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The Success Story of Robert Hicks, Group HR Director at Reward Gateway

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“Understanding how different parts of the business work and actually being able to go in and experience them is far more helpful than hearing about them. You need to be able to see how things are done, the dynamics and power structures at work, and what clients are saying first-hand.” – Robert Hicks, Group HR Director at Reward Gateway, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership.   As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Robert Hicks at Reward Gateway, who began his HR career as an HR Assistant at the British Council. He later transitioned to the role of HR Manager at Workspace Group, and in January 2008, moved to Exponential-e to work as an HR Manager before ascending to the role of HR Director. In November 2014, Robert set up his own HR Consultancy, and took on an interim HR contract at Cognizant Technology Solutions, before joining the team at Reward Gateway as Head of HR on an interim contract. In April 2016, he transferred to a permanent contract upon undertaking his current role. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? HR found me rather than me finding HR. My first job was an admin role in the Marketing department of the British Council. The role wasn’t a great fit, but I fitted well into the business, so I started to look for other roles. I found that the one that best suited my skills was as an HR Assistant. I had experience training and interviewing from earlier in my career at McDonald’s, so it felt like a natural progression. I decided to go and work in HR for a year. 24 years later, I’m still here! I love working in HR for many reasons. I liked the fact that doing HR qualifications set me off on a whole new career path, but I also found that I was good at organising teams and training courses. I enjoyed pulling together paperwork, improving processes and doing those things really suited me.  I soon realised that I wanted to achieve more than the basics in HR. So, I gained my CIPD qualification. The route I took to get it wasn’t easy, as I did my exams directly with the CIPD, which was the hardest route you could take, but it was ultimately helpful in enhancing my understanding of HR. After moving to the Workspace Group, I began to realise that I needed a really strong educational background in HR to progress. While my previous educational background got me comfortably into the position as an HR professional, I wanted to improve further, so I decided to convert my qualification into an HR Master’s degree and become a Fellow of the CIPD. In 2011, I decided to take it one step further and undertake my MBA, which I thought was more of a rarity for people in the HR industry.  My career has been a journey of continuous learning. I’ve loved it. Over time, I’ve created a path of progress. It’s really important when you’re trying to move from HR Manager or HRBP jobs, for example, or change sectors. I was lucky to have three amazing influences in Adrian Clark-Morgan at the British Council, John Miller when I was at Workspace, and Colette Keegan at Exponential-e, who all supported me to further my education. Doing so was a great way for me to develop. My MBA taught me different areas of critical thinking, it automatically gave me more credibility during certain conversations, and boosted my appeal when I was applying for jobs. It also helped me understand the strategies we use and challenges we face in business, which enable me to be at the forefront of those conversations even today. Can you tell me about the key themes and challenges that you’re seeing across the HR sector? Even though HR still has its challenges, it’s important to acknowledge that we’re probably in the best place we’ve ever been in. The CIPD needs to take a lot of credit for that. The move to Chartered Institute back in the 90s was great strategically, and it’s made us stronger as a sector. In terms of the challenges we still face, I think the biggest one is the shift in our focus. The paperwork and administration side of our roles is no longer dominant, because automation is helping with a lot of it. Instead, we’re dealing more with positive and interesting things in the diversity arena and fighting the ‘War on Talent’. We constantly face issues in terms of finding not only enough people, but enough skilled people who are right for the jobs we need to fill. I think that’s a cyclical issue that won’t ever fully go away. We also face challenges around educating people in a cost-effective, value-add way while remaining as dynamic, agile, and responsive to change as possible. Our sector is definitely more changeable than others, and a lot more subject to current concerns— COVID-19 is forcing change upon us. We have to be experts in everything, including infectious diseases and creating safe workspaces. The digitisation of HR has resulted in the removal of a lot of entry routes for those who would previously have moved into HR Manager and HRBP positions having learned the ropes in admin roles. That said, I think the sector has done well to promote those in HR leadership roles as more than just second-level leaders (the seat at the table conversation seems to now be over). To be recognised as leading voices within companies as a whole means we are now in a position of strength and ability to do the right thing. As a business, Reward Gateway’s key themes at the moment are stability and growth. We’ve been able to continue to grow our business throughout the COVID crisis by investing

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‘Don’t be afraid to go after what you want’ – Interview with Valentina Kristensen

