Human Resources Director Singapore 3.01

HUMAN RESOURCES DIRECTOR HRDMAG.COM.SG ISSUE 3.1

HOT LIST The who’s who of HR 2017

UNDER ATTACK HR’s role in preventing data breaches

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TEETHING PROBLEMS HR in rapid-growth companies

WIN-WIN OUTCOMES Resolving conflict through mediation

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ISSUE 3.1

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CONTENTS

HRDMagSG +HrdmagSg HRDSingapore

UPFRONT 04 Editorial

HOT LIST 20 COVER STORY

HOT LIST

HRD’s annual Hot List brings together the best of the best in the industry – an impressive group of high achievers in the HR profession PROFILE

REWRITING THE HR RULEBOOK

HRD profiles one HR director who is shaking up traditional notions of HR – and has the IPO success to prove her approach works

16 2

Say hello to the CPO

46 FEATURES

HOW GIVING BACK PAYS OFF

Sam Neo outlines why CSR is more than just a ‘nice to have’

06 The data

Closing the gender gap in digital fluency

08 News analysis

What role should HR play in protecting employee data?

10 Upfront: Employment law Illegal job interview questions

12 Upfront: Technology

Why tech fatigue might be taking over your workplace

14 Head to head

48 FEATURES

THE NEXT ITERATION OF WEARABLE TECH Wearable technology can enhance employee health and wellbeing, but what happens next? Iain Hopkins investigates

How involved should HR be in employees’ mental wellbeing?

15 Opinion

Dave Ulrich explains how HR can add business value in 2017

PEOPLE 54 Career path

For Klaus Duetoft, HR is a bridge between career stepping stones

56 Other life

Kicking it with HR consultant, author and black belt Karen Gately

52 FEATURES

TURNING WIN-LOSE INTO WIN-WIN

How can mediation help us manage workplace relationships more effectively? Susan de Silva shares her tips

HRDMAG.COM.SG CHECK IT OUT ONLINE

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UPFRONT

EDITORIAL www.hrdmag.com.sg ISSUE 3.1

CEO, CHRO, CFO… CPO? MANY WILL be looking ahead to 2017 with relief and perhaps some trepidation. The old saying, “May you live in interesting times”, comes to mind – if nothing else, 2016 proved we are indeed living in interesting, if not downright disruptive, times: Brexit, a surprise (for some) US election result, military flare-ups in the Middle East, market volatility… the list goes on.

How about HR? 2016 saw further evolution of the once-humble ‘personnel’ function. Historians may look back on the years 2015–20 as HR’s ‘coming of age’ years when the function finally gained the analytical tools and capabilities to help it become a core member of the decision-making team in business.

It’s not before time. Looking ahead, some have hypothesised that the executive board of the future may have a new member – the chief performance officer (CPO) – with responsibilities that will combine HR, finance, planning, operations and strategy. The new role has emerged as a result of the aftermath of the financial crisis, increasing globalisation and the growing impact of digital

EDITORIAL

SALES & MARKETING

Editor Iain Hopkins

Marketing & Communications Manager Lisa Narroway

Journalists Hannah Go Lauren Acurantes Production Editors Roslyn Meredith Bruce Pitchers

ART & PRODUCTION Design Manager Daniel Williams Designer Marla Morelos Traffic Coordinator Freya Demegilio

Commercial Manager - Asia Gareth Scott

CORPORATE Chief Executive Officer Mike Shipley Chief Operating Officer George Walmsley Managing Director Justin Kennedy Chief Information Officer Colin Chan Human Resources Manager Julia Bookallil

EDITORIAL ENQUIRIES iain.hopkins@keymedia.com.au

SUBSCRIPTION ENQUIRIES tel: +61 2 8011 4992 • fax: +61 2 8437 4753 subscriptions@keymedia.com.au

ADVERTISING ENQUIRIES

Some have hypothesised that the executive board of the future may have a new member – the chief performance officer disruption in the workplace. The CPO title first rose to prominence in 2009, when then US President Barack Obama appointed one of his staff, Anthony Politano, to the position. Politano described the role as having the ‘six Cs’: “Collect, consolidate, and condense performance-related data; communicate the results; collaborate with others; and control and govern the process.”

It’s a combination of skills that may have once rested with the CFO and, more recently, the CHRO. The advent of the CPO is also a sure sign that, with volatile market conditions, the most successful companies will have key functions working together to drive performance across the business.

Iain Hopkins, editor

gareth.scott@keymedia.com tel: +65 3158 0288

Key Media Regional head office, Level 10, 1–9 Chandos St, St Leonards, NSW 2065, Australia tel: +61 2 8437 4700 • fax: +61 2 9439 4599 www.keymedia.com Offices in Singapore, Sydney, Auckland, Denver, London, Toronto, Manila, Bengaluru

Human Resources Director is part of an international family of B2B publications and websites for the human resources industry HUMAN RESOURCES DIRECTOR AUSTRALIA iain.hopkins@keymedia.com.au T +61 2 8437 4703 HC AUSTRALIA ONLINE hcamag.com HRD MAGAZINE CANADA hrmonline.ca HRM NEW ZEALAND hrmonline.co.nz

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Copyright is reserved throughout. No part of this publication can be reproduced in whole or part without the express permission of the editor. Contributions are invited, but copies of work should be kept, as HRD Magazine can accept no responsibility for loss

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UPFRONT

STATISTICS

DIGITAL FLUENCY: CLOSING THE WORK GAP

Canada

7

45/100

While workplace equality is still an unreached ideal, digital fluency has the potential to close the economic gap between genders WHILE MEN currently have an employment advantage, it is a gap that is closing, due in large part to a significant uptick in outcomes for women driven by digital fluency.

According to an Accenture study, #GettingtoEqual: How Digital is Helping Close the Gender Gap at Work, nations with higher rates of female digital fluency also have higher overall rates of gender equality. A digitally fluent person can decide when to use specific digital technologies to achieve their desired outcome, and also articulate why the tools they are using will provide their desired outcome.

71%

16

of respondents who agree that “the digital world will empower our daughters”

number of countries in which women have attained higher levels of education than men (of the 31 studied)

United States

The work flexibility afforded by newer forms of technology seems to have an outsized effect on women: almost six out of 10 women surveyed who were not currently engaged in formal employment said that working from home part or all of the time would help them find work. A similar proportion reported that having more flexible hours would assist them in their search for employment.

Hearteningly, most study respondents – 76% of male and 79% of female respondents – agreed that women have more opportunity afforded to them now than in times past.

72%

of respondents who say women’s employment opportunities increase as their digital fluency climbs

52/rank 5

1

55/100

55/rank 3

A WORLD OF OPPORTUNITY When it comes to quantification of digital fluency, the US has the highest overall score, indicating that with the help of digital fluency American women have made significant progress. Digital fluency is the combined result of factors including education, employment and advancement at work. Accenture rated each nation out of 100 on these core components to produce an overall score and a digital fluency rating. Here are the top 15 nations.

61%

of women in developing countries who would like to start a new business in the next five years

Rank

Overall score

Digital fluency

LARGEST GAPS

ACCELERATING THE PACE

Of the five countries with the largest gap between the digital fluency of the genders, the top two are both in Asia; the remaining three countries are in mainland Europe.

In a scenario in which women were enabled to become digitally fluent at double the speed, gender equality could be reached decades earlier than the current date forecast.

80 2100

70

ity ual q e der : h gen O QU ac TUS s to re A T r S 5y 8

68

60

63

58 53

50 40 44

52 46

42

ality equ r e end O: S QU reach g U T A ST yrs to 50

54 48

30 2015

20

25

2065

YEARS FASTER

2040

2x SPEED: 25 yrs to reach gender equality

2015

40 YEARS FASTER

2060

2x SPEED: 45 yrs to reach gender equality

10 0 Japan

Singapore

Women

6

France

Switzerland Netherlands

Developed countries

Developing countries

Men

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Netherlands

2

Nordic

52/100

63/rank 1

4

51/100

58/rank 2

Switzerland United Kingdom 9 5

49/100

45/100

48/rank 10

Germany

53/rank 4

Austria 15

Ireland 14 8

45/100

41/100

40/100

47/rank 11

42/rank 16

United Arab Emirates

47/rank 12

11

France

Spain

44/100

52/rank 6

Singapore 6

46/100

10

52/rank 7

44/100

46/rank 13 12

Argentina

13

41/100

42/100

42/rank 15

Australia 35/rank 19

3

52/100

50/rank 8

SMALLEST GAPS

REACHING AN AGREEMENT

The countries with the smallest gap tend to be developed nations, with three of the top four located in Europe. Of note is the fact that in three out of five cases, women’s digital fluency outstrips that of men.

An overwhelming majority of respondents agreed that women’s employment opportunities increase as their digital fluency rises, with only a minor discrepancy between the genders.

60 54 50 53 47 47

49 48

52

Respondents agreeing that women’s employment opportunities increase as their digital fluency rises:

50

40 35

30

32

20

72% Women

10

68% Men

0 UK

Ireland

Women

Korea, Rep

Spain

Argentina

Men Source: #GettingtoEqual: How Digital is Helping Close the Gender Gap at Work, Accenture, 2016

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UPFRONT

NEWS ANALYSIS

DATA BREACHES AND HR Several high-profile cases around the world have highlighted the need for companies to prepare for cyberattacks. What role can HR play?

THE NEW cybersecurity buzzword ‘insider threat’ is a nod to the growing understanding that internal data security deserves as much – if not more – attention than the external threats we know and fear.

“While high-profile data breaches through external hacks are often those that make the news, the reality is that the majority of data breaches fly under the radar,” says Guy Eilon, senior director and general manager of Forcepoint, a data security advisory firm.

Indeed, around 53 million data security incidents took place last year alone, according to a global report by IBM. “While the headlines would lead us to believe that

to a phishing scam) or a purposeful leakage (when an employee has a specific motive to steal sensitive data).

To provide just one example, in late 2016, global recruiting firm Michael Page had its security breached in an accidental leak. The records of 711,000 job candidates from China, the UK and the Netherlands were accessed by two individuals “without malicious or fraudulent intent”, according to the firm. Michael Page reported that the leak occurred on a server used by its third-party IT service provider, Capgemini.

In order to combat the threat of employees stealing information, HR must

“While high-profile data breaches make the news, the reality is that the majority of data breaches fly under the radar” Guy Eilon, Forcepoint these are due to sophisticated cybercrime from foreign adversaries, [many] of these incidents were in fact due to the company’s biggest asset: their employees,” Eilon says.

This type of ‘insider threat’ encompasses a number of potential dangers that stem from internal vulnerabilities, including accidental leakage (when an innocent employee leaves sensitive data lying around), social engineering (when an employee falls victim

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work closely with the IT team, says Lynne Lewis, intellectual property partner at law firm Minter Ellison. In particular, Lewis says, it’s important to ensure that there are comprehensive systems in place so that employees engaging in potentially harmful behaviour can be tracked.

Employers have the option of accessing technology that allows them to see if an employee has been downloading onto

USB keys, or if they have been taking their computer home, hooking it up to devices and downloading or printing from it. However, Lewis has come across organisations, quite often large ones, that don’t have sound IT systems in place – for example, there may not be any logs kept of USB keys that are plugged in and out of workplace computers.

“If I’m running a case, I want to be able to show that the night before someone actually departed or the night before they handed in their resignation, a USB key was inserted into their work computer and that XYZ was copied over onto that,” Lewis says.

“HR must work with the IT team to get good tracking and lockdown technology in place ahead of time.”

HR teams also need exceptional internal communication in place whenever an employee resigns, she adds.

“I’ve seen many circumstances where the information doesn’t necessarily get told

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LARGE-SCALE INTERNAL LEAKS AROUND THE WORLD RED CROSS BLOOD SERVICE (2016) Personal data of 550,000 blood donors – including names, genders, addresses and dates of birth, as well as information on ‘at-risk sexual behaviour’ – was accidentally published to the public.

VODAFONE (2013) Using privileged insider access, an IT contractor working for Vodafone copied the names and bank account details of two million customers from a server located in Germany.

MOSSACK FONSECA (PANAMA PAPERS, 2016) Sensitive data on clients, including high-profile politicians, criminals and professional athletes, was leaked from law firm Mossack Fonseca.

The roughly 11.5 million documents included emails, contracts, scanned documents and transcripts.

to the correct people, who might notice that something unusual is happening with people’s access to the premises or documents during that period of time,” Lewis says. “Had

in place an exemption to that if they’ve got a basis for it in their system.”

It’s critical for HR professionals to develop an understanding that data security is an

“HR must work with the IT team to get good tracking and lockdown technology in place ahead of time” Lynne Lewis, Minter Ellison they known that person had resigned, then they might have actually spoken up about seeing some strange things happening.”

