Chapmancg Global Hr Interviews

Research shows that organisations with employees who are highly engaged are more productive. Although this is not surprising, the question of how to increase employee engagement remains. Should you create a flexible working environment? Increase communication? Or does it start with something as simple as respect? Ayana Champagne, Senior HR Director, Global Aftermarket Operations at Pratt & Whitney discusses how simply treating employees with more respect can lead to higher employee engagement.

It’s that time of the year and far too many employees and their managers roll their eyes at the annual performance review process. It’s supposed to be a time of reflection, of aligning expectations and goals to ensure future success—for the organisation and its employees. So why do so many think of it as a tedious exercise often leading to disappointment and wasted time? John Patterson, Senior Vice President of Human Resources at Talbots, discusses the death of the appraisal system and how to partner for real growth.

It seems that young, tech companies have got HR right. They’re listed as some of the best places to work, employees are more engaged, and they have a better understanding of the new consumer. But what is their key to success? How does HR operate inside these digital companies? And why are so many people wanting to work for them? Rob Davies, Human Resources Director for Asia Pacific at Groupon, discusses managing HR in the digital marketplace.

Technology has enabled us to deliver faster and more customised solutions to our clients. It has also given us the freedom to work remotely across various geographies. However, working in virtual teams in different time zones can make it more challenging for employees to feel connected. How do you keep employees engaged and working towards a unified, common goal? John Hackett, Director of Human Resources for Asia Pacific at Pitney Bowes, discusses how effective employee communications and employer branding strategies can lead to higher engagement.

The recruiting function operates in an increasingly complex work environment. Recruiters face a number of challenges – both internal and external – which impacts their ability to deliver effective results with agility. A new type of recruiter has has evolved in recent years to meet the talent demands of today’s global organisations. Talent Advisors are equipped with the skills and experience needed to strategically partner with the business on labour market conditions, intricate talent pipelines and help the business to get to the next level. Greg Noorigain, Senior Director, Global Executive Talent Acquisition & Marketing at PepsiCo, discusses the evolution of recruitment and the growing demand for Talent Advisors.

Interest in delicious and healthy food is one of the fastest growing consumer trends. Start-ups offering new recipes and fusion foods can be found on any city’s street corner and in many grocery store aisles. So how do traditional organisations built on quality and reputation remain competitive in this changing marketplace? Niklas Lindholm, Vice President of Human Resources at Paulig Group, discusses human resources at one of the world’s leading family-owned, international enterprises in the food industry.

In high-growth markets, identifying the right talent is becoming increasingly difficult. And retaining that talent—the kind of employees who will one day lead your organisation through market changes and strategy shifts—is going to be essential to business survival. With competition being so fierce for high performing talent, developing an employer brand that highlights your organisation’s values and culture will be an integral component to the organisation’s overall talent strategy. Steven Dyke, Vice President of Global Talent Acquisition at Elsevier, discusses the key elements of building a world-class employer brand.

Today’s HR leaders must be effective organisational change consultants if they want to drive employee engagement. They must become adept at operating along a spectrum that spans from strategy to implementation and from leader to facilitator. Noel Lenehan, Head of Global HR Operations at Maersk Oil, discusses how to keep employees engaged during times of transition.

An effective company culture can set the organisation up for financial success and serve as a great competitive advantage. Leaders who prioritise culture are willing to take an honest assessment of the status quo and are willing to engage their teams in the cultural reform. But, how can leaders harness the power of culture and connect the dots between culture and financial performance? Cathy Doyle, Chief People Officer at McDonald’s Australia, discusses the benefits of an effective company culture.

It wasn’t long ago that diversity was about ticking boxes on a form and mandatory presentations for all employees. But a lot has changed since then and the prevailing approach to diversity has evolved beyond HR seminars. Organisations are now placing a high value on developing a corporate culture of inclusion. Michael Knierim, Senior Vice President and Global Head of HR at Roche Pharmaceuticals, discusses the value of diversity and inclusion.