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“If there’s anything that the current situation has taught us, it’s to take advantage of every opportunity, because the world could change tomorrow. Be opportunistic; don’t be afraid to go after what you want.” — Valentina Kristensen, Director of Growth and Communications at OakNorth, speaks to us about developing a career as a business leader. As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some industry leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Valentina Kristensen at OakNorth, who began her career at communications consultancy, Lansons. Valentina later joined Dragon Advisory as an Associate where one of her clients was OakNorth. After a secondment with the business, she joined full-time in July 2016 as OakNorth’s comms lead. Can you tell us how you started your career and how it developed into a leadership role? The possibility of a career in financial services communications first came to mind while I was studying for a degree in Business Management back in 2008—it was the perfect storm for change and opportunity in the sector with the launch of the iPhone and the financial crisis. At that point, trust in the big banks was all but destroyed, and there was a huge effort to try and bring new players into the financial sector to overthrow their market dominance. I could see that these new players had an opportunity to take advantage of this new dawn of technology and revolutionise banking, but  would need to work hard to encourage consumers to put their trust in them first. I decided that I wanted to manage communications for businesses that had had their reputations affected by these developments, and take advantage of the opportunity to potentially help new brands launch and rebuild public faith in the sector. Either way, finance promised to be an interesting sector to work in amidst all the upheaval going on.  My goal was to join a financial services communications agency, because I knew an agency offered the diversity of experience I wanted to have starting out. I’d heard it was a great way to learn from a number of other communications professionals, build up a broad portfolio of clients, and get a wide range of experience in launches, research, and other key areas of the role. I started my career at an agency called Lansons, which had done everything from launching completely new brands—including Metro Bank, who were one of my first clients and the first new bank in the UK in 150 years—all the way through to serving some of the largest financial services companies in the world. I got the opportunity to work with established players like Vanguard, JP Morgan, and BlackRock, but also to see the launch of a number of newer fintechs such as Nutmeg. My first encounter with OakNorth was in the summer of 2015 – the business had recently been granted a banking license with restrictions and I was working consultancy-side for them at Dragon. What really resonated with me was the mission and vision for the company laid out by its founders, Rishi Khosla and Joel Perlman. They explained how in 2006, they’d been looking for debt finance to grow their financial research outsourcing business, Copal Amba, but found that none of the banks would give them a loan unless they could secure it against a property – even though they were profitable, had strong cash flow and a great list of retained clients. Back then, there were no alternative sources of debt finance such as crowdfunding or peer-to-peer lending which exist today, so when Rishi and Joel sold that business in 2014 to Moody’s Corporation, they set out to fix the problem of lending to scale-ups. My mother is an entrepreneur, so I had seen first-hand the challenges of starting a business as I was growing up. I loved the fact that Rishi and Joel were trying to create a new bank for entrepreneurs who were seeking to grow their businesses even though they themselves weren’t bankers.  About five years into my career, I was seconded to work at OakNorth in-house. By that point, I’d had the chance to build up a broad range of experience with different types of businesses, and I knew I really wanted to work for a start-up. I was keen to build a Communications function from scratch and be part of the team that helped to build a brand from the ground up, and OakNorth could offer me exactly that opportunity.  Culturally, it was a very good fit, so not long into the secondment, Rishi, Joel, and I had a conversation about me joining full-time. I initiated that conversation which of course meant taking a risk, but creating that opportunity to sit down with them and give the elevator pitch was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.  I’ve been at OakNorth full-time for four years now, and I’ve had the chance to build a brilliant team and help grow the brand from the ground up just as I always aspired to. It’s been a really exciting opportunity. How would you say your leadership has developed throughout your time at OakNorth? What skills have you developed as part of that? I’ve been extremely lucky to have real champions in Rishi and Joel, who have given me opportunities to develop and provide me with inspiration for my own leadership. For example, there have been multiple times over the years when Rishi has been approached for an interview and  suggested I do it instead because I know the talking points and he’s of course limited for time. In the beginning, I was very nervous, because I hadn’t really done public speaking, but my confidence built up over time. That has led to some amazing opportunities, but also upped my confidence to speak capably and with conviction in meetings with key stakeholders. Even though we’ve grown significantly, Rishi and Joel still see Communications as an incredibly important