It’s also important to be careful with document destruction policies, because sometimes important information can be lost, Lewis says. She says one of her clients has introduced a policy whereby everything disappears after 30 days. “That can be really hard to recover,” she says. “But they can put

issue for more than just the IT department, the CIO or the CSO, Eilon says; it impacts recruitment and training, and should involve active participation from every staff member.

Eilon adds that staff training can help reduce the instances of accidental and socially engineered data breaches. Moreover, training employees on safe data practices is a great way to improve overall security. He says staff should learn to recognise and report

YAHOO (2016) More than 150,000 US government and military employees were among the victims of the Yahoo data breach, which put their names, passwords, telephone numbers, security questions, birth dates and back-up email addresses in the hands of cybercriminals. Experts warned the leak could allow foreign intelligence services to identify employees and hack their personal and work accounts, posing a threat to national security. a phishing scheme email, understand the importance of separating work and personal technology use (including the dangers of third-party apps), and of course take seriously the importance of having unique and complex passwords across various platforms.

Beyond training, however, Eilon points out that there are technology solutions that are also an essential part of an effective data protection program. “New-to-market tools are capable of using computer learning to recognise abnormal employee behaviour, identify any potential threats and record those actions to produce a court-admissible piece of evidence, in the form of a playback video, for prosecuting illegal and malicious actions.”

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UPFRONT

EMPLOYMENT LAW UPDATE NEWS BRIEFS The key to foreignworker pay disputes Almost all cases of foreignworker salary disputes are dealt with “speedily”, figures from the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) show.

The ministry recorded 4,500 salaryrelated claims in 2016. The vast majority (95%) of them were resolved through mediation. Nearly all (95%) mediation cases took no longer than one month.

“All mediation is conducted only with the consent of both the employer and the worker. No worker is compelled to accept a mediated outcome that they feel is unsatisfactory,” MOM said in a statement. Foreign workers occupy a third of the workforce.

MOM announces changes to RRA MOM has confirmed changes to the Retirement and Re-employment (Amendment) Bill 2016. Among the key changes, from 1 July the re-employment age will be raised from 65 to 67; retirees will have the option to be re-employed by another employer; the existing option of employers to cut wages of employees at age 60 will be removed. Current laws do not allow the re-employment of older workers by other companies, but with these changes an employer who is unable to offer a suitable position will be able to transfer its re-employment obligations to another employer.

Employers must report accidents It is mandatory – and not voluntary – for employers to report to MOM any workplace accident resulting in an employee’s death, or hospitalisation for at least 24 hours, or medical leave for at least three days. Such guidelines fall under the Workplace Safety and Health Act

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and Work Injury Compensation Act. The workplace fatality rate remains at 1.9 per 100,000 employed persons, while non-fatal injuries increased by 5.4% in 2016. The construction industry remains the most dangerous industry in Singapore, accounting for half of all the nation’s workplace fatalities.

SIA controversy raises concerns Singapore Airlines (SIA) has refuted claims that its sick leave system discourages genuinely ill employees from taking medical leave.

The accusations followed the death of a 38-year-old SIA flight attendant who was found dead in a San Francisco hotel room a few hours before she was due to depart on a return long-haul flight.

A SIA spokesperson told media that employees who are given medical leave are encouraged to rest at home. MOM has issued a statement confirming that sick leave is “a basic protection” under the Employment Act.

CEO blames HR for breaches Ho Yow Ping, CEO of Mary Chia Holdings, was found guilty of employing three foreign workers without the prior approval of the Licensing Officer and was ordered to pay a fine of $2,600 for the offence. Ho said the oversight was committed by the company’s HR department when they hired the workers in 2015 without completing the proper paperwork. In May 2016, Ho received three charges for a breach of employment under the Foreign Manpower Act. According to the Employment of Foreign Manpower Act, any employer seen as contravening any condition of a work pass is subject to a fine of up to $100,000 or imprisonment up to a year, or both.

LET ME ASK YOU A QUESTION… Have you ever asked a job applicant about their plans to have children, their religious denomination, or whether they drink or smoke?

All of the above are unlawful in Singapore.

But if you have, you’re not alone – a 2016 CareerBuilder survey showed that one in five employers has unknowingly asked an illegal interview question, and at least one in three employers is unsure about the legality of certain interview questions.

The following questions are definitely off the cards: • What is your religious affiliation?

• Are you pregnant?

• What is your political affiliation?

• What is your race, colour or ethnicity?

• How old are you?

• Are you disabled?

• Are you married?

• Do you have children or plan to?

• Are you in debt?

• Do you socially drink or smoke?

Leading Singapore employment lawyer Susan de Silva, partner at ATMD Bird & Bird, told HRD Singapore the above questions are contrary to the Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices.

“The first principle of such fair employment practices is that employers should recruit and select employees on the basis of merit (such as skills, experience or ability to perform the job), and regardless of age, race, gender, religion, marital status and family responsibilities or disability.

“These questions fall into the regardless group of considerations, and are inappropriate.”

An employer also runs a serious risk of breaching the Personal Data Protection Act

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with such questions, de Silva said.

“Singapore’s data privacy laws [require] organisations to ask only for personal data that is reasonably necessary for the purpose for which the data is being collected. These questions [above] are not evidently necessary for the purpose of evaluating a person’s ability to do the job.”

One in five employers has unknowingly asked an illegal interview question Companies with discriminatory hiring practices can expect to be subjected to additional scrutiny by the Ministry of Manpower and, in serious cases, may have their work pass privileges for hiring foreign employees curtailed by MOM, she said.

De Silva provided some tips for employers around structuring interviews: » Have a list of selection criteria to be applied consistently to all candidates. » Prepare a list of interview questions directly related to the selection criteria identified and review whether these questions are relevant to the job. » Should questions that may be perceived as discriminatory be asked, the reasons for asking such information should be made known to the candidate to prevent any misunderstanding. » Undertake interviews with more than one interviewer, if possible, and ensure that interviewers are familiar with the principles of fair employment.

Areas of law employers need to be aware of when interviewing applicants include the Personal Data Protection Act and TAFEP Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices.

Q&A

Shaun Lee Supervising associate JWS ASIA LAW CORPORATION

Fast fact Under Singapore law, a written signature is not necessarily required for a valid contract – contracts are generally valid if legally competent parties reach an agreement, whether they agree verbally, electronically or in a physical paper document. Electronic signature has been recognised by law in Singapore since 2010, with the passage of the Electronic Transactions Act.

HOW LEGAL ARE E-SIGNED DOCUMENTS IN SINGAPORE? There’s a push for more HR processes to embrace digital.

Legally, what should HR be aware of when it comes to electronic signatures on employment contracts?

The Singapore Electronic Transactions Act provides for electronic signatures to be legally and functionally equivalent to a traditional handwritten signature.

Signature is simply defined by the act as “a method (electronic or otherwise) used to identify a person and to indicate the intention of that person in respect of the information contained in a record”.

What are some of the risks involved in going purely digital with company contracts and records?

There are risks in terms of the authenticity of the signature, the identity of the party making that signature, the intention of the party making that signature as well as the authenticity of the electronic record that is received by the employer.

The act places a distinction between a simple electronic signature and a secure electronic signature.

The requirements of a secure electronic signature are that it can be verified that the signature was, at the time it was made: (a) Unique to the person using it (b) Capable of identifying such person (c) Created in a manner or using a means under the sole control of the person using it (d) Linked to the electronic record to which it relates in a manner such that if the record was changed the electronic signature would be invalidated HR can further look to the act for guidance on what constitutes a commercially reasonable security procedure, which can be used to create secure electronic records or secured electronic signatures.

The act provides that whether a security procedure is commercially reasonable is to be determined by having regard to the purposes of the procedure and the commercial circumstances at the time the procedure was used, including the: (a) Nature of the transaction (b) Sophistication of the parties (c) Volume of similar transactions engaged in by either or all parties (d) Availability of alternatives offered to but rejected by any party (e) Cost of alternative procedures (f) Procedures in general use for similar types of transactions Alternatively, HR could also look towards digital signatures solutions backed by a certification authority that has been accredited by the Infocomm Media Development Authority’s Controller of Certification Authorities. Such digital signatures are treated as secure electronic signatures under the act.

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UPFRONT

TECHNOLOGY

SUFFERING FROM TECH FATIGUE Where can we draw the line when it comes to technology?

expectations can steal employee resources even when actual time is not required – simply because employees cannot fully separate from work. The expectation doesn’t have to be explicit or part of written policies. It can be a normative standard of behaviour at the company or defined by leaders as acceptable.

“Thus, if an organisation perpetuates the always-on culture, it may prevent employees from fully disengaging from work eventually

Managers can directly express their expectations regarding emails and other after-hours work It seems like common sense that replying to emails after work hours may cause employees to stress out. And yet it’s also so easy to justify replying to or sending out one last email.

Recent research, however, suggests that just one last email is a big job stressor that could potentially lead to an employee’s emotional exhaustion.

The study, authored by Liuba Belkin of Lehigh University, William Becker of Virginia Tech, and Samantha Conroy of Colorado State University, is the first to “identify the emailrelated expectations as a job stressor along with already established factors such as high workload, interpersonal conflicts, physical

NEWS BRIEFS

environment, or time pressure”, according to Science Daily.

What the authors have found is that it isn’t the number of emails or the amount of time spent on them after work hours that causes exhaustion.

Rather, it is the organisational expectation of replying that causes anxiety.

Calling it “anticipatory stress”, Belkin and company describe it as “a constant state of anxiety and uncertainty as a result of perceived or anticipated threats … that makes [employees] unable to detach and feel exhausted regardless of the time spent on after-hours email”.

The authors argue that this cultural environment suggests that organisational

VR technology may soon replace conference calls

Businesses could potentially be looking at virtual reality as an option for business meetings within the next two years as technology advances enough to make geographic distance between colleagues a thing of the past, according to Professor Andrew Glennester of Reading University. He said that even eye contact and handshaking would be as realistic as if everyone were in the same room. However, some VR developers, such as Jonathan Wagstaff of Context, believe conference calls will remain popular as VR technology may still be too costly and will be more helpful for collaborative working.

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leading to chronic stress,” Belkin says.

They detail their findings in the article and urge managers to combat this issue by coming up with programs that can help employees detach. One suggestion is to have email-free workdays or a rotating schedule on replying to emails after work to help manage work-life balance. Managers can also directly express their expectations regarding emails and other afterhours work, such as limiting them to a certain number of hours or up to certain times.

“We believe our findings have implications for organisations, as even though in the short run being always on may seem like a good idea because it increases productivity, it can be dangerous in the long run,” they write.

How emotion-detecting technology can help HR

Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have revealed the EQ-Radio, an emotion-sensing app that uses wireless radio signals and boasts a reported 87% accuracy rate. The device may prove useful in advertising, health care, and even in the workplace, where managers need to read the non-verbal cues from employees in order to lead them better. Other apps available to managers at present include TINYpulse and Morale, which is another emotion-based app that lets team members rate their moods for the day, thus helping managers track morale.

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Q&A

David Mallon Head of research BERSIN BY DELOITTE

DESIGN THINKING FOR HR Can you outline what design thinking means and how it can apply to HR?

Fast fact Companies like Nestle and Deckers Brands use design thinking to develop highly intuitive, experiential L&D initiatives. Others, like Zappos, use design thinking to create recruitment processes that make it easy for candidates to apply for roles.

It’s starting with the end in mind. It has an element of empathy – not empathy in the emotional sense, but rather walking in the shoes of the people you serve. In this case, rather than HR looking to solve a problem by creating a top-down process based on consistent step-by-step guidelines, HR instead should embed themselves with the employees to gain intimate knowledge of everything happening in the employees’ world – all the disruption they are facing and what competes for their attention.

Designing with employees in mind, how can you then help them be successful, productive and engaged employees? It’s about having a relentless focus on the people you serve.

Of course technology plays a role in this. Can you provide some examples of how technology plays a role in design thinking?

There’s a major telecom in Asia that we’ve studied. This is a mobile phone company so they have thousands of local offices that sell their devices. A major issue in that retail environment is onboarding new employees, in particular just the little transactions. For example,

Developing the liquid workforce

Accenture’s Technology Vision 2016 has identified that, with the continuing investments made in technology, organisations should also invest in their workforce to produce more flexible, multiskilled employees – “workforce chameleons” – who know how to use the technology and can use it effectively to create adaptable and change-ready work environments that can meet the demands of the 21st century. To achieve this, organisations must implement learning as a core competency, promote agility and innovation, and generate insightful analytics that show organisational capabilities and improve workforce responsiveness.

undertaking employee verifications, or getting all their data into the system to ensure they get paid, and so on. It’s a major task with hundreds of employees coming and going. By the application of mobile devices, algorithms, automation, et al, they took what was a two-week process down to two days. Then they kept pushing. Today, the person who runs the local office can come in, use their smartphone to load employee information, take a picture of the employee, which then gets routed off to a verification company to get the background checks done. They can now do this in as little as two hours.

