ABOUT OUR FIRM

A woman with blonde hair and blue eyes standing on a city sidewalk with tall buildings in the background, wearing a brown top and looking at the camera.

About Me

I work at the intersection of applied psychology, human systems, and workforce transformation.

My work focuses on how organizations and leaders make decisions about talent, capability, and authority as AI, automation, and economic volatility reshape the structure of work. I help institutions see where their people systems no longer reflect reality, and how to redesign them with clarity, accountability, and humanity intact.

I don’t believe people are broken.
I believe systems are outdated.

Crunchbase: The Wildfire Group

Crunchbase: Keri Tietjen Smith

Experience That Actually Matters

I’ve spent more than two decades inside real hiring and workforce systems, not studying them from the outside.

At NetSuite, I helped scale the organization from roughly 400 to more than 5,000 employees, building hiring operations, workforce infrastructure, and capability-based decision frameworks that supported rapid global growth.

Across my career, I’ve advised CEOs, founders, technologists, and executive teams in SaaS, AI, enterprise, and public sector environments. I’ve seen hiring from every angle, from early-stage operational chaos to board-level workforce architecture and governance pressure.

When I speak about hiring systems, leadership, or identity disruption, it’s not theoretical. It’s grounded in lived systems experience.

Perspective, Earned

I also understand transformation from the inside.

Over the course of my life, I’ve navigated repeated structural disruption: long-term military family life, geographic instability, career reinvention, global remote work, and profound personal loss. I’ve rebuilt professional and financial systems more than once under conditions most people never expect to face.

That experience shapes how I work. Not as inspiration, but as systems literacy.

I understand what happens when stability disappears, when assumptions collapse, and when people are forced to adapt faster than institutions are prepared for. That perspective informs how I evaluate risk, resilience, and decision-making in organizations under pressure.

My Approach

My work integrates:

  • Applied and organizational psychology

  • Human systems design and decision architecture

  • Workforce and hiring systems

  • Identity disruption as a systemic risk

  • Labor market dynamics and generational change

  • AI and automation in hiring and evaluation

What I’m Focused On Now

  • Advising executives on hiring systems risk and readiness

  • Supporting organizations redesigning workforce and decision infrastructure

  • Writing and researching the psychological and structural forces shaping the future of work

  • Building a body of work on how AI is reshaping human economic identity and authority

  • Advocating for Ethical AI Policy, Governance and Legislation

Author & Public Work

My writing explores applied psychology, human systems, identity disruption, and the future of work. I publish essays and analysis across multiple platforms, including:

  • Medium — essays on systems, identity, grief, AI, and human evolution

  • Substack — Human Systems Review

  • LinkedIn — commentary on hiring systems, leadership, and workforce transformation, Human Systems Review Newsletter

I also contribute commentary, podcast guesting and analysis to select publications focused on talent strategy, leadership, technology, and organizational change, such as Brainfood Live with Hung Lee.

Check out my Media Page Here

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Our Practice

Section 1: The Challenge
Most organizations approach AI hiring risk from one angle—either legal, or technical, or operational. That’s why they miss the compounding vulnerabilities that emerge where these domains intersect.

A lawyer can tell you if your AI vendor contract has liability protections. But can they audit the algorithm itself?

A data scientist can explain how the model was trained. But can they map it to EEOC compliance standards?

An HR leader knows their hiring process. But do they understand how API integrations change decision authority?

We bring all of these perspectives into one engagement.

Our Multidisciplinary Approach
The Wildfire Group is a specialized advisory practice focused on AI hiring systems risk, compliance, and operational maturity.

Our team includes:
Legal & Compliance
Employment counsel with expertise in algorithmic discrimination, EEOC enforcement, and vendor liability frameworks

Technical & Security
Cybersecurity engineers who audit AI systems architecture, data handling, API security, and model transparency

Talent Acquisition & HR Operations
TA/HR process and compliance experts who have built and scaled hiring systems at Fortune 500 companies and hypergrowth startups

Contingent Workforce Strategy
Advisors specializing in contractor classification, workforce planning, and compliance in blended talent models

Human Systems & Organizational Psychology
Practitioners trained in decision science, behavioral economics, and the human factors that determine whether AI integration succeeds or fails

AI hiring systems create risk at the intersection of:
-Legal exposure (discrimination, disparate impact, vendor liability)
-Technical vulnerability (data security, model bias, system failures)
-Operational breakdown (process gaps, authority confusion, quality collapse)
-Workforce complexity (FTE vs. contingent, global compliance, classification risk)

Most firms send one consultant. We send the team that can see the whole system.

Who We Work With
We work with mid-to-large organizations navigating:
-Hypergrowth scaling (50+ hires/month, distributed teams, operational strain)
-IPO readiness (institutional investor scrutiny, regulatory compliance, audit-ready systems)
-AI vendor adoption (Workday, HireVue, BrightHire, Gem, Covey, Paradox, etc.—evaluating before deployment or auditing after)
-Post-acquisition integration (merging hiring systems, harmonizing compliance, managing workforce transition)
-Regulatory exposure (EEOC complaints, pending litigation, proactive risk mitigation)