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“Don’t be afraid of learning from your team” – Interview with Vicky Walker

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“No matter what level you’re at in your career, every day is a school day. Don’t be afraid of learning from your team; knowledge doesn’t always have to come from above, and humility is key.” – Vicky Walker, Head of People at Westfield Health, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership. As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Vicky Walker at Westfield Health, who started her HR career as People Manager at Tesco before moving on to take on the role of HR Business Partner at Westfield Health. In July 2018  Vicky transitioned to the role of HR and Wellbeing Manager, before taking on her current role in October 2019. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? My initial career aspiration whilst I was at university was to go and work for the NHS in a People role—even my degree was geared around that particular path. The NHS element of that aspiration didn’t work out, so I applied for a graduate scheme at Tesco, where I’d worked part-time throughout my studies. That didn’t work out either, but this time I was left feeling determined that I could get to the Line Manager level in a different way. I did, and my first Line Manager role was actually managing the deli counters and the team of 35 that worked them. I suppose I didn’t really have a clue what I wanted at that point in my career, but I continued to work my way up into a senior role. It was very hands-on and very operational, but we still dealt with people all the time. An opportunity within the People function opened up when the People Manager went on maternity leave, and I asked to take it on—the People aspect was the best bit of my management role, and I wanted to continue that. I was given the chance, and absolutely loved it. I didn’t want to go back to an operational leadership role after that; I really wanted to stick with People leadership.  I think HR stuck because I liked talking to people. I try not to overcomplicate HR in my own practice—for me, as long as you can talk to people right, you can do it. The conversations you have might not always be the nicest, but as long as you can have them properly, you’ll get the right outcome.  At the same time, I knew I still wanted to stick with the management side of things. I felt that was where I could make a difference, even if it was just a practical one in terms of developing a new Line Manager to work their way up to a position above me, for example. I love developing people and encouraging them to become better versions of themselves—it gives me a sense of pride even today.  For me, HR is really about being able to understand a business and their people and how you can support them, not how you can get in the way or dictate policies and processes. As an HR leader, I should be just as involved as a function like Finance is in our decision-making processes.  Any business problem is a People problem, because people are involved in every single aspect of the business. Equally, any business solution is a People solution, because solving issues is often about having the right people in the right places with the right skillset and the right energy level to tackle them. To me, people should be at the centre of every business because they’re our biggest asset. Being in an operational role might have introduced me to HR, but the People aspect in them was always secondary, even though people were what delivered that operational aspect. After that opportunity, I knew it was time to make a change and allow People to become my primary focus, so I transitioned to HR at Tesco full-time. As a Senior HR Manager, I built up three teams from scratch prior to store openings, and I really enjoyed it. I loved being able to shape our crew and the expectations of them, and I also found myself responsible for everything from recruitment to disciplinaries to staff development, so I was getting great experience.  I had a little boy a while later and went to a part-time role, but I still had the same responsibilities right up until I was made redundant in 2017. If it wasn’t for that redundancy, I don’t think I would ever have left Tesco—I’d been there for such a long time that I was institutionalized, really.  Towards the end of my time there, I knew that a job hunt was on the horizon, so I decided to self-fund my CIPD. You didn’t need it to be a People Manager at Tesco regardless of how many colleagues you were responsible for—policies and processes were already written for you, so your job was just making sure they were implemented and followed—but as I started to look to the future, I knew I needed the qualification to equip me with the theory to back up my practical experience and be able to transfer it to other roles. My current role at Westfield Health has definitely drawn on both sides of my experience. Even though I entered into a brand-new industry when I joined the team, I very quickly found that people are people wherever you go, and I was able to tap into my previous practical experience at Tesco. Never underestimate the practical element of HR; it’s what enables you to put your strategies in place and be a partner to your business.  Can you tell me about the key themes and challenges that you’re seeing across the HR sector? I think a major key theme for us is the fact that the future of work is going

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Interview with Zoe Parker about developing a career in HR Leadership