In your experience are HR professionals fast or slow at embracing digital tools?

HR people by and large do like to experiment with new technology. However, HR often see their first role as ensuring consistency and compliance, and sometimes that is hard to do when you try new things. You do see HR using tools to manage their own work; for example they use collaboration tools really well. But where it falls down is where those tools are taken wider across an organisation – for example a collaboration tool for IT. Often they focus in the wrong place. They focus on control rather than innovation.

Tech institution launches in Singapore

Byte Academy, a well-known technology education institution from New York, recently opened its first Fintech Skills Centre in Singapore in partnership with Standard Chartered Bank, IBM, INSEAD, Thomson Reuters and Microsoft. Designed to support Singapore’s Smart Nation initiative, the centre will offer 12-week full-time courses and individual eightweek short courses with a focus on fintech and software development.

Also offered is a placement guarantee program, offering job placements to its full-time course graduates.

Digital skills lacking: report

According to the latest Randstad Workmonitor report, more than 80% of Singaporean employees feel they need to upgrade their digital skills in order to guarantee employability. Employees are worried about their job security as more organisations change their strategies in order to grow the business. “The Workmonitor results have clearly shown that employees understand that there is a strong lack of digital talent in the region and that they need to upskill for the future,” said Michael Smith, Randstad Singapore managing director. www.hrdmag.com.sg

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PEOPLE

HEAD TO HEAD

GOT AN OPINION THAT COUNTS? Email hrd_editor@keymedia.com.au

How are employers reducing the risk of psychological injury?

In a society crammed with workaholics, HR is integral to the management of mental health in the workplace

Andrew Chan

Aaron Anderson

Founder and CEO ACI HR Solutions

Partner Norton Rose Fulbright

Workplace stress has become an important concern. Companies have become increasingly elastic post-GFC, with retrenchment and job consolidation more common as businesses run lean. This makes employees particularly vulnerable to increases in workload and anxiety over job security; simultaneously, demand is high for flexibility and lifestyle balance.

There’s no one-size-fits-all approach, but good companies are especially adept at protecting their people’s time. Start by reducing, and even eliminating, needless meetings while making communication instant.

Rather than automatically scheduling meetings, time-efficient companies leverage on social media, using group chat to communicate and gather feedback in real time.

Employers are moving towards a more riskbased approach to managing the likelihood of psychological injury. This involves gaining an understanding of what workplace factors may give rise to the risk of psychological injury and implementing preventative measures to seek to manage the risks.

The types of preventative measures that employers are adopting include fostering a culture of understanding about mental health through education and leadership support, training mental health first aid officers who can assist in early intervention, adopting a zero-tolerance approach to workplace bullying, and readjusting patterns of work to provide a flexible and adaptive work environment for the individual.

Michelle Phipps VP HR ANZPI/Asia Brown-Forman

Brown-Forman seeks to reduce risk of psychological injury by creating a psychologically safe environment not just through valuable, free counselling services but through engagement, enablement and wellness strategies.

Our Employee Resource Groups on Gender, LGBTQI and Young Professionals are staff-driven and focus on building an inclusive workplace. Similarly, we run wellness programs that encourage employees to care for and oversee each other’s health and fitness. Finally, our involvement in charities or social events celebrating differences – eg Mardi Gras, RSPCA – shows employees they are valued no matter what and can speak up if they need support.

GRAPPLING WITH THE BIG STRESS ITEMS Last year’s Working in Asia study from leadership institute Roffey Park isolated the fact that just over half of all Singapore workers responding to the survey reported that the previous six months had seen an increased stress level. These figures put Singaporean workers far above their counterparts in China, who reported increased stress at the rate of 45%, and those working in Hong Kong for whom the figure was 43%. Two out of every five Singapore-based workers polled cited office politics as a major cause of stress; just over one in three pointed to workload, with a similar proportion crediting lack of support as a significant stressor.

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9/03/2017 8:36:47 AM

UPFRONT

OPINION

A GREAT TIME TO BE IN HR

A combination of forces is shifting HR to centre stage, and it’s how HR will handle these forces that will deliver business value, writes Dave Ulrich

WE SEE four forces making HR more central to business success: the context of business (STEPED: social, technological, economic, political, environmental and demographic changes); the increased pace of change (VUCA: volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity); the demise of employee wellbeing (individuation, isolation, indifference, intensity); and the requirement to be outside in (attend to customers, investors and communities). Collectively, these four forces shift HR to centre stage. In our new book, Victory Through Organization, the first sentence is: “HR is not about HR.” Rather, it’s about attending to these four forces to deliver business value.

While it is a great time to be in HR, it is not without downsides. I find three models are helpful in enabling HR professionals to respond to the new opportunities.

Resource demand HR professionals are being asked to do more. Some of these demands can be moderated (eg don’t do non-value-added work). But the focus should be on resources.

What resources can HR professionals access to help them cope with their increased demands?

I see two categories of resources: personal and departmental.

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Personal resources HR professionals can better respond to increased opportunities when they have

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the competencies to succeed and a more personalised career map.

Competencies are the skills that HR professionals bring to their job. Through our research, we identified nine competencies for HR professionals. Three were foundational (compliance manager, analytics designer and implementer, and technology and media integrator). Three were strategic enablers (culture and change champion, human capital curator, and total rewards steward).

may choose to stay within one quadrant (eg functional excellence in rewards, learning or organisation design), or they may move across quadrants throughout their career (eg moving back and forth from centres of expertise to business).

Department resources HR professionals seldom succeed by themselves. In our research, we found that the quality of the HR department had four times the impact on business performance as the quality of individual HR professionals (hence the title of our book). Part of creating an effective department is making sure that roles are clear, which is about decision rights, accountabilities and responsibilities. HR departments should be organised to mirror the business organisation. If the business has more centralised governance, HR should be more centralised, with common HR practices across the enterprise.

But we have come to appreciate that relationships matter as much as (or more than) roles. If the structure is mostly right, HR

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While it is a great time to be in HR, it is not without downsides But three had the most impact on HR professionals around the world: • Being a credible activist allows the HR professional to be invited to the business dialogue and be personally effective.

• Being a strategic positioner helps the HR professional to deliver the most value to business customers and investors outside the organisation.

• Being a paradox navigator is the competency that is most connected to delivering business results.

With these competencies, HR professionals can take charge of their careers. HR professionals can work in four areas: functional expertise, geographic area, business unit or outside HR. They can work at three stages: individual contributor, manager or leader. Within this mosaic, HR professionals

leaders need to build positive relationships throughout the HR community. There have been many studies of positive relationships by psychologists and marriage therapists, which include sharing a common purpose, respecting differences, having realistic expectations, caring for each other, sharing experiences and growing together.

As HR moves to centre stage to deliver real business outcomes, the demands need not be threats but rather opportunities if personal and department resources exist.

Dave Ulrich is a university professor, author, speaker, and management coach and consultant.

Ulrich is a professor of business at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan and co-founder of The RBL Group.

For more, visit daveulrich.com.

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9/03/2017 8:37:41 AM

PEOPLE

GLOBAL HR LEADER

REWRITING THE HR RULEBOOK HubSpot is shaking up traditional notions of HR – and it has the IPO success and innovative perks to prove its approach works. HRD sat down with HubSpot’s global VP of culture and experience, Katie Burke, to find out how THE WORD ‘unconventional’ applies not only to HubSpot’s approach to people management but also to the career of its global VP of culture and experience, Katie Burke. Prior to HubSpot, Burke was the director of marketing and corporate partnerships at Athletes’ Performance and Core Performance (now known as EXOS).

This unique mix of communications and marketing skills, combined with HR expertise, has positioned Burke well to tackle her current employer’s challenges.

HR and IPOs Established just over a decade ago, HubSpot develops and markets software products for inbound marketing, including tools for social media marketing, content management, web analytics and search engine optimisation. In short, the company knows something about marketing. It’s perhaps the perfect match for Burke, who was handed the responsibility of running the company’s internal and external communications for its IPO early in her tenure.

In October 2014, the Boston-based company launched on the New York Stock Exchange with an IPO listing of US$125m in fresh capital, leaving the company with a market valuation of US$880m.

“There’s a very traditional recipe going into an IPO that people want you to follow,” Burke

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says. “You’re working with your bankers and your lawyers, and you say, ‘OK, here are the financials, here are our growth numbers, here is our projected revenue, and so on.’ We had all of that. Then we kept adding in flags about our culture: our employees, our talent brand, our community and the net worth effect all this was creating.”

Part of the reason for this focus, she adds, was due to the number of investors

the line,” says Burke, who adds that HubSpot was wary of falling into the trap of other similarly sized businesses, which have gone down the IPO path while claiming that culture was critically important, only to fail dismally.

Another of Burke’s key takeaways from the IPO experience occurred on the morning of the IPO. “You have this amazing morning – you walk in [to the stock market floor], and your banner is up, and everyone is

“It’s not just employees who care about the employer brand; it’s your shareholders, the public market and potential candidates” who asked about and deeply cared about the company’s commitment to culture. “They told our founders how a culture of innovation is really what distinguishes outstanding companies from average companies in terms of overall performance. That’s why we knew we had to get the culture piece right.”

Indeed, Gallup reports that organisations with above-average levels of employee engagement reap 147% higher earnings per share. “It’s not just employees who care about the employer brand; it’s your shareholders, the public market and potential candidates down

excited. You feel energised. And at 11am, they walk you out, they say congratulations, and then another company does their IPO. It’s a very visceral reminder that the world goes on – your party is not everlasting, and you can’t take anything for granted. I think you have to say your IPO is the beginning of your journey as a company, rather than the end. You have to show that to employees.”

Transparency and autonomy Today, HubSpot employs more than 1,500 people in six locations around the world,

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PROFILE Name: Katie Burke Company: HubSpot Title: Global VP of culture & experience HR experience: Two years Previous roles: »»Director, media and analyst relations, HubSpot »»Director of marketing and corporate partnerships, Athletes’ Performance and Core Performance »»Brand manager, EXOS »»Director, Glover Park Group »»Researcher, Booz Allen Hamilton First HR role: Director, talent and culture, HubSpot Qualifications: MBA, Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

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9/03/2017 10:24:02 AM

PEOPLE

GLOBAL HR LEADER including its headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts, as well as New Hampshire, Sydney, Dublin, Singapore and Tokyo. A new office will open in Berlin in 2017.

The ‘unconventional’ nature of HubSpot’s approach to HR comes down to its two underlying principles: transparency and autonomy.

On the former, Burke says that anyone who works at HubSpot, from intern to executive, has access to all of the company’s documents. For example, all staff have access to management team meeting minutes, board meeting outcomes and even the random musings of the CEO answering off-the-cuff questions from employees. Burke says being

instead, they want latitude to do great work on their own with the support of management. “We set our company goals and directives, but we don’t give people an exact map on how to get there,” she says.

While some business leaders might cringe at the thought of training people to think like entrepreneurs, Burke says this mindset is actually helpful to HubSpot.

“You feel more accountable to other divisions and to the company. You don’t get that feeling if you’re sitting in the corner with your head down.”

If and when ‘HubSpotters’ do leave, it’s not unusual to find the company’s founders and executives acting as angel investors for the

“I think the next few years will see a convergence between HR, marketing and IT. I’m excited by what those changes will bring” “radically transparent” allows the company to do two things.

“One, it prevents people from [problem]solving for themselves or for their team,” she says. “Having to share things and having a bias to share information ensures people are truly ‘solving’ for the company. Second, we believe people do better when they know better. For example, if you’re working on a data project for the data team, and you’re working on something for the marketing team, the bias to share everything prevents people from putting their guard up and saying, ‘That’s my project or my data’. It encourages collaboration.”

She adds that the company’s “super talented” employees likely have career aspirations beyond HubSpot – they may want to start their own company or become a CEO some day. “The idea of learning from other parts of the business just by checking with our company Wiki, for example, is really important for us.”

As for autonomy, Burke says she’s never met a talented professional in any division who has wanted to be micromanaged;

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new ventures. An active alumni program also gives a boost to these start-up companies.

Borrowing from the best How can traditionally risk-averse HR functions learn from companies such as HubSpot, which appears to be rewriting the HR rulebook? For Burke, who says that often the best opportunities in business emerge from a willingness to think differently, there are two initial steps.

