12 June 2026
TCS is not a headcount story.
Boards keep asking 'what's our number?' But headcount is the output of a decision, not the decision itself. What's changing is the unit of work, and the junior-heavy pyramid that was built to deliver it.
The boards asking “what’s our number?” are starting in the wrong place. Headcount is the output of a decision, not the decision itself. What’s actually changing is the unit of work, and the junior-heavy pyramid that was built to deliver it.
When you treat that as a cost problem, finance trims the old model and declares victory. Twelve months later you’re rehiring into roles that didn’t exist when you ran the numbers.
The question isn’t how many people. It’s what work looks like when the assumptions underneath your operating model stop being true.
More from the Friday Frame archive.
- 10 July 2026
Channel, competitor, or infrastructure?
OpenAI will have ad sales on the ground in every major advertising region within a year. If boards haven't decided what ChatGPT is to them b...
- 3 July 2026
The demand side has finished eating the supply side.
Google's AI Overviews are the antitrust question wearing a search costume. Boards asking what their own model can do are missing the bigger ...
- 26 June 2026
Project Genie killed the storyboard.
Google DeepMind's Project Genie at Cannes turned the storyboard into a playable prototype. The pitch becomes the prototype. Agencies have to...
Get a heads up when there is new writing here.
I publish irregularly. The Friday Frame ships most weeks. The longer essays land when they are ready. Drop your email and you will get a note when something new goes up, or when an existing post gets a meaningful rewrite. Nothing else.