September | 2026 | The Dan Smolen Experience

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The modern workplace has undergone enormous change. But are we still designing offices around an outdated idea of what people actually need when they come together?

MillerKnoll’s Ryan Anderson returns to What’s Your Work Fit? to answer our lead question: What should the modern workplace be designed for?

His answer is one word: interaction.

Ryan argues that many activities offices were once designed to support—meetings, training, collaboration and individual work—have migrated to our laptops. That means the workplace needs a different purpose: creating the human interactions, relationships and sense of belonging that are harder to replicate digitally.

We explore what that means for workplace leaders, including why badge swipes reveal little about what actually happens inside an office, how workplaces can foster stronger team connections, and why organizations should think about “reattachment to office” rather than simply Return to Office.

The conversation also turns to AI. Ryan explains why agentic AI could make human connection even more important as people increasingly work alongside intelligent agents—and why organizations should be wary of creating workforces where people feel like isolated freelancers interacting with AI all day.

And Fran Saele brings the discussion to employee health and well-being: could thoughtfully designed workplaces help people feel better during their workday? Ryan describes opportunities ranging from respite and inclusive spaces to childcare and other practical resources—and argues that organizations must communicate the intent behind these investments.

Joining Ryan are What’s Your Work Fit? Executive Producer and Host Dan Smolen and co-hosts Mark Gilbreath, CEO of LiquidSpace, and Fran Saele, Managing Principal of MorteVita.

In this episode:

What the modern workplace should actually be designed for
Why interaction is replacing activity as a workplace-design priority
Why measuring attendance isn’t the same as measuring workplace success
Return to Office versus “Reattachment to Office”
Why AI may increase the importance of human connection
How agentic AI could affect workplace relationships
The role of mentoring, belonging and relationship-building
How workplace design can better support employee health and well-being

The bigger question: If we no longer need an office simply to get our work done, what should make the workplace worth going to?

Subscribe to What’s Your Work Fit? wherever you listen to podcasts.

MillerKnoll Insight Page

MillerKnoll About Place Podcast

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 58:58 — 54.0MB)

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As AI becomes embedded in our work, a deceptively simple question is getting much harder to answer:

Who owns it?

Future-of-work strategist and host of The Future of Less Work Podcast, Nirit Cohen, returns to What’s Your Work Fit? to explore what happens when workplace AI becomes more than a company-provided tool.

AI is learning how we write, reason, make decisions, solve problems and express our expertise. That raises an entirely new set of questions about the relationship between workers and employers.

The company may own its data and the work product we create. But does it own the way we think?

And what happens when AI dramatically expands our productive capacity? If technology allows us to accomplish eight hours of work in six, who owns the two hours it gives us back?

Nirit joins host Dan Smolen and co-host Fran Saele and me for a wide-ranging conversation about AI, agency and the changing bargain between employers and employees.

We explore the rise of the AI-enabled “second brain”; what should happen to our personalized AI when we leave a company; the provocative possibility of employers retaining digital representations of our expertise; why AI should prompt us to ask “what is now possible?” rather than simply “how can we do more?”; and why Nirit describes the future of work as potentially the “future of less work.”

We also examine a fascinating tension emerging between traditional employment and independent work. If employers use AI-created capacity simply to fill every newly available hour with more work, will some of their most capable people decide that greater agency can be found outside the organization?

And Nirit takes us even further: toward a world that could include billion-dollar companies with almost no employees—and extraordinarily capable individuals who need almost no company around them.

Underlying it all is a question central to Work Fit:

Will AI give people greater agency over their work and lives—or simply enable organizations to demand more from them?

This is not simply a conversation about AI technology.

It is a conversation about ownership, time, human intelligence, agency, and the kind of working lives we want to create.

Listen to this episode of What’s Your Work Fit? and then ask yourself:

If AI learns how you think, who should own that capability?

And if AI gives you time back, who should own the time?

Topics include

AI and the changing employer-employee bargain • Who owns your AI “second brain”? • Company intellectual property vs. human thinking • AI-created productive capacity • Who owns the time AI saves? • RTO and measuring work by time • Employee agency • Independent work • The future of less work • The four-day workweek • Portable benefits and social safety nets • Billion-dollar companies with no employees • Human intelligence in an AI world • Work Fit

🔥 Why This Episode Matters

Agentic AI has created measurable productivity opportunities for companies. But it also could be at the expense of career professionals who want agency to fashion their day at work and beyond.

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Monthly Archives: September 2026

What Should the Modern Workplace Be Designed For?