For HR professionals within large organisations who don’t know where to start and are unsure of what the appetite for change is, she suggests simply asking people what they think. “Don’t ask via a lengthy survey,” she says. “Ask, on a scale of one to 10, how likely you’d be to recommend your company to a friend or colleague. You’ll be surprised by what you get back.”

As part of this process, it’s critical to also ask what the company can do better. “I’m constantly amazed at the number of companies who are unwilling to take that step,” Burke says.

“Own the accountability coming out of it and ensure you’ll actually take action on it.”

The second step is to ask people to write

THREE INNOVATIVE STAFF PERKS AT HUBSPOT 1. Unlimited vacation policy.

“Unlimited vacations get a lot of attention for the days on versus the days off, but from my perspective it’s about other things, such as working parents who can do their work without asking for exceptions. Or if you’re someone training for a marathon, you can build your work schedule around what you’re personally passionate about without having to ask for permission.”

2. Free books: “For the last eight years, the company has had a program where you can request a business book. I’m a lifelong learner and avid reader myself, so I love it. Our employees are busy; they have a lot going on. Any friction you create between their ability to learn more and actually doing it can prevent them from taking that leap. So we make it easy for people to learn on their own and learn from other people.”

3. Mystery Dinners: “Three times a year, groups of eight to 10 people sign up for a Mystery Dinner. They have no idea what restaurant or what group of people will be attending until 4pm that day. What we’ve found is that evening of spending quality time over a nice meal goes a long way toward our employees building meaningful connections with people on other teams.” down what matters most to them about work. Burke often finds that leaders assume that people know what a culture stands for because they have company mission statements or values. But if your newest employee can’t recite what it means or how they feel about it, you’ve failed.

Finally, Burke maintains that a culture like HubSpot’s depends on trust. “You can’t fake trust,” she says. “For example, companies that try to launch unlimited vacation policies without a true commitment to autonomy always fail because it’s not about a policy; it’s about the dynamic of trusting employees to do their best at work.”

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9/03/2017 10:24:05 AM

COVER STORY

2017 HOT LIST

HOT LIST 2017 HRD’s annual Hot List brings together the best of the best in the industry – an impressive group of high achievers in the HR profession

IT’S ALWAYS a pleasure browsing through the final list of HR professionals featured in HRD’s annual ‘who’s who’ guide. These are the people who continue to add value to the profession and increase its standing in the business world. Some of them have appeared in our previous Hot Lists, proving their staying power; others have featured in the magazine over the past 12 months. Then there are the new contenders: they’ve launched innovative initiatives, tackled tough business-critical challenges, or moved the dial on persistent issues like diversity and inclusion.

Many have already been acknowledged as industry leaders, and they have the accolades to prove it; or the organisations they work for have been applauded as employers of choice by the likes of Aon Hewitt and the Great Place to Work Institute.

Significantly, it’s not all about bright optimism; some HR professionals on the list are in declining markets or at companies that are struggling to reinvent themselves. Rain, hail or shine, HR continues to prove its worth, as the leaders on the following pages prove.

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HOT LIST INDEX COMPANY

PAGE NAME

Adobe Asia-Pacific AirAsia X Berhad Airbnb American Express International Boehringer Ingelheim Singapore Brown-Forman Changi Airport Group Cisco Club Med Daimler Financial Services DBS Bank Dell Technologies Deloitte Singapore eBay ERA Realty Network Fuji Xerox GoSwiff International

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Sarah Dunn

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Yeoh Sai Yew

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Ken Hoskin

25

Joanna Miller

25

David Serés

22

Michelle Phipps

22

Justina Tan

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Lim Hwa Choo

25

Marina Bianconi

25

Maria Riolo

23

Theresa Phua

26

Jocelyn Macedo

24

Seah Gek Choo

29

Klaus Duetoft

22

Marcus Chu

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Pauline Chua

27

Sherlina Chew

COMPANY

GroupM APAC Havas Asia-Pacific IBM Singapore Juniper Networks APAC Lazada Group LEWIS Marina Bay Sands MasterCard Metro Drug National Environment Agency NBCUniversal OCBC Bank Royal Plaza on Scotts Unilever Asia Williams-Sonoma Wyndham Hotel Group

PAGE NAME 23

Angela Ryan

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Kevin Zhang

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Pallavi Srivastava

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Maria Zhang

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Tim Rath

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Jennifer Wu

25

Chan Yit Foon

26

Mike McCarthy

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Jun Obtinalla

28

Gloria Chin

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Susana Garcia Bernal

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Jason Ho

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Patrick Fiat

29

Tricia Duran

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Billy Tan

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Sherine Chua

Head of HR, APAC

SHERINE CHUA

LEWIS

Director of HR

JENNIFER WU

WYNDHAM HOTEL GROUP

For Jennifer Wu, joining LEWIS as head of HR was an exciting prospect as it meant taking on a “sales-oriented role” and being able to “market to external candidates [and] internal staff … the opportunities that were available to them”.

This emphasis on career development or what she terms as “people transformation” is Wu’s top priority as she works to hone self-motivated employees who possess the entrepreneurial skills crucial to the growth of PR and communications firm LEWIS. In line with this, she has witnessed one of her very first hires rise through the ranks and become a senior manager, which she deems her most significant achievement in the past 12 months.

In 2017, Wu will be focusing on training and development. Her team is working to install a global online training platform for all employees to receive training not only from their local office but also from other global offices, in order to maximise their resources and ready their staff for a new disruptive era.

With over 20 years of experience in HR and hotel management, Sherine Chua joined the Wyndham Hotel Group in June 2016, just a few months after the company set up its Singapore headquarters. In this short period of time, Chua has been busy establishing HR practices and aligning them to the company’s global strategy while ensuring their relevance to the local context.

She has also recruited a number of key roles and refined HR policies to reduce turnaround time for major projects. Having worked in the hotel sector of the travel industry for most of her career, Chua’s biggest challenge in 2016 was learning the nuances of the vacation ownership (or timeshare) industry, which she managed adeptly by immersing herself in the team’s operations to better understand employees’ needs. In 2017, Chua will be working on an internal initiative to promote a responsive and attentive work culture among the hotel staff, while introducing other HR strategies in line with the company’s aggressive expansion plans for Southeast Asia.

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COVER STORY

2017 HOT LIST MARCUS CHU COO ERA REALTY NETWORK

Marcus Chu joined ERA Realty Network’s sales team in 1996 and eventually became the first ERA salesperson in Singapore to achieve $1m in commissions in a year.

Chu then gradually moved towards managing its operations, including driving the company’s strategic branding and culture, recruiting talent, and developing training programs and tools to help employees realise their full potential. The company is the largest real estate agency in Singapore, and has over 6,000 salespeople catering to more than 400,000 clients. One major challenge for Chu’s HR team right now is helping all salespersons get through the annual process for renewal of their licences as required by the Council for Estate Agencies; this requires continually facilitating their professional development to ensure their marketability as estate agents and entrepreneurs.

JUSTINA TAN Managing director, people CHANGI AIRPORT GROUP

MICHELLE PHIPPS HR director, ANZ/SEA/North Asia BROWN-FORMAN

Michelle Phipps leads a lean team of three HR business partners, overseeing 350 employees in Brown-Forman’s Asia-Pacific operations and spearheading initiatives on talent, culture, the HR process, organisation structure, and particularly D&I. Her PhD in communications and cultural strategy undoubtedly contributed to this emphasis, and the company’s D&I strategy is one example of global best practice. As part of the strategy, Phipps has put one D&I council in place for each region (Australia, Southeast Asia, North Asia), knowing that “D&I is a leadership concern” and cannot be easily achieved by running the same programs/activities across regions. Phipps has also ensured that the company’s D&I initiatives go beyond the office space, and has been heavily involved in industry-specific networking events. Brown-Forman also threw its weight behind the 2016 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.

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After working in various areas of aviation, such as airport retail, airline marketing, and even policy work, Justina Tan was eventually approached by Changi Airport Group’s management to oversee HR, trusting that her extensive experience with the company’s operations would enable her to transform the HR role into that of a true business partner. There are significant challenges looming: the airport’s Terminal 4 is scheduled to open in 2017, and there are plans to open a new airport, Changi East, in the late 2020s. Tan’s priority is for HR to keep pace in terms of talent recruitment and development, to always start with sourcing the right talent, effectively integrate them into the business, and foster an environment conducive to accelerated growth of each employee’s knowledge and capability.

YEOH SAI YEW Head of people AIRASIA X BERHAD

Airline competition in Southeast Asia is particularly fierce, and AirAsia has been a disruptor in the market.

Yeoh Sai Yew joined AirAsia Group in 2010, and in 2015 he took on the leadership role in the company’s people department. Yeoh finds the fast-paced environment in aviation both exciting and challenging as it demands quick thinking and extreme efficiency. One of his focuses as HR leader is managing cultural diversity, with employees from various ethnic backgrounds needing to work together as one. Another concern is learning to work with millennials, as they now make up the majority of the talent pool and are on the lookout for continuous growth and learning opportunities. In response, Yeoh and his team have put succession planning in place to ensure retention and engagement.

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THERESA PHUA Managing director, group business HR/Singapore HR head DBS BANK

Since October 2013, Theresa Phua has served as head of HR for DBS’s Singapore operations (its headquarters in Southeast Asia) as well as its consumer banking and wealth management division. She is responsible for HR decisions that affect the whole group. Phua also works with key government agencies such as the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the Workforce Development Authority, and wears many hats, overseeing everything from talent acquisition to succession planning and organisational integration. At DBS, Phua and her team ensure that innovation is at the heart of their HR strategy and practices, as seen in their use of customised selection tools in recruitment, gamification in their graduate program, the launch of a health management portal to promote employee wellness, and other digital platforms for training and career development.

Phua identifies the need for upgrading skills of HR professionals as the most pressing concern for the coming years.

SUSANA GARCIA BERNAL VP, HR, Asia-Pacific NBCUNIVERSAL

Susana Garcia Bernal oversees the HR function in a detailed ‘matrix structure’ covering over 550 employees in six businesses across 12 countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Despite the scope of her work, Garcia Bernal believes in the importance of “paying attention to the small details”, especially when celebrating cultural differences.

Being “an introvert Spaniard” based in Asia and having worked in different countries and industries have both certainly helped her develop this cultural sensitivity. In terms of D&I initiatives, Garcia Bernal and her team launched OUT in Australia, an LGBT group that also has a presence in the US, Singapore and London.

In April 2016 the company launched a comprehensive leadership development program, the Talent Lab Space, based in Singapore.

The Singapore Lab follows on from similar concepts in New York, LA and London, and provides a suite of L&D experiences matched to key transition points in an employee’s career.

ANGELA RYAN Chief HR and talent officer GROUPM APAC

Following on from a hugely successful 2016, Angela Ryan and her team at GroupM are looking ahead to launching a market-first virtual reality 360-degree immersive video project, which is a creative attempt by HR to provide candidates and employees with an out-of-the-box recruitment experience. She’ll also launch the 2017 Talent Academy, which will introduce a new syllabus for HR practitioners to develop new skills.

BILLY TAN Director, HR – Global WILLIAMS-SONOMA

Billy Tan joined retailer Williams-Sonoma’s team in its Singapore office when the company decided to expand its presence outside of the US and provide in-house key functions. Kick-starting HR operations in Asia has been a challenge but also an invaluable opportunity that Tan and his team have welcomed, as it has allowed them to become “builders” and “pioneers”. Talent attraction and retention are Tan’s top priorities in 2017.

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COVER STORY

2017 HOT LIST SEAH GEK CHOO Assurance and advisory partner and talent partner DELOITTE SINGAPORE

In 2016, Deloitte Singapore won several awards for its employer branding initiatives and for achieving workplace wellbeing and workforce mobility. The awards are testament to the innovative programs Seah Gek Choo and her team have implemented – a prime example of which is the Deloitte Ignite program, a special initiative offering elite athletes flexible internship and employment opportunities across a wide range of fields – audit and finance, marketing and communications and even HR. Another key initiative Seah helps manage is the internship program Inspire@Deloitte, in which grads learn about career opportunities and expand their network through interactions with Deloitte employees. As Deloitte Singapore approaches its 50th year in 2017, one of Seah’s priorities is to see through the application of a design thinking methodology – “learning from employees’ personal experience to create processes centred on their needs”.

MARIA ZHANG Senior director, HR

Chief people officer

JUNIPER NETWORKS APAC

LAZADA GROUP

Trust and empowerment is ‘The Juniper Way’, which Maria Zhang describes as “a set of core values on how we conduct our business [including] a strong belief in fostering an environment steeped in openness and autonomy”. Zhang’s proudest accomplishment of the past year was helping to put together a solid roster of country leaders for Asia-Pacific, and bringing on board new systems engineering and marketing APAC leads.