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“[
]Your attitude and behavioural qualities are hugely important to succeeding in HR. You can have technical knowledge, and you can follow a process map, but having the ability to build relationships and develop your emotional intelligence is what really takes you to the next level…” – Zoe Parker, Head of HR at Everymind at Work, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership.   As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success.  This week, we had a great conversation with Zoe Parker at Everymind at Work, who began her career as a Graduate Trainee at Tesco Stores Ltd before being appointed as HR Manager. In September 2000, Zoe joined Alliance & Leicester as an HR Business Partner for the Corporate Division, later ascending the ranks to become a Senior HR Business Partner. Zoe moved on to Banco Santander to act as Senior HR Manager for their Corporate division following the acquisition of Alliance and Leicester, later turning her managerial attentions to the Retail Multichannel in February 2012. In October 2013, Zoe became an HR Consultant for Community Integrated Care, later becoming HR Business Partner for The Very Group ahead of taking on her current role in May 2020. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? I studied Technology Management at university because I wanted to pursue a Management career, but at the time, I didn’t know that that was specifically going to be in HR. Once I’d graduated, I wanted to get onto a graduate programme to gain some general leadership experience, and I’d heard really good things about Tesco’s trainee management programme.  The idea of being able to work my way up a business and experience different departments was really attractive to me—I think that as a leader, if you can genuinely say you’ve been in the same situation as your team, you can create a bit more of a rapport and gain their respect. I took on roles from the bakery to the fish counter and everything in between before specialising in HR, so I had that wide-ranging experience. I did the bulk of my training in Tesco’s Personnel and Training department, where I was given the opportunity to shadow the then-Personnel Manager, and eventually appointed as a store Personnel Manager myself. Working in a store was a very different experience to a traditional HR role in a Head Office. It’s a real leadership role, so it entailed store and duty management on top of HR accountabilities. It was quite different from roles I’ve had since, but a really good experience. What really made HR stand out for me was the people and interaction side of things. I loved the building of relationships I saw happening through training and coaching, and I was more drawn towards a role where I could help others develop their careers than I was to the more operational and retail-focused roles, so I thought my relationship-building and management skillset would be better suited to the HR and Training side. That said, having a grounding in all the different departments helped considerably—I found that I could use my experience to better advise people and get to grips with how certain things might be affecting them. A lot of the time in HR, we’re working on launching initiatives, rolling things out, and communicating changes, so being able to tailor that using your knowledge of different departments to ensure that colleagues are as engaged as possible and feel part of a dialogue is hugely helpful, as is using that to anticipate how changes will land. By September 2000, I’d worked in various Tesco stores, relocated across the country, and experienced a range of different working cultures, but I knew I really wanted to gain different sector experience in a Head Office environment for my own personal development. When I took the Business Partner role at Alliance & Leicester, I found that it was considerably different from everything I’d been used to in terms of culture, timing, speed of execution, and bureaucracy. I was used to having the autonomy to roll things out quickly for my teams at Tesco, but moving into banking added in more regulatory requirements and guidance to follow. It was a great experience, though, and I’m glad I stayed with them to see the acquisition by Santander. From an HR perspective, we had to handle the integration and harmonisation of the two businesses very quickly, which was a very challenging project, but also a fantastic experience that brought up a lot of new skills I hadn’t been exposed to before. Once everything was set up in terms of OD, I did move over to the retail arm of the company for a few years of experience on the more customer-focused side, but the majority of my time at Santander was spent within corporate banking and the specialist finance teams. They were vastly different populations with very different focuses, but I developed a broad skillset from experiencing them both. My career has always had that element of diversity to it—I went from the corporate sector to consultancy, and then into the strategic Business Partner role at Very, which was more about building relationships with the Directors and supporting the execution of their People plans. My current role is very different once again—what I’m doing now is really about supporting a tech start-up. Can you tell me about the key themes and challenges that you’re seeing across the HR sector? Although the current situation with COVID-19 has proved to be a hugely challenging time for everyone, I think that we as HR professionals have more of a seat at the leadership table than ever now. Our businesses are looking to us to help them navigate the current crisis and shape our organisational agendas, as well as directing what those may look like in some cases.  In a lot of respects, the current

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Developing a career in HR Leadership: Interview with Laura Guttfield

