impossible job and start making the job possible. The fix is role redesign by subtraction. See the true load, decide what only a manager can do, move or kill the rest, and measure whether the job is doable in the hours a manager actually has, not whether the manager is effective.
The through-line for the attendee is relief and cover. The failure was never theirs or their managers. It was the design, and the design is fixable.
SHRM Knowledge Advisors will join the live webinar to answer your questions in real time—right in the chat. If we don’t get to your question during the session? No problem, SHRM members can head to SHRM Connect after this webinar to keep the conversation going with advisors for 30 extra minutes. This benefit is only for members who join the live webinar and not included later on demand.
Meet the Presenters
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Jackson O. Lynch
Jackson O. Lynch is the Founder of Talent Sherpa, a leading platform for pragmatic talent strategy. Through his best-selling Substack newsletter, podcast, and executive coaching, he equips senior leaders with the tools to maximize business outcomes through people. Talent Sherpa has grown to more than 6,300 active subscribers and was recently ranked the 6th fastest-growing business publication on Substack. Lynch's human capital insights also reached more than 3.2M annual views on LinkedIn. His podcast, the Talent Sherpa Podcast, delivers candid conversations with executives and thought leaders, while also challenging conventional HR wisdom and equipping CHROs with actionable strategies. In September 2025, Lynch joined Johny C. Talyor Jr. on-stage to kick off the SHRM Executive Network Visionaries Conference. A core part of Lynch's work is coaching new and emerging CHROs. He helps first-time, rising, and even struggling chief people officers thrive by sharpening their executive influence, mastering board and CEO alignment, and delivering required business impact through talent. Lynch recently served as Executive Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer at Sunnova Energy International (NYSE: NOVA), a renewable energy leader navigating strategic restructuring. He strengthened talent density by upgrading leadership teams around top performers, drove clarity of expectations by anchoring leaders on outcomes rather than activities, and accelerated speed to impact by redesigning role architecture, selection standards, and ramp-up processes. Underpinning the transformation was a unified talent philosophy that provided the substructure for rapid transformation.
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Kim Lantis
Kim Lantis has spent nearly a decade asking executives good questions. She joined dojo.live as a co-host in 2016 and went on to become its host and producer, turning the live video podcast into a recognized voice in hospitality technology with guests from companies like Sabre, Amadeus, and Oracle Hospitality. Along the way, she found she does her best work bringing structure to new ventures, whether that meant building internal knowledge platforms and communication programs, running podcast production, or helping launch THINC³ Tank Media within Hospitality Nexus. Today she leads community development at Talent Sherpa, connecting with HR leaders across the industry. Originally from Montana, Kim has called Mexico home for more than twenty years. She'll tell you love brought her there, but the food made her stay.
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