In 2017, her priority is the internal culture-focused program JUNI, which is designed to help staff take greater ownership and accountability of their work, while fulfilling personal career development goals. Facing an extremely competitive talent market in Singapore, the company has partnered with universities and educational institutes in internship and recruitment, and over 10 fresh college graduates joined their go-to-market teams in 2016. As the networking technology industry is mostly led by established veterans, Juniper hopes to diversify the workforce by bringing in more ‘next generation’ workers who can spearhead technological advances for a new era.

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TIM RATH

In April 2016, Alibaba became the majority shareholder of e-commerce business Lazada Group. As head of the newly formed people team at Lazada, Tim Rath’s challenge was to define and communicate a new organisational vision that would transform the ‘doer’ mindset of the staff to one of long-term strategic leaders, and to empower the new team to be champions of change within the organisation. Though his current role as chief people officer is his first experience in HR, Rath has ably tapped into his non-HR experience for fresh perspectives and out-of-the-box thinking, and recruited from a variety of professional backgrounds to form a diverse team for the people division. After organising an internal communications team to communicate the new change strategy and vision to over 5,000 employees across eight countries, Rath and his team rolled out a framework for talent development and introduced new KPIs for long-term growth. Rath will be concentrating on L&D and ‘culture-shaping’ in 2017, with continued investment in the Lazada College and the launch of ‘Cultural Ambassador’ and ‘DNA Session’ initiatives.

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JOANNA MILLER Head of HR, Singapore & Indonesia AMERICAN EXPRESS INTERNATIONAL

Joanna Miller started at American Express as director for change management in New York, and later in London. She eventually moved to Singapore and took on the leadership role in HR. In 2016, American Express Singapore was again named as one of the Best Employers by Aon Hewitt, as well as the Best Employer specifically for Generation Y, or the millennials, as evidenced by the increased internship applicant numbers. In the same year, Miller and her team also landed a spot in HRD’s inaugural list of Top HR Teams for the following accomplishments: setting up a sales community to facilitate knowledge sharing and network building among sales talent and leaders; forming a strategic task force that solicits inputs and insights from various functions of the business; and revamping the career program to a year-long flexible program to ensure continuous learning.

MARINA BIANCONI VP, HR, East & South Asia-Pacific CLUB MED

Club Med’s recruitment tagline says, “Club Med is more than just a job; it’s a life experience”. Upon taking up a post at the company, potential employees are offered various enriching experiences, such as travel, exposure to cultural diversity, a variety of work, and career acceleration at a young age.

After her post in Club Med’s Europe-Africa business unit, Marina Bianconi was offered a position in Singapore in 2012 as head of the South East Asia and Pacific Business Unit.

With the continuing hospitality boom in Asia, Bianconi identifies talent attraction and retention as the ultimate challenges, which Club Med handles by promoting from within.

This is an unusual practice for an industry that relies mostly on contingent workers. Club Med was also the first global tourism company to launch Facebook at Work in 2016, a collaboration and communication platform that aims to improve the guest experience.

DAVID SERÉS HR director, South East Asia and South Korea BOEHRINGER INGELHEIM SINGAPORE

David Serés oversees pharmaceutical giant Boehringer Ingelheim’s newest regional operating units: South East Asia and South Korea. To continue growing the talent base in these markets, Serés and his team established a regional leadership program in 2016, in partnership with Singapore Management University. Around 800 employees from seven different countries in the region participated in the programs. The team also designed and implemented an employee recognition program to reward individuals and teams for their outstanding contributions to the company. One major challenge the HR team faced this year was the global ‘business swap’ of Consumer Health Care and Animal Health between competitor Sanofi and Boehringer Ingelheim, for which HR had to ensure smooth transitioning for the project.

CHAN YIT FOON Senior vice president, HR MARINA BAY SANDS

In 2016, Marina Bay Sands landed a spot for the second time in HRD’s Employer of Choice Awards. MBS also came out on top in several award subcategories, such as access to technology, work-life balance, and D&I. Chan Yit attributes these successes to a new one-stop solution for HR-related employee enquiries, and the provision of more devices for easy access to and processing of company information and procedures; a ‘Heart of House’ set-up that allows staff to experience integration of work and home lives; and the organisation of events throughout the year to celebrate cultural differences. In her primary role as leader of the people strategy, Chan hopes to maintain the organisation’s position as a top-of-mind company and employer of choice.

MARIA RIOLO Vice president, HR, financial services – Africa & Asia-Pacific DAIMLER FINANCIAL SERVICES

Since late 2015, Maria Riolo has been the vice president of HR for the Africa and Asia-Pacific operations of Daimler Financial Services, which came in at fifth place overall in the global Great Place to Work Institute’s rankings in late 2016 – the second time the company has ranked within the Top 25 employers globally. The company’s workforce in Africa and the Asia-Pacific comprises nearly 20% of its total employee population. Riolo has been with Daimler since 1994, and has worked in HR as well as in marketing and communications. Prior to her current position, she was VP of HR for one of the company’s major divisions, Mercedes-Benz sales and marketing, and before that served as the head of global talent acquisition and development for Daimler AG.

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9/03/2017 8:41:24 AM

COVER STORY

2017 HOT LIST MIKE MCCARTHY

KEN HOSKIN

Group head of HR, Asia-Pacific, Middle East and Africa

AIRBNB

MASTERCARD

Mike McCarthy joined MasterCard in 2012, and for the past four years he has been working on the frontline, following the company’s declaration of “war on cash” and its shift towards electronic payment methods. A major component of this is managing recruitment to draw in talent with experience in the tech and telecoms industries. McCarthy and his team have also helped cultivate a culture of innovation within MasterCard through initiatives such as live forums and express learning sessions, as well as encouraging staff-submitted patents. In its advocacy for diversity and inclusion, MasterCard Singapore has partnered with Women 2.0, an organisation that draws young women into the workforce in the STEM fields.

McCarthy and his team are continuously working to empower female employees and help them develop meaningful careers.

In 2016, McCarthy was listed as one of LinkedIn’s top power profiles in Singapore.

In 2012, Airbnb set up its Asia-Pacific headquarters in Singapore and opened a spanking new office in May 2016. But more so than the fancy office, what Ken Hoskin considers the most significant achievement for Airbnb Asia-Pacific in the past 12 months is being the first region to launch an internal coaching program. The program includes mentoring training for C-suite executives, which aims to help them develop high-level coaching techniques so they can conduct meaningful and fruitful coaching sessions with younger employees. Hoskin and his team are looking forward to the full launch of a new learning platform, Degreed, in 2017, which will deliver personalised content based on each employee’s interests.

Hoskin believes that, alongside L&D, trust and empowerment is key to employees’ adaptability and flexibility in a fast-changing environment. “We spend a lot of time discussing about ‘the why’ and encouraging the involvement of teams in decision-making,” he says. “This ensures they have a stake when teams are restructured to best support the Airbnb community.”

JOCELYN MACEDO

KEVIN ZHANG

Vice president of HR, Asia Pacific and Japan

HAVAS ASIA-PACIFIC

DELL TECHNOLOGIES

The biggest challenge Jocelyn Macedo faced in 2016 was helping to manage one of the largest technology mergers in history – that of Dell and EMC. One of Macedo’s top priorities has been defining the corporate culture – the company’s values, leadership principles and work ethic – based on the feedback and insights of over 75,000 former Dell and EMC team members.

Impressively, in the same year, the company was recognised as one of the Best Workplaces in Asia. Macedo explains the impetus for and effectiveness of their talent strategy: “Being a Great Place To Work is an important part of our talent strategy, which is geared toward creating an inclusive work environment where all team members have the opportunity to contribute to the company’s success and realise their full potential. It is our strong culture that sets us apart and enables us to attract, retain and engage talented team members across the Asia region.”

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Regional talent lead, APAC

Director of HR & talent

With over 15 years of HR experience in the advertising, media and marketing industry, Kevin Zhang and his team primarily look after talent attraction and retention through the development of L&D programs, and by promoting D&I through various initiatives and activities. As an experienced HR leader, Zhang recognises the need for HR to keep pace with how the business evolves, yet they must choose to adapt new models only after having properly assessed the organisation’s size and culture. Professionals in this space must also have mastered the basic HR functions to ensure that a strong foundation is built and maintained. Before joining Havas, Zhang spent 10 years in New York as director, corporate HR, at IPG, before moving to R/GA Singapore and heading its APAC HR operations. He is also chairman and founding director of the Asian/Pacific Islander American Chamber of Commerce and Entrepreneurship (NY Chapter).

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9/03/2017 8:41:30 AM

SHERLINA CHEW

JUN OBTINALLA

Global head of HR

Assistant vice president, HR

GOSWIFF INTERNATIONAL

METRO DRUG

In June 2016, Sherlina Chew was appointed as global head of HR at mobile commerce provider GoSwiff International. Having worked at several leading regional and international banks, she now joins the company’s team of international experts, overseeing staff from over 30 countries and operations in 25 countries. As head of HR, Chew champions the development of the overall HR function and leads the entire spectrum of HR services across the diverse regions. She also spearheads strategic HR business plans, manages talent and aligns human capital priorities to optimise leadership capabilities and organisational effectiveness. Prior to joining GoSwiff, Chew was head of HR at FGB Asia Pacific, Singapore, where she established the HR function and ensured implementation of the human capital strategy and delivery of operational support as well as engagement and transformation initiatives across all functions.

Metro Drug won an HRD gold award as an Employer of Choice in 2016, and Jun Obtinalla sees this as a validation of “the role of HR as a strategic partner in cultivating a culture wherein people actively contribute to the success of the company”, as well as its “service-centric culture” that has made Metro Drug a leading brand among clients and employees alike. Talent retention has been the biggest challenge for Obtinalla and his team in the past year, and to address this concern they have implemented a series of employee engagement programs that have sought to highlight the value of individual contributions and help staff gain a deep sense of significance within the organisation and renew their commitment to the company. In terms of L&D, the HR team runs the MDI Academy and partners with the Zuellig Pharma Regional Office in implementing an Accelerated Leadership Course for young and high-potential talent as well as frontline managers.

JASON HO Head of group HR OCBC BANK

Having served as head of asset and liability management since 2013, Jason Ho assumed the position of head of group human resources in 2015, though he was already involved in key HR initiatives prior to this assignment, such as the OCBC mentoring program which forms a key pillar of the company’s leadership development program. Keeping to the L&D focus, one major project Ho oversaw was the recent refurbishment of the OCBC campus, a $58m L&D hub with more than 32,000 square feet of training space for 400-plus learners. Apart from the facilities, Ho cites OCBC’s numerous L&D programs that fall within three main faculties: banking; leadership and employee development; and customer experience. These programs cover technical and leadership competencies as well as personal discovery and holistic development for career building and long-term engagement.

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COVER STORY

2017 HOT LIST SARAH DUNN Head of people resources ADOBE ASIA-PACIFIC

Adobe Australia has just been included (for the fourth time in a row) in the annual Best Places to Work list compiled by Great Place to Work Australia, making Sarah Dunn a proud member of a winning company and HR team. The award reflects the company’s performance in five key areas: credibility, camaraderie, respect, fairness and pride. Adobe has taken strides in terms of offering flexible work conditions, particularly by providing generous parental leave for Australian and New Zealand workers. Going beyond the traditional maternity and paternity leave provisions, Dunn and her team have introduced leave for primary and non-primary caregivers, and have extended the paid leave period by a factor of four times the original offering.

PATRICK FIAT General manager and chief experience officer ROYAL PLAZA ON SCOTTS

PAULINE CHUA General manager of human capital and CSR FUJI XEROX SINGAPORE

Given the common humanitarian aspect and spirit of two different departments, Fuji Xerox Singapore has managed to combine both HR and CSR into one role for Pauline Chua. This dual focus is also what drew her to join the company five years ago, as Chua recognised that CSR and sustainability inevitably translated back to more benefits for staff and the company as a whole. In particular, the CSR focus has been effective in attracting Generation Y workers, who want more than the usual development and pay benefits and are more concerned about gaining experience and making a difference. Chua has also found that the CSR work has led to increased engagement and kept the attrition rate low, as employees find the related activities therapeutic and meaningful. On top of these benefits, the company also promotes flexible work arrangements and offers facilities on-site for new parents to care for their children. With these in place, Chua and her team have effectively communicated to the staff their dedication to making the company a most empathic and desirable employer.