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“Throw out any kind of HR rule book that you’ve ever been taught from or that you think is the right thing to follow. [
] [Y]ou need to be brave enough to adapt to what your business needs.” – Laura Guttfield, HR Director at Childs Farm Ltd, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership.   As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Laura Guttfield at Childs Farm Ltd, who began her career in HR as an HR Administrator and later an HR Advisor at Lexis PR before moving to Ketchum Public Relations to work as a Talent Manager. In January 2013, Laura took on a role as HR Business Partner for ITN Productions and Channel 4 News before moving to subsequent roles as Human Resources Business Partner for ITN Productions and ITN Technology, and Head of HR for ITN Productions and Technology, winning the title of HR Business Partner of the Year at the 2016 Personnel Today Awards for her efforts in her HRBP role. In August 2018, Laura became Head of HR for ITN Productions & Corporate ahead of taking on her current role in January 2019. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? After doing my law degree, I knew I didn’t want to continue down that career path, and I took some time out to think about what it was that I wanted to do. I’d really enjoyed my company law and employment law modules, and I knew I wanted to be an expert in an integral function that was relied upon in an organisation, but at the same time wasn’t law. I happened upon HR, and found that it offered the perfect combination of being able to work with people, use my law degree, and allowing me to become a go-to expert. I was lucky enough to get an entry-level position in a PR agency in London the year after I left university, but getting there wasn’t without its challenges. I went for so many interviews to get into HR after I graduated, but everyone seemed to want admin experience or office experience I simply didn’t have, as I’d only ever worked in retail part-time. Thankfully, I was able to secure the role at Lexis with no experience, and it was a fantastic first role to have. I was an HR Administrator reporting straight to the HR Director, and that gave me an incredible grounding in both more generalist HR and the qualitative and cultural side.  Rather than just paper pushing, data processing, and treating people like numbers, we were really hands-on, and there was a huge focus on employee engagement, company culture, and reward. I was exposed to anything and everything at Lexis—I really got to understand the business, and I loved it.  From there, I moved to another PR agency, but the role was very Recruitment-focused, whereas in the long term I was really keen to work my way up and take on an HR Manager role. Shortly after that, I moved into broadcast media. The transition was incredible. That’s one of the things that sticks out about HR for me—you can go and do the job you’re passionate about anywhere, which opens up the possibility of also working in an industry you’re passionate about as well. It was a really exciting prospect for me. The Business Partner role at ITN terrified me, but in a good way. It was quite high-profile—working with Channel 4 News and the commercial arm of ITN, ITN Productions—but it was also the perfect step to tick off all the HR experiences that I hadn’t had the chance to fulfil in my previous roles. I found that I really enjoyed working within ITN Productions to grow the business. It was dynamic and exciting, whereas the newsroom side of ITN didn’t really face the same kind of commercial challenges and had less potential for me to be able to shape things. With that in mind, I sought opportunities to take on other divisions and climb the ladder that way. I made myself known and made sure that people were aware of my skills and achievements within the commercial side of the business, as well as what kinds of change I could enact in a role more suited to my skill-set.  As a result, I moved across to the technology and group functions, which was brilliant. Both groups of functions were quite traditional and legacy-run, so there was huge potential for me to make changes and encourage them to be more commercial in their thinking and do things more efficiently while also managing union relationships. Following that, I asked to transition to a Head of HR role. It was really important to me to show progression, but I was also leading some really significant projects and running crucial negotiations in my role as HRBP and wanted to be recognised for what I was bringing to the business, and the role enabled that. I was at ITN for six years in total, and it was an amazing time during which I achieved a lot and developed a lot personally. I loved the challenge and excitement of fast growth during my first years there, but it’s a large organisation with unions to account for and a complex change process.  I found myself wanting to turn my attention to a growing business with an agile approach to change, and the opportunity at Childs Farm ticked every single box that I was looking for—a founder-owned business with an incredible growth story, hugely successful products, and a strong affinity with my personal values. I was recruited to go in and set up an HR function, so I went from having Learning and Development and Benefits functions reporting to me to having no direct reports, but instead rolling my sleeves up and getting involved.

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Careers advice: “…cure the fear by doing it anyway.” – Kelly Jackson, Chief People Officer at Luno, speaks to us about a career in HR Leadership.

