About Maria Black
In a June 2024 interview on CNBC's "Squawk Box," ADP President and CEO Maria Black discussed the state of the labor market, the impact of AI on the workforce, and the future of work. Black stated that the pandemic accelerated AI integration into the workplace and said that younger generations, including Generation Alpha, "will never know work without AI." She noted that ADP's research shows perceptions of AI's impact vary by generation, with younger workers expecting AI to drastically change their roles while more experienced workers view it as an evolution that enhances productivity. Black also said that access to talent globally, combined with AI and flexible hybrid workspaces, has become more widespread and transformative.
Black addressed ADP's 75th anniversary and the company's history of innovation in payroll and HR solutions, stating that the company started with one client and now serves over a million globally. She described the competition in the HR tech space as "fierce" and a healthy sign of innovation, and said ADP continuously evaluates potential acquisitions to enhance its capabilities. Black emphasized that ADP's data spans from small businesses to multinational corporations, providing a comprehensive view of workforce trends, and that AI is a fundamental part of how the company operates.
Source: AI-verified profile updated from Maria Black's recent appearances.
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Transcript (10 segments)
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Narrator0:11
The government's employment report showing gains in non-farm payrolls stronger than forecast, while the ADP report showed less than expected gains in private payrolls. For more on the changing labor landscape, we bring in Maria Black, President and CEO of ADP, the global tech firm specializing in human capital management solutions. Maria, welcome. Here to ring the opening bell today.
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Maria Black0:36
Sure are. 75th anniversary of ADP. I can't believe you've been around that long.
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Interviewer0:42
Yes. 75th anniversary. Couldn't be more excited today ringing the opening bell. ADP at the forefront of payroll and innovation for 75 years. Personally here for 30.
Yes. Maybe in the last five, ten years. The pandemic, people working from home, and now AI coming to the workplace too.
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Maria Black1:18
You do. For us watching the trends, one of the things unique about ADP's data, the unique data set we have, we span all the way from the small business pizza shop on Main Street all the way to the most complicated multinational corporations. One million clients across 140 countries. Think about that. Look at the workforce trends. Remarkable, Becky. Workforce trends, distributive workforce that exists. Access to talent globally is not new. It started in the '80s and '90s with global expansion. Working in the market today, as everyone is setting course as relates to what that means in terms of being an employer, having to address all of these five generations, there's a lot that we're seeing that employers are solving for.
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Interviewer2:24
And weird. We've spoken a little on the show about how different generations obviously look at AI pretty differently. You anticipate the youngest workers are the ones most open to seeing what's there. What surprised me, though, is that most people who are 23 and younger expect that AI is going to drastically change their jobs and in some cases make a lot of what they do obsolete?
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Maria Black2:49
Right. We are. We have been doing a lot of research. In fact, later today we're going to release things we've studied on generations. That's the case what we have today. Beyond that, Generation Alpha, those born in 2010. I have a 14-year-old at home and think about him joining the workforce. Legally age 14 he could. He will never know work without AI. He will never, in our case in the HR space, have to verify to fill out a form for PTO and take a day off manually. Those things will be facilitated through modern tools. In our case, things like the ADP mobile app, able to through natural language search be able to do these things and never know work without AI. The younger generations at some level, whether digital native or Alpha, the next generation, they...
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Interviewer00:04:10,000 --> 00:04:12,000
The sort of upstart competition in your space? Thinking of Brex and Rippling, what you integrate into and are frenemies or something.
Yes. You are the... I don't know... the billion dollar gorilla, biggest player. There are other players coming in. Do you look at them and say these guys are acquisition targets one day? Look at their technology and say I really like that, wish we were doing that? How do you consider this?
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Maria Black4:42
So I'll take the comment that being a gorilla is a compliment. Again, 75 years of payroll acquisition and weathering various technology and innovation cycles, more to come. A lot of upstarts at the very enterprise level. Also we partner across the ecosystem. For us it's about one thing that it's always been about. Date back all the way to our founder Henry Taub, who founded the company 75 years ago. Solving for our client. He found a problem, solved it. Started with one client. We have a million clients today and that involves operating in the broader ecosystem.