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Patrick Fiat’s main challenge in 2016 was talent recruitment and retention, given the steady growth of the hotel/travel industry coupled with the tightening of the quota for foreign talent and the retirement of mature-age employees. To address this, Fiat and his team arranged regular engagement/feedback sessions with staff of different age groups and received suggestions and insights on what could be done to improve Royal Plaza on Scotts’ standing as a hotel and an employer of choice. The team has also made several improvements and added green initiatives to its regular operations to enhance efficiency and address environmental concerns. As a reward for its efforts, Royal Plaza on Scotts was named as the Sixth Best Company to Work For by Great Place to Work Singapore in 2016. And in 2017, Fiat will keep HR’s focus on high-impact initiatives, including L&D, empowerment and meaningful work, while constantly improving work processes to enhance overall productivity.

GLORIA CHIN HR director NATIONAL ENVIRONMENT AGENCY

2016 was another eventful year for the National Environment Agency (NEA) as it continued to work towards ensuring that Singaporeans enjoy clean air, water and public areas and minimal pollution despite being one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Much work was accomplished by Gloria Chin and her team in terms of strengthening the workforce and the individual capabilities of employees. With strong partnerships with line departments, the Strategic Workforce Plan for the building of engineering capability was completed last year. New initiatives were launched to support employees’ desire for growth and skills upgrading. Initiatives included tactical field training, the introduction of a service competency framework, mentoring services, as well as supervisory coaching and career development workshops. In recognition of its progressive employment practices, NEA was conferred the TAFEP Exemplary Employer Award 2016 and the Public Sector Employer of the Year award at the HR Excellence Awards 2016.

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9/03/2017 8:41:32 AM

LIM HWA CHOO

TRICIA DURAN

Head of HR, ASEAN

HR director

CISCO

UNILEVER ASIA

As head of HR at Cisco, Lim Hwa Choo takes pride in the fact that the company is an acknowledged best employer and has created a family-friendly organisation – in one instance going so far as to help arrange for the diagnosis and treatment of one staff member’s critically ill child. There’s also a willingness to meet employees’ needs, whether it be finding positions that match their skill set or assisting in their personal needs. Lim’s work requires her to keep abreast of the ever-changing digital landscape and of how HR can stay ahead. With the use of data analytics, Lim and her team are able to decide on matters such as providing specific skill-set training for certain areas/offices, upgrading medical policies and benefit programs, and other people-planning initiatives.

KLAUS DUETOFT Senior director, APAX, MyHR EBAY

Few industries are as fast-paced as the online retail space, and eBay veteran Klaus Duetoft – he’s been associated with the company since 2003 – has seen it all. Over the past few years he has focused on transforming how HR operates in order to support a rapid-growth company. MyHR was launched to do just that. The MyHR team handles all HR operational functions – everything from back-end data management and analytics through to policy interpretation and development, benefits management, and engaging managers with performance management and counselling – to name a few areas. Today, 95% of eBay’s employees’ needs are met by the MyHR function. “We now have an organisation where we have around 80 people servicing around 15,000 people.

It’s highly efficient and scalable.”

PALLAVI SRIVASTAVA Country human resources director IBM SINGAPORE

Following IBM’s strategic shift from traditional IT solutions to cognitive solutions (their ‘Watson’ could be classified as a prime example of artificial intelligence or machine learning) and the take-up of cloud platforms, Pallavi Srivastava and her team at IBM Singapore have followed suit to ensure they remain aligned with the business’s needs. The team has achieved the following in the past 12 months: implemented several new L&D programs to support IBM’s transition to a cloud-based cognitive company; adopted a cloud-based HRMS solution for self-service transactions and its first Watson-based cognitive solution for compensation; and hiked up the employee engagement scores by at least seven points following last year’s results.

Facing the challenge of ensuring continuity and seamless operations, Srivastava credits these achievements to the team’s three-pronged strategy of maintaining accuracy; maintaining frequent communication; and continuous collaboration across all HR functions. She expects to have the same focus – engagement, new technologies, and data analytics for talent management – with even better results in 2017.

Tricia Duran went from developing and marketing products and brands to finding and cultivating a competitive edge in people. In terms of notable achievements, Duran cites a considerable investment the company recently made in its premier leadership development centre, which aims to continue its commitment to learning and growing leaders. Facing the ubiquity of digitalisation and big data, she identifies the human element as an irreplaceable component in HR that she and her team will strive to maintain amid the trends towards automation and self-service technology.

IT’S BEEN A TOUGH YEAR FOR… Charlotte Thng, head of HR, Standard Chartered Bank In November 2016, Standard Chartered Bank announced it would be reducing the global head count of its Corporate and Institutional Banking (CIB) division by 10%. The exercise is part of its planned 15,000 gross head count reductions over three years announced in November 2015.

At 7,000 employees, Standard Chartered Singapore employs the highest number of employees across all offices in Asia-Pacific, the bulk of them in the CIB division. Since the 2015 announcement the bank has focused its HR efforts on workforce planning to minimise the number of jobs lost.

Robert Chong, director, Group HR, Keppel At the end of 2016, Keppel Corp, which has already eliminated more than a quarter of its workforce throughout 2016, said “painful measures” and job cuts would continue as profit at the world’s biggest oil-rig builder dropped. Senior managers at the Singapore-based company have taken a cut in their monthly pay and directors will propose lower fees. Keppel slashed its workforce at its offshore and marine business by 26%, or about 8,000 jobs, in the nine months through September 2016.

In order to rightsize further, the HR team will be looking to end contracts earlier and possibly look at retrenchment options.

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9/03/2017 8:41:34 AM

FEATURES

L&D

LEARNING FOR LIFE All areas of HR are being disrupted, and L&D is no exception. What are the latest learning trends and how can HR create a culture of learning?

ASK ANY HR professional and they’ll tell you just how essential L&D is to overall talent management. Indeed, Mark Chan, regional director of Cornerstone OnDemand, says that while effective talent management requires the smooth interlocking of key areas, including talent identification and recruitment, onboarding and career mapping, the linchpin is L&D.

in order to provide career growth.

“People love to learn and this helps to keep them engaged. Sustaining a learning culture will support on-going knowledge exchange, which is particularly important to harness new emerging technologies in the workplace. The exchange of ideas and learning is also fundamental to enabling creativity and innovation.”

“For training to be effective it is important to be able to support the different preferences reflected in the demographic of your workforce” Mark Chan, Cornerstone OnDemand “We believe that companies need to more effectively develop critical skills and competencies at all levels, to prepare employees for new positions and to develop future leaders,” he says. “In order to achieve this, employers must invest in L&D and training and put it at the core of their talent management strategy, creating a learning culture in their company.”

The key, Chan adds, is to provide learning programs that are aligned with employees’ career aspirations and development paths

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All change As in other areas of HR, L&D is being impacted by various disruptive forces. For example, for the first time in living memory, the workforce consists of five generations working side by side. HR professionals must factor this reality into any L&D strategies.

“For training to be effective it is important to be able to support the different preferences reflected in the demographics of your workforce,” says Chan. “Creating a learning culture to support the needs of

different generations is just one part of a talent management plan to ensure a smooth transition as your workforce experiences a shift in generations.”

Chan says the ability and speed to adopt new learning technology naturally varies between age cohorts, so he urges employers to utilise different learning methods and content styles for both push and pull training.

For example, when providing a learning program for millennials, companies need to be aware that millennials are very likely to adopt a consumerised learning approach, which means that they proactively reach out to search content, but the consumption is fast and sometimes fragmented as they have a short attention span when viewing the content, and they usually do it on the go with mobile devices. Gamification is another key element to consider blending into content design. Gamification content engages millennial learners in ways that static and formal content cannot achieve.

HR should also be mindful of accepting generational stereotypes.

“While we hear a lot about digital natives and millennials, it is the generation of baby boomers that has the expertise, experience and is often in positions of leadership,” Chan says. “Organisations can leverage these employees as valuable learning assets in their learning platform and get them to collaborate with other employees to share, exchange and regenerate skills and knowledge.”

By leveraging their learning platform, employers can also capture the knowledge and skills from their baby boomers. “The fact that millennials can do things faster than previous generations does not necessarily mean that they have the knowledge to do the right things,” Chan says.

Identifying and closing skills gaps As the pace of change is so rapid in the

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10/03/2017 11:43:47 AM

brought to you by

5 L&D TRENDS Mark Chan presents five key trends to be aware of:

business world, all employees must keep their skills sharp. Employers naturally play a key role in identifying and then closing these skill gaps.

For example, many organisations have well-established graduate recruitment and trainee programs to help fresh graduates transition from tertiary education to the commercial world. This has been the case in vocational and non-vocational areas.

“Traditionally, young adults were exposed to the world of work through after-school and vacation jobs,” Chan says. “However, with the increase in automation and these low-skilled roles being filled full-time, many young adults have not been exposed to these experiences and so may lack understanding of the basic work ethic. Therefore an

Mobile learning has become the norm rather than the trend and we are seeing that mobile has become the delivery method of choice for many of our clients here in Asia-Pacific.

Micro-learning is the ability to deliver small, useful bite-sized learning that quickly closes a skill or knowledge gap.

Video usage has increased tremendously and we are specifically seeing an emerging trend for user-contributed content and video.

Personalised learning – in the same way that we expect Netflix or Amazon to know what we like, learners also expect that their learning experience is tailored to their needs. We are seeing many of our clients leveraging their learning data and our analytics to drive such personalisation.

Social everything – social and collaborative environments for learning and knowledge sharing are not new trends, but are becoming much more widely used. Employers and employees see the value in capturing organisational knowledge sharing among teams and across typical silos.

organisation with a learning culture is attractive to them.”

When it comes to the transition of graduates into the business environment, employers need to develop programs that introduce new hires to the company

culture, and offer focused, role-specific learning content.

“While an induction program may take a specific duration and time frame to accomplish, bridging skill gaps along an individual’s growth is an ongoing

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10/03/2017 11:43:54 AM

FEATURES

L&D brought to you by

HOW VALUED IS LEARNING? A 2016 survey* indicated that millennials are desperate for development, with it being their most coveted job benefit.

Training & development (22%) Flexible working hours (19%) Cash bonuses (14%) Free private healthcare (8%) Retirement funding (6%) Greater vacation allowance (6%) Learners expect learning to be …

Untethered: 30% of full-time employees do most of their work outside their employers’ locations.

On-demand: 70% will turn to search engines for information.

Collaborative: 80% of workforce learning happens on the job.

Empowering: 30% of workers say they can learn in the workplace. *Corporate Learning in 2016: Ten Trends Shaping the Future, Deloitte

CORNERSTONE ONDEMAND Cornerstone OnDemand (NASDAQ: CSOD) is pioneering cloud-based learning and talent management software to help organisations realise the potential of the modern workforce. The company is based in Santa Monica, California, and its solutions are used by more than 2,900 clients worldwide, spanning 30 million users across 191 countries and 42 languages.

Visit www.csod.com

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journey,” says Chan. “It also means companies need to develop talent at the speed of business change, and embrace the idea of lifelong learning.”

Keeping track Given there are so many components of talent management, how can HR keep track of the skills and competencies of their employees?

Chan says there are a number of ways.

“Most organisations we talk to use and develop competency frameworks to measure and track skills and desired behaviours that are key to achieving the goals and business objectives of that organisation,” he explains.

This type of data can be extremely valuable to organisations as they look at specific initiatives or projects. By analysing and combining competency, skill and profile data, employers can then start to build career paths and talent pools. These will include L&D programs specific to the needs of the related initiatives.

Looking ahead Chan says that learning is one of the fastest developing and evolving areas for Cornerstone’s clients – and most of them are looking at how to manage the continuum that spans formal learning, informal learning,

“For training to be effective it is important to be able to support the different preferences reflected in the demographic of your workforce” Mark Chan, Cornerstone OnDemand “Once companies refine these structures so that they are specific to job roles and job levels then this data can start to be leveraged to drive both L&D and career pathing for employees.”

In addition to this more formal approach, Cornerstone has the belief that employers will garner further benefits if they can capture skills that are not recorded in more formal competency assessments.

“We believe that allowing employees to develop and self-maintain a profile and update their internal resume – similar to their external experiences with LinkedIn – will increase their engagement levels and provide valuable data for career and development planning,” Chan says. “Profile data may be specific to career pathing – for example, willingness to move, countries they would like an opportunity to work in, and even simple things such as language or other life skills.”

social learning and collaborative learning.

While there are several emerging learning preference trends (see box on p31), consumerisation of learning is the overarching trend, says Chan. “Learning is following the trend of many other types of media and data we consume, so it must be relevant, immediate and easy to consume.”

Also critical will be analytics and learning optimisation. “This can help companies to identify courses that drive the most impactful training for their employees, and better understand things such as course completion trends,” says Chan.

Whether it be traditional, social or microlearning, employers should aim to provide the options for the cohort that you are supporting. This will be an ongoing challenge with the entry of Gen Z to the workforce, for whom technology is not just a tool; it is central to their identity.