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“Don’t let fear hold you back. Just because people are in positions right at the top of the company doesn’t mean that they’re superhuman, they’ve just decided to cure the fear by doing it anyway.” – Kelly Jackson, Chief People Officer at Luno, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership. As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Kelly Jackson at Luno, who began her HR career working as an HR Advisor for Experian QAS UK before moving on to Stemcor to ascend the ranks there, transitioning  from Head of Business Partnering to Director of HR in July 2013. In November 2014, Kelly joined the team at WorldFirst, now part of the Alibaba Group, adding responsibilities as Chief People Officer to her existing role as Group HR Director in September 2017. In August 2019, Kelly took on her current role at Luno. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? I joined Experian QAS pretty much straight from university, having no real idea about what I wanted to do, but joined them because I liked how they described their culture and values, and track record of promoting people from within. I was originally a Sales Coordinator for the Telesales team, and I loved the banter of the team! Fortunately, I also had a very supportive boss, who after about six or seven months in the role encouraged me to look around the business, speak to people to find out about their careers, and see if anything interested me. When I did that, I found that the HR team were the most interesting to me, partly because I’m quite nosy! I like knowing what’s going on within the business, and the HR team is a good way to do that. I’d also done a psychology degree, and the blend of knowing everything that’s going on and having an influence on the people in the business while using my understanding of how people think and work from my degree meant that HR was my natural home. joined the HR team to set up their Recruitment function, which was quite a specialist role that I felt it was too early in my career to stick with for long. When an opportunity came up, I moved into more generalist HR, and I’ve continued in the People space because I enjoy knowing that the work I was doing was having an impact on the success of the business. I love being able to make a difference to how people experience work, and I’m still really passionate about that now. I think that if companies get it right, they can unlock an awful lot more passion and achieve more amazing things than they could by sticking to “the ways things have always been done”. Even at the start of my career I understood that People teams could have a level of influence on how people felt about their jobs and the company, as well as seeing the satisfaction that came from knowing people were having fun! I like people as well, but I’ve always known that you don’t go into HR if you want to be liked back—that’s the number one rule. Don’t go into HR for popularity, but if you like people and you’re curious about how they show up and behave and what you can do that might change that, then it’s a really interesting place to be, especially right now. Can you tell me about the key themes and challenges that you’re seeing across the HR sector? Within the last two companies I’ve had roles with, my career has been about scaling businesses working with the founder CEO, which is a really interesting challenge. In terms of what Luno specifically is facing at the moment, our biggest opportunity relates to designing what our future ways of working will look like in a post pandemic world. COVID has of course presented most businesses with a unique and unexpected set of challenges, but also an acceleration of the flexibility that people have now become accustomed to and want. That’s a really big but exciting challenge, because at the moment remote working seems to be effective, but a lot of that is perhaps because everyone is forced into it. When people do want to go back into the office for those social connections or collaborative spaces, or just to get a change of scenery, that’s when you can quickly get yourself back into a position where the hybrid model doesn’t work so well because you haven’t deliberately designed it to. Another area we constantly look at is whether our employee experiences and systems are fit for scale—finding a way to take the our culture and practices that worked with 100 people and adapt them so that they will work with nearly 400 Lunauts and are scalable beyond that too. We’re also focusing heavily on leadership and leadership identity—establishing what a Luno leader looks like, how they show up for their teams, and what they need to do and understand in their role, especially now through the lens of a business that was always global but has the added complexity of being fully remote. We need to support them in navigating leadership in the way it is needed today and specifically find a way for them to build the same intensity and trust in remote relationships there as they have with someone who might be sat opposite them. Once we establish that, it’s about passing that knowledge and those skills onto managers in a very different way than just the normal classroom-based training, which can quickly be forgotten especially if it isn’t relevant to them at the time. So, we have introduced a ‘micro-learning’ approach. We do fortnightly learning sprints with smaller groups of managers where we focus on a particular area for one hour a week

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The Secret to Success: Interview with Gemma Shambler

