Fermin Talks Work

Posting one photo from every month.
Somehow it still doesn’t capture how much this year held.

A home. A marriage.
Japan and NYC.
Rock shows and rap concerts.
Weddings, bachelor parties, and my cats keeping life unpredictable.

2025 stretched me.
It tested me.

But it gave me memories I’ll carry for a long time.

Stressful, yes.
Forgettable, not even close.

Posting random pics from Japan because I miss it 🥰

Had to post this quick selfie before I go off on vacation.

Posting this meme because it feels therapeutic 💆‍♂️

This summer I stopped lifting weights to “reset” my body.

All my injuries were adding up, and I was in constant pain. Some days I couldn’t even walk. My sprained wrist was so bad I couldn’t type.

I needed something else. That’s when Vicky put me on to yoga.

It’s been dope af. Little by little, I’ve been improving. My body and soul are healing.

Most importantly, I get small moments to relax, unwind, and hold her hand.

Can’t thank enough for their help, and for this candid shot.

My stupidity does numbers on LinkedIn ...

I hung out with marketers and business leaders and pretended to know what the hell I was doing.

So far, I don’t think employees or HR leaders are feelin’ 2025
There is a lot of negativity, specifically around how employees feel in the workplace.

What’s in the news :
→ Entry-level jobs being eliminated because of AI
→ RTO mandates being forced as quiet layoffs
→ Gen Z struggling to get hired
→ ATS systems auto rejecting candidates because of poor AI guardrails
The list goes on … and on … and on

One thing that hasn’t changed this year, or in the past 15 years?
Satisfaction rates are abysmal. And I’m sure all these external factors aren’t helping.

So what can you do to help people feel comfortable at work?

Have your CEO send a memo saying AI will take everyone’s job?
Umm, no.

Here’s what actually works:
→ Be a human
→ Show empathy
→ Keep things open and transparent

For a lot of folks, things feel tense. The future feels bleak.
So, you’re going to have to know how to lead.

Here’s the plug:

That’s what I’ll be discussing in our webinar with Adam Horne of Open Org.
It’s next Thursday — “Leading with Humanity in the AI Era.”

There should be some valuable insights on how to lead during this weird time in the “world of work.”

I’m excited to get back to what got me into this work in the first place: conversations about employee engagement and how to solve these issues. And I get to do it with someone who’s 1000x more knowledgeable than me.

Check it out. This matters.

I’ll leave the link in the comments/bio

What really killed remote work?

Remote work did not fail. It proved effective for employees, for productivity, and for many businesses. But the culture around work refused to adapt.

It was death by a thousand cuts:
→ Boomers holding onto the idea that “real work” only happens in an office and staying in the workforce longer than expected
→ Middle managers trying to justify their roles by demanding visibility and control over outcomes
→ Corporate real estate losing billions as office buildings sat empty and pushing companies to bring people back
→ Influencers portraying remote work as endless leisure, feeding the false belief that nobody was actually working

Remote work revealed how much of office life was unnecessary. But old habits, corporate interests, and bad optics prevailed for now.

Good luck to those returning to office.

New York is a city that’s guided by love.
It is hard. It is painful. It is rugged.
The rent is high. The people walk fast.
The pigeons will soar next to your face.
The rats will remind you of the race.
You’ll overpay for crappy drink.
You’ll go on a lot of sh*tty dates.
The loud construction workers will ruin your sleep.
BUT if you stick it out long enough, you’ll find what you seek.

With that said, congrats to my friends.
We all found love and our journeys can finally begin.

MIT ran an extensive brain scan study of ChatGPT users. The results are… not great.

→ 83% couldn’t recall what they wrote minutes earlier
→ Neural connections dropped from 79 to 42
→ That’s a 47% decline in brain connectivity
→ Teachers described AI-assisted essays as “soulless” and “empty”
→ Chronic AI users performed worse than people who never used AI when writing without help
→ Brain-only users showed stronger neural activity across all bands

Researchers are calling this cognitive debt - a new phenomenon from over-reliance on AI.

Why am I bringing this up, especially if I’m Pro-AI!?
2 reasons:

1. I believe that AI NEEDS to be used strategically.
2. AI can’t outright replace all of your work.

Now, I have to admit, I use AI every dang day. Maybe every hour. Heck, alright, every 10 minutes.

However, I am still actively working the machine, not letting it do the work for me.

I spend time perfecting prompts, reviewing its outputs, writing original copy (like this post) just to QA it and make sure my arguments are fair and unbiased.

You can’t fall into the trap of thinking that it’ll do all the work for you.

Just remember, aside from making your work look like the soulless AI slop that is plaguing the internet …
You will literally destroy your brain 🧠

Use AI tools that will ADD time to your day, so you can actually be more creative.

Write. Think. Be human ✌️