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10/03/2017 11:43:55 AM

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9/03/2017 PM 9/03/2017 12:02:07 7:48:13 AM

FEATURES

CORPORATE HEALTH

EMPLOYERS MUST CARE

Employee health and well-being is no longer solely a personal matter for employees; employers have a moral and social responsibility as well TODAY, THE once clear-cut line between work and home is blurry. Longer working hours, the ability to work from anywhere and the uptake of mobile technology mean traditional notions of work-life balance have shifted. It’s no surprise that employers today are also more involved in the physical and mental well-being of employees. Employee health and well-being is no longer solely a personal matter.

Indeed, according to a March 2016 Labour Market Survey by the Manpower Research & Statistics department, employees spend an average of 45.5 hours at work each week – that equates to more than a quarter of their lives.

“It only makes sense that employers play an active role in their employees’ health,” says Mr Alvin Fu, Chief Corporate Solutions Officer at AIA Singapore. “Employers must care. A healthy workforce will lead to higher employee engagement, higher productivity and lower healthcare costs. Therefore investing in workplace health – from physical surroundings to encouraging physical activity – makes good economic sense and return on investment.”

A wider issue It’s the well-documented hard statistics that are making business leaders take note. Put simply, poor health costs Singapore. In 2013,

AIA VITALITY WEEKLY CHALLENGE Launched in January 2017, the AIA Vitality Weekly Challenge inspires AIA Vitality members to get active and be rewarded weekly via a mobile app with cash vouchers from Cold Storage, Starbucks and Uber.

Each week, members who earn 250 AIA Vitality points by participating in physical activities will be able to redeem vouchers worth $5. To put this into perspective, walking 7,500 steps a day translates to 50 AIA Vitality points. An average sedentary deskbound Singaporean walks around 5,000 to 6,000 steps a day. This means that all it takes is to walk a little more every day and exercise once a week to achieve the rewards.

Further, participants can form teams of four to get an additional reward of $5 every week if each member of the team achieves their 250 AIA Vitality points.

“Many colleagues have increased levels of motivation when in a team as the peer pressure provides positive encouragement for everyone in the team to achieve their 250 AIA Vitality points. This is an example of how Vitality is founded on behavioural science to encourage employees to do a little more physical activity each day,” says Alvin Fu, Chief Corporate Solutions Officer, AIA Singapore.

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physical inactivity in Singapore cost the government, companies and Singaporeans more than S$200m in direct costs alone, the figure ballooning to a whopping S$275m when indirect costs are added.1 The Singapore government is taking note, and is now laying the groundwork to ensure the well-being of individuals, families, businesses and the nation through initiatives such as the Healthy Living Master Plan. It recognises that employers now see the value of investing in a more productive workforce.

“Given Singapore’s labour market and ageing population, an increasing proportion of our workforce will work over a longer period of their life,” says Alvin Fu. “It must be imperative then that Singapore keeps its workforce at the highest level of good health possible in order to maximise its productivity.”

What can employers do?

How can employers play a role in a healthier Singapore, and how can they encourage sustainable behavioural change among employees?

At last year’s AIA Vitality Summit, delegates were asked this question. In a live poll, C-suite leadership endorsement and rewarding employees’ healthy behaviours were identified as the top two critical drivers for an effective workplace health program, approximately one in three (35% and 37% respectively) attendees selecting each option.

Alvin Fu says that employees should be rewarded for small step changes in behaviour. Examples of how to make step changes in behaviour include physical activity, healthy eating, annual health screening and mental wellness. Providing vouchers or benefits for small changes in behaviour can create a refreshing workplace culture that is fun and rewarding.

“In addition, forming teams with colleagues to strive for team challenges creates peer-to-peer motivation and I have seen personally how this encourages

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brought to you by

INSIGHTS INTO THE HEALTH OF SINGAPOREANS employees to increase their physical activity,” says Alvin Fu.

Sustainable programs Part of the problem for employers, however, is creating initiatives that last. Too many will launch with huge fanfare, only to fizzle out a few months later. Alvin Fu reiterates that this is less likely to happen if the two previously mentioned levers – C-suite leadership endorsement and rewarding employees’ healthy behaviour – are utilised.

“There is no point in having a wellness program without rewarding employees,” he says. “Such programs do not encourage any change in behaviour, as employees quickly get tired with weekly runs or yoga classes.

A proper, science-backed wellness program giving vouchers or benefits for each lifestyle

AIA’s 2016 Healthy Living Index Survey found that Singapore’s healthy living index score continues to track below the regional average. The survey also uncovered key motivators for Singaporeans to lead healthier lifestyles. These included: smaller and more achievable goals (79%), help to change one step at a time (79%), and rewards for reaching their goals (73%).

Further insights were gleaned by surveying AIA Vitality Summit delegates: • 36.6% of participants identified rewarding employees healthy behaviours as the critical driver of an effective workplace health program • 34.7% suggested C-suite leadership and engagement was critical to the success of a workplace health program • 38.9% said their biggest challenge to implementing a corporate wellness program in their organisation was uncertainty about ROI from corporate wellness

change milestone is critical for sustainability and interest.”

AIA’s Vitality program meets these challenges head-on. Launched in 2013, AIA Vitality is a comprehensive wellness program that inspires people to make real change to their health by rewarding them for the small steps they take to become a little healthier every day.

L everaging behavioural science principles, it provides incentives and rewards for people to make healthy choices. Done repeatedly, these behaviours become a habit and eventually a lifestyle.

A results-driven program An easy way to get started is to seek a sustainable, effective corporate wellness

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9/03/2017 10:21:56 AM

FEATURES

CORPORATE HEALTH brought to you by

AIA HEALTHIEST WORKPLACE SURVEY The inaugural Singapore’s Healthiest Workplace 2017 by AIA Vitality is a comprehensive survey of the health and wellbeing of employees in Singapore.

This is a well-established survey modelled from Britain’s Healthiest Workplace, which was launched in 2013 and surveyed more than 100,000 employees and 400 employers across multiple industries. The survey provides companies with insights that will inform strategies to increase productivity, reduce absenteeism and turnover rates, and lower medical costs. Mr Alvin Fu outlined its importance to Singapore employers.

“Singapore is lagging in its efforts to promote corporate health and the well-being of its employees. Organisations invest in wellness activities such as yoga classes, gym membership and fruits for employees, but fail to have a comprehensive way to track employees’ health and its return on investment.

“AIA Singapore, reinforcing our promise to help our customers live longer, healthier and better lives, is championing this survey at no cost to companies. We want to help Singapore companies establish a baseline for their employee wellness programs and measure their returns on investment.

“I invite every company serious about their employees’ health and well-being to participate in this survey.”

Companies with 50 or more employees are encouraged to register online from Wednesday, 15 March: healthiestworkplace.aia.com.

Deadline for registration is Monday, 15 May.

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program. AIA Vitality is one such program that has been proven to improve productivity, engagement and retention, as well as decrease healthcare costs for companies. The results speak for themselves: • Vitality drives employee engagement: According to Vitality Data from the US, the engagement of the segment of the workforce that took part in physical activities increased after Vitality was implemented. A further study found that participants nearly doubled the amount of wellness activities from 6.9 to 13.4 activities per month.2

The AIA Vitality Summit 2017 Following the event’s huge success in 2016, the AIA Vitality Summit 2017 will take place on 3 April. Themed “Changing behaviours for a healthier workforce”, the Summit will provide insights and address key questions on how employers can take action: • What are practical ways for businesses to implement corporate wellness programs that lead to sustainable behavioural change among employees?

• Is there an easy, plug-and-play solution for companies to inspire behavioural change and influence good habits

“Employers must care. A healthy workforce will lead to higher employee engagement, higher productivity and lower healthcare costs” Alvin Fu, Chief Corporate Solutions Officer, AIA Singapore According to the same study, the productivity of employees who were highly engaged was 18% higher when compared to those who had no or a decreased level of engagement.

• Employees engaged in Vitality exhibit lower absenteeism and healthcare costs: Data from South Africa, recorded 2008-2011, showed the average number of sick days for employees not on Vitality increased year-on-year, whereas the average number of sick days for employees with Vitality decreased year-on-year. In the same study, an analysis of medical claims for employers showed that the greater the level of Vitality engagement by employees, the lower their associated healthcare costs, relative to employers with lower levels of employee Vitality engagement.

for a happier, healthier and more productive workforce?

• What are the benefits of corporate wellness programs, how do you measure them and why are they especially relevant today?

The Summit will bring together leaders from the financial, healthcare and policymaking sectors to discuss and provide practical advice on how companies can inspire behavioural change and influence good habits among employees to reap the business benefits of a healthy and more productive workforce.

Follow AIA Singapore on LinkedIn for updates: www.linkedin.com/company/aiasingapore Source: 1

The economic burden of physical activity: a global analysis of major non-communicable diseases (2016) The

Lancet, http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(16)30383-X/fulltext 2

Investing in Employees Health Whitepaper, the McKesson case study available at: http://www.aia.com.sg/ content/dam/sg/en/docs/aia-survey-research/investing-in-employee-health-whitepaper.pdf

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FEATURES

EXECUTIVE COACHING

CALMING STORMY SEAS: EXECUTIVE COACHING In periods of uncertainty, it’s in the interests of both employers and employees to commit to professional development, and one proven option is executive coaching 2017 IS a tough time to be a CEO or running a large corporate division. The term it’s lonely at the top is very apt: executives often have very few people to talk to about professional concerns, and there’s the added element of competition at that level.

This personal stress is magnified during uncertain and often volatile business conditions. There is only one response: leaders must exponentially ramp up their leadership skills – and a proven way of doing this is by engaging the services of an executive coach.

When asked why, in this market, executives might turn to the services of a coach, Kelvin Lim, founder and principal coach of Executive Coach International doesn’t hesitate in his response.

“I would say that they are looking to take a different approach to the market,” he says.

“They are eager to try out new business strategies and are looking at different ways to succeed. They want some sort of guarantee or reinforcement that the option they are considering is the best, most appropriate one.”

EXECUTIVE COACHING VS LIFE COACHING Given that one is typically organised and paid for by an individual and the other is typically organised and paid for by a company, is it a fine line between executive coaching and life coaching? Kelvin Lim explains: “I don’t think there’s a clear delineation between the two. The dynamics may be subtly different, but fundamentally it’s the same process. It makes sense that the two have some overlap, given how work life is now impacting on personal life. We build a relationship of trust that is so deep that often the executive will take us into their confidence. They have issues they would never tell anyone else, so in that sense it can be similar to life coaching. It’s completely confidential and that is important of executive coaching.”

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Finding the right match Finding an effective coach – preferably an external coach who works with a leader in an environment of total confidentiality – is critical. Another employee acting as a sounding board can’t do that.

HR practitioners, for example, can provide an executive with feedback on a whole host of issues pertinent to the organisation but they must do so carefully.

“The difference is internal politics,” says Lim. “If you’re the HR director you can’t really go tough on an executive without some fear of consequences. An external coach can.”

Indeed, an external coach will be fully briefed on negative issues, which can be addressed within the coaching environment.

They may also have greater understanding of those issues in terms of the impact on the executive’s career aspirations.

Most coaches at Executive Coach International have themselves held senior roles in business, or have had equally valuable life experiences. “If you’ve been an executive or have worked at a high level in government or have what I call a parallel experience, you’ll have similar dynamics but use different approaches to reach different outcomes,” says Lim. He adds that typically both the client and the coach bring something to the relationship, so there is never a superior position. This is unlike most of the other forms of professional development, which are based more on an expert/student dynamic. Coaching only works if the coach acknowledges their clients’ intelligence, experience and knowledge of whether something does or does not work.

“As long as there’s a rank equivalent the coach should be able to relate to the executive. It provides a different perspective.

Sometimes if it’s all business you get locked into a certain way of thinking.”

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brought to you by

Self-reflection Importantly, coaching can help executives shine a light on their strengths and weaknesses – a form of self-reflection that Lim says is often missing from an executive’s arsenal.

“The process helps the executive to cover off what skills they really have, what talents they really have. It highlights what they might have that is valuable and worth listening to, and how they can apply that to their work or business.”

However, Lim says that given the highly competitive business environment, even identifying someone’s strengths is not enough;

“Coaching has proven to be one of the most effective forms of professional development in the last half century” Kelvin Lim it’s about how that insight is applied that matters. He cites an example: “You could say to someone, ‘You are a people person.’ But if you were to look at it carefully and peel it back there are many different ways of being good with people. So it’s about applying that insight

specifically to that person. A lot of it comes down to the coach and their observation.”

A coach can also act as a sounding board.

For example, Lim has one CEO client who is particularly strong on strategy execution.