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 “Be sure to find a mentor. Their insight is invaluable and they can act as great coaches to help you progress.” – Gemma Shambler, Head of People at The Happiness Index, speaks to us about developing a career in HR Leadership. As part of our commitment to supporting candidates to develop fulfilling careers, we’ve invited some HR Leaders to share the secrets of their success. This week, we had a great conversation with Gemma Shambler at The Happiness Index, who began her HR career by taking on the role of Office Manager at 4Ps Marketing before ascending the ranks to become an HR Manager in April 2015. In January 2019, Gemma took on her current role as Head of People at The Happiness Index. Can you tell us how you got into HR and why? I got into HR whilst working at 4Ps Marketing. Initially, I joined them in more of a Facilities role working as an Office Manager. It was a fast-growing company so even at that stage there was always an element of HR to my role. It started small and grew with the company. I loved it! I’d not worked in a company that was so people-focused and invested so much in growing their people before. That philosophy really resonated with me, so I moved away from the office side of things and focussed on HR. I enlisted the help of some experienced—but not formally trained—mentors within the business to learn the HR skills I needed. I completed some courses to facilitate that as well but I never undertook the CIPD qualification or went to university. I definitely didn’t take a conventional route to where I am now. You could say my grounding in HR was a mixture of self-taught skills, mentorship and some more formal training. What made HR stick for me was undoubtedly the people element. The knowledge I was gaining played a role but mostly I loved being able to help people grow and progress. I wanted to help people get the best out of their careers. After five and a half years at 4Ps, I moved to take on the Head of People role at The Happiness Index – where they are even more people-centric and offer everyone the freedom and trust to work in a way that suits them best. There’s no prescriptive, process-driven side to what I do at all, which I love! That side of HR doesn’t appeal to me in any way. Being Head of People means that I can be fully in control of our people strategy and the direction that we take.  At The Happiness Index, we’re very passionate about our vision of giving employees the freedom to be human. We’re constantly trying to achieve that by ensuring our values are underpinned in all our working practices. We really want to be the beacon for what the happiest place to work for looks like, and my role plays a huge part in that. Can you tell me about the key themes and challenges that you’re seeing across the HR sector? Given the current COVID-19 situation, businesses are principally focused on ensuring their survival. Many have had to go into survival mode in light of the pandemic. At The Happiness Index, we’re getting used to working remotely. In a business sense, we’re starting to come out of survival mode and into thrive mode again. In a People sense, we want to make sure that we can provide clarity and complete transparency on what to expect over the coming months and years. Our main priority is ensuring our people are secure in their roles and they know what they’re doing. We have had to pivot some roles already, but the team has taken to that really well. Our next focus is internally kicking off our plan to make The Happiness Index the happiest place to work! That will include many different focuses and projects. The idea of having the freedom to be human is all about making sure that people have a voice, they can be true to their values and they are listened to. We are really big on the belonging piece and making sure that everyone feels like they have a place with us. With the recent developments in the Black Lives Matter movement, we also want to ensure we’re doing everything we can to promote and demonstrate equal opportunities diversity and inclusion. Obviously, they are always on the agenda but COVID has reset a lot of things in our minds, and we’ve been able to focus on what our priorities should be. We’re also currently engaging a lot with neuroscience. It can be really useful in terms of understanding how feelings can affect performance in a work environment. We’ve found that the insight can be hugely beneficial when you’re trying to work out how to approach tasks, set up teams and communicate with them. Not only in times of uncertainty but also more generally.  In terms of HR more broadly, I think engagement needs to be a bigger key theme across the sector. People are working in ways they’ve never worked before. Now, more than ever, it’s vital that companies are listening to their employees, giving them a voice and acting on their feedback. An open dialogue with employees is 100% key industry-wide. When you take that approach, it will create a better working environment, make everyone feel valued and inform business tactics. What career advice would you offer to someone either working towards a career like yours, or someone just getting started in their HR career? Find a mentor. We all need support and it’s so important to have someone to bounce ideas off and discuss what’s going on in your working life and how they might approach things. Their insight is invaluable and they can act as great coaches. Gemma has been working as Head of People since January 2019 and provides support and leadership for all aspects of The Happiness Index’s strategic

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If Not Me, Then Who?

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Last week I invited 5 HR Leaders to share their thoughts on D&I and how to start the hard conversations which become the catalyst for change.  You can find the webinar here. We have also pulled together a document filled with resources and articles about anti-racism, allyship and what steps organisations and their HR leaders can do to make positive changes. If you want to download the pdf, click here.

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Connecting you with Global Opportunities and Global Talent

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We’ve always believed collaboration is key to success. Now more than ever we need to deliver as much value to our clients and candidates as we can – that’s why we’ve joined NPAWorldwide.  NPA connects you to premier recruiting firms located throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, Africa and the Americas. Human now has a global network of trusted business partners who can help meet all of our clients’ and candidates needs, whether local, national or international. Watch this video to learn more about NPA!

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