Storytelling is a powerful learning tool. In a corporate environment, it can translate knowledge into the human experience. It helps bridge the gap between theory and practical solutions. And it also helps us understand how to behave in certain situations by presenting us with the opportunity to reflect on our own past experiences. Kimo Kippen, Chief Learning Officer and Global Talent Development Leader & Brand Ambassador at Hilton Worldwide, discusses effective learning strategies and the use of storytelling as a corporate learning tool.

The reason why performance management and appraisal programs have been such a hot topic is because they haven’t really done what organisations needed them to: accurately reflect (in a standardised format) an employee’s value to the organisation. Sure, boxes have been ticked on appraisal forms and goals set for the next 6 to 12 months, but in running through this process—year after year—what HR and organisations have found is that a key piece was missing to the equation. Capturing performance (did an employee do X or Y) isn’t enough. Susan Lyon, Director of Human Resources, Global Fabric Care at P&G, discusses the employee value equation at P&G.

Organisations know they must continually transform if they’re to meet ever-growing consumer demands. But changing an organisation that’s been around for almost two hundred years, keeping relevant, and out-delivering competition is no easy feat, especially in such a competitive and dynamic industry like food and beverage. Giorgio Pivetta, Global HR Director for Gruppo Campari, discusses human resource strategy inside one of the world’s leading branded beverage companies.

Advances in digital technology are bringing about new approaches to the way organisations operate. A shift towards a customer-centric approach to human resources has been largely enabled by smart digitisation. This approach requires organisations to rethink the way they interact with employees, re-evaluate the structure of the organisation and the way they manage work-force related activities. Rick Hall, Executive Director, Human Resources Global Service Delivery at Merck discusses the shift towards consumer-centric approaches to HR.

Everyone is searching for the formula to develop the next generation of leaders. It’s one of the most important responsibilities of any management team: identifying the employees who will lead the company into its next era of success. HR creates leadership and high-flyer rotational programs, mentorships, and even sponsors certain employees for business graduate degrees. But what is the right formula? How do you develop existing employees into future leaders? Heather Wang, Global Director of Human Resources for GE Growth at General Electric, discusses Leadership Excellence within GE, one of the most notable organisations for developing HR best practices.

Multinational organisations have longed faced the question of how to structure themselves given increasing customer sophistication, expanding markets, and technological advancements. A lot of them have organised into a matrix structure—some willingly while others have found it was an organic shift over time. The challenges of leading in this type of environment are well-known as they require a new method for information sharing, managing employees, and day-to-day operations. Malcolm Dore, Asia Pacific HR Director at Halyard Health, discusses how to manage within the matrix to ensure global alignment and local team cohesiveness.

Smarthphones and online retailers have allowed consumers to pretty much have what they want, whenever they want it. All they have to wait for is shipping, but with some retailers even offering “same-day shipping”, it really does place a lot of control with the buyer. Often we don’t think about what this means for traditional retailers—for those larger, more renowned institutions that have always had a more physical presence. Maintaining their competitive advantage often means rethinking how they go to market, and often times developing a completely different strategy for the digital marketplace. Bill Allen, Global CHRO for Macy’s, discusses their recent restructuring exercise.

If you ask any business leader they will tell you that diversity is integral to ongoing innovation and global success, yet so many organisations struggle to make diversity and inclusion more than a corporate mandate that makes everyone feel uncomfortable and afraid of saying anything that could lead to mandatory sensitivity training. Ricardo Sookdeo, Head of Talent and Performance Management at A.P. Moller Maersk, discusses the future of diversity and inclusion and the profile of D&I’s best leaders.

World-class HR organisations deliver high quality strategic workforce planning and employee analytics while at the same time operating at a lower cost per employee than their peer organisations. The key to this success can be attributed to a well-designed and executed service delivery model (SDM) that emphasises operational excellence. Magnus Hibbert, Global Head of Shared Services at GlaxoSmithKline, discusses developing World-Class HR Operations.

If you’ve come up through the HR ranks, you would’ve seen the gradual shift in HR priorities away from things like policy setting and benefits enrolment to a more strategic agenda that involves partnering with management to help achieve business success. While new employees do need access to and information about their benefits—and policies are needed from time-to-time—today’s HR leaders spends more of their time in business meetings that set the strategic agenda for the organisation. Kamali Rajesh, Head of Human Resources for ASEAN at Syngenta, discusses how HR enables business success.