“We’ll talk about an issue and he’ll say,

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FEATURES

EXECUTIVE COACHING brought to you by

THE TRAITS OF GREAT COACHES “Executive coaches – the great ones – are different in that they have a number of unique traits,” says Lim, who refers to them as “orientations”. “These orientations help people make coaches amenable to clients. The client has to trust you to work with you.

If they don’t trust you, the game is lost.” Here’s what makes great coaches special: They are people-oriented They appreciate and understand people. There’s a genuine interest in making the lives of clients better.

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They are system-oriented They are skilled and systemised in their ability to organise information. Their processes are sound, and they get results.

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They have a set of values that pursues a certain level of excellence Each executive coach is different and depending on how far they have gone and what kind of values they base themselves on, they often have a certain philosophy and approach to their coaching.

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EXECUTIVE COACH INTERNATIONAL PTE LTD Executive Coach International Pte Ltd is one of Asia’s top coaching and coach-training providers.

The firm focuses on transforming human potential into tangible, lasting results. Visit our website www.ecicoaching.com to find out about our executive coaching services or how to become a certified coach.

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‘I don’t know what to do in this situation.’

I’ll make a suggestion and he’ll assess it and follow through with it. The next time I meet him I’ll ask him how it went and he’ll report on the results he got from going down that route. Sometimes it’s just redirecting people down a path they may not have seen.”

“If they are designed for sales coaching and I’m working with people linked to revenue and production then, yes, there may be some terms attached to that. But generally, if you’re talking about developing the CEO or another executive, usually I’m given a free hand,” he explains.

The practicalities

Formal training

It’s critical to get a good match between coach and coachee. Lim says he is approached both by individual executives and HR professionals who are looking to engage the services of a coach for a member of staff. “For the former it’s straightforward,” says Lim. “The client meets you; they like you; they want to work with you.”

For the latter approach, there are usually more formalities involved. “The other way is

Lim has been dismayed in the past about people in his industry claiming to be coaches who do not have any form of credential or qualification.

He adds that credentials are essentially standards. “It’s a guarantee that these people can perform at this level under stress. We get lots of people who want to be coaches who say ‘OK, I’m a coach,’ and this has been a problem as they have nothing to back up that claim.”

“I’ll say to a client, ‘What do you want to work on today? What do you anticipate will happen in the next quarter?’ It’s always about the now” Kelvin Lim when HR makes a decision,” says Lim. “It might be that they have a new CEO or new marketing director and they’ve identified that a coach might help. Then we need to be checked out so we do a full compatibility test. We sit down and talk. Do they like my style? Am I making sense?

Do they think I can help with their problems?

If so there’s a match.”

From there it’s up to the executive and their diary to decide how much time they devote to the coaching sessions.

Sessions are very situational. “I’ll say to a client, ‘What do you want to work on today?

What do you anticipate will happen in the next quarter?’ It’s always about the now,” says Lim. As for results, Lim says that if it’s the organisation that has arranged the coaching sessions, he’s usually given complete freedom in terms of setting objectives for the coachee and assessing results.

He urges those looking to engage a coach to check the coach’s credentials, check they are competent and have experience as a coach, and whether or not they have any clients who will vouch for them.

Executive Coach International offers training and formal credentialing for coaches.

The formal course occurs over a time frame of four months. Exams are held twice yearly. The company has trained some 500 people.

“We take in very small batches of people,” says Lim. “They must be people who are willing to commit themselves to a level of competence and excellence.”

For Lim, the effort is worth it: “Coaching has proven to be one of the most effective forms of professional development in the last half century. It’s definitely worthwhile for executives to consider this option during uncertain or ambiguous times.”

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INSIDE HR

COMMVAULT

SCALING FOR GLOBAL GROWTH

While significant expansion would make most organisations envious, it can come at a cost. HRD chats with Commvault CHRO Jesper Helt about how he has helped transform and scale his company’s operations 42

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IN LATE 2016, Commvault celebrated what company insiders called its ‘20-10 anniversary’: 20 years as an independent company and 10 years on the NASDAQ stock exchange. CEO Bob Hammer and around 40 Commvault software developers went to New York to ring the closing bell for the day of trading. For Jesper Helt, CHRO at Commvault, the day was highly symbolic: instead of a group of senior executives in attendance, it was the developers.

“That is Commvault’s story,” he says. “It’s our bread and butter.”

Commvault is a global technology vendor that provides data protection and information management solutions for some of the world’s

HRD: What’s the history of Commvault?

Jesper Helt: It was formed in 1988 as a development group in Bell Labs, and later became a business unit of AT&T Network Systems. It was incorporated in 1996 following the deregulation of the telecom sector, and segments of that business were sold off. At that time our current CEO, Bob Hammer, came on board. You could not really call him a founder, but in a way he is.

When we became a company 20 years ago, he was there, and he is really the founder of the Commvault we know today.

We have 2,700 ‘vaulters’ all over the world. Around half of these are based in

“It can be hard to move an HR function along.

In larger HR organisations, which I’ve been part of in the past, it’s very tough” largest enterprises. It operates across the Americas, Europe, Africa and the Asia-Pacific, and employs almost 2,700 staff worldwide.

Last quarter alone, it posted more than half a billion dollars in revenue.

Helt joined Commvault two and a half years ago, just as it was undergoing a massive global rebrand to address the company’s declining revenue and its failure to take significant market share away from competitors. During this transformation, Helt played a key role by changing the recruitment process, specifically focusing on the types of people being hired. HRD talked to Helt about how HR has helped with the transformation.

the Americas – the US, Canada and Latin America – and around 35% are in EMEA and the remaining in APAC. We have a presence in 36 countries, and although we have not entered a lot of new markets in recent years, just in my two and a half years in the company we’ve opened up seven new markets. We’re headquartered in New Jersey, and really the business has grown from that base. We’ve been in Europe for close to 18 years, and APAC came a little bit later.

However, from a presence and head count perspective in the last two and a half years alone, growth in both APAC and EMEA has been quite significant.

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INSIDE HR

COMMVAULT MANAGING THE PAIN POINTS McKinsey & Company has identified three common ‘pain points’ for rapid-growth companies.

Stifling structures Well-defined organisational structures establish the roles and norms that enable large companies to get things done. Therefore, when growth plans call for doing things that are entirely new – say, expanding into new geographies or adding products – it’s well worth the leadership team’s time to examine existing organisational structures to see if they’re flexible enough to support the new initiatives.

Sometimes they won’t be.

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Unscalable processes Business processes are another area that companies often overlook, to their detriment, when they are growing. It’s important for a company to determine which processes will come under particular stress when it grows.

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Unprepared people Growth naturally creates new interactions and processes, expected and unexpected, and often at a fast pace. To manage them, the employees who face the greatest complexity – for example, those in functions or businesses that will see increased activity – must have ‘ambidextrous’ capabilities. These enable people to take initiative beyond the confines of their jobs, to cooperate and build linkages across the organisation, and to complete many tasks in parallel.

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HRD: How does HR operate at the company?

JH: I have a global role. I was brought in with a background in HR in the pharma and technology industries, which I’d worked in around the world for a number of years. I joined when I was on the West Coast of the US, based in Silicon Valley. The idea, as my boss said to me, was “to bring a West Coast feel to an East Coast company”.

What he meant by that is, there’s a tendency in the US to foster more innovation – particularly HR innovation – on the West Coast rather than the East Coast, which tends to be more conservative and old-school HR.

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The Valley in particular spearheads this. A lot of the cutting-edge, outside-of-the-box thinking is coming out of that part of the US. So I was enticed by that opportunity. Also, the company had enjoyed tremendous growth, but did not really have a strategic HR function. There was of course an HR function, but it was more of an administrative, transactional HR function.

That said, the people agenda has been front and centre at Commvault from the get-go, so it wasn’t like good things weren’t being done; it was just that the HR function was not built to scale up. The company had reached a point in time – around 1,500 people – where it was decided that what had

only from the HR function but also from the business itself. How do you bring the business along if it’s been accustomed to certain things?

HRD: Can you provide a specific example?

JH: Take vacations. This is mainly a US phenomenon, but in the US, certain companies have moved to unlimited vacations, versus the old way where you had a certain number of allocated days off and the employer kept track of it. Getting the business to feel comfortable with a change like that, and the HR function who manage it – because it requires a slightly

“When I joined Commvault, I found that if I asked 10 different people what prospective talent or a high-potential candidate looked like, I’d get 10 different responses” been done historically would not help with the scaling of the culture and processes.

different mindset – can be a challenge. Trust is the key.

HRD: Many larger organisations do look to those tech start-ups for bright HR ideas. How well received was that West Coast approach in a more traditional, structured HR company?

HRD: Continuing the change theme, you joined Commvault just as it was undergoing a significant transformation. Can you outline what was happening?

JH: It can be hard to move an HR function along. I was lucky in that there was only a small HR function, so there weren’t a whole lot of changes for me to undertake. But in larger HR organisations, which I’ve been part of in the past, it’s very tough. It puts your identity to the test. If you have been a very well-executing HR function but focused on the classic HR policing of policies or being very strong on transactional HR, suddenly you need to forget about policies and move toward guidelines, for example. It’s more about adding strategic value.

That’s a tough transition, one that many HR functions are struggling with. They like the talk – it all sounds very appetising – but when it comes down to actually putting it into practice, there is a lot of resistance, not

JH: The simple version is the whole industry we are in was being disrupted. In the storage back-up industry, we’ve seen more and more enterprises move to the cloud. It happened so much faster than anybody anticipated, and the industry at large had a hard time adapting to that. We saw it coming, and we were working on it, but the speed by which it hit took us by surprise. What that essentially meant was that a company that had become a Wall Street darling because it had seven years of 20% growth on top- and bottom-line results, quarter after quarter, all of a sudden hit a wall.

That was part of it; the other part was coming out the other side and building a company that could scale beyond 1,500 people.

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HRD: What did you do?

JH: We’ve spent a year and a half, maybe a little longer, transforming in a couple of ways. For example, we worked to get our set of solutions and software second to none in relation to our customers being able to manage, secure and access their data in the cloud as well as if it’s on-premise. That required massive innovation in our platform and in our solutions. Other work was done on the organisational front in terms of scaling the organisation, building out the capabilities – be it in sales, technical roles, marketing – because with the disruption also came the need for different types of personnel.

HRD: And you were involved in changing the recruitment process?

JH: We didn’t have a recruitment function or capability that was built to find as much talent as we needed. So that was a major part of it: building up the recruiting function in all parts of the world.

The even bigger element was getting proactive with some of the technologies that are now available in the recruitment space – for example, building a sourcing strategy so we can leverage social media data and rapidly locate talent globally. We wanted to be able to source talent proactively and build talent pools so even if we didn’t need it immediately, we’d have someone to get in touch with in three or four months – and of course, as part of that, building robust talent selection processes. That meant ensuring there was a strong partnership between the talent acquisition function and the hiring managers, and then establishing what sort of talent we want.

When I joined Commvault, I found that if I asked 10 different people what prospective talent or a high-potential candidate looked like, I’d get 10 different responses. When organisations are growing so fast, that sort of thing just happens. We were venturing into new markets and moving from being a midmarket player to being an enterprise player.

The skill sets required were different, and it took some time to define and crystallise

Jesper Helt at Commvault HQ

THE PERSONAL IMPACT OF RAPID GROWTH Jesper Helt outlines three ways he’s managed to keep on top of an ever-changing work environment: Prioritise what makes the biggest difference. “That also means leaving behind some of the things that could keep me very busy; I used to do them, but they are not really moving the needle.”

Move to an agile philosophy. “Forget about sequential strategy implementation. Break away from that and do spurts instead – spurts on different projects or tasks so you can move on many things in parallel. You do not necessarily look to get to 90% or 100% completion. If you get 60% to 70% of the way there, that’s good enough because you’ve been able to move on five things in a fairly short period of time versus carefully planning out one or two initiatives but taking twice the amount of time. At least in my world, a lot of things will have changed, so even two-year strategies or projects run the risk of not being relevant once we get to the end of it.”

Foster courage in your team. “Trust your instincts and celebrate on an ongoing basis if you’re heading in the right direction.” the profiles of people who are likely to be successful here. We worked with the business to build success profiles and think through what has changed and how that will impact the experiences people will have when they join us. That then impacted the talent pools in which we were looking for talent.

HRD: How far along do you think you are in the transformation process?

JH: It’s ongoing. You need to stay on your toes, especially in this industry. From an HR perspective, I think we’re getting to the point where we’ve solidified the foundation; we’ve built our team, and we have some more robust, scalable processes in place. The next step is to ramp up the benefits of having those foundations, which is about getting the brand and the story out there, and then

bedding in these processes and ensuring they become part of the DNA of the company.

We want to have fun along the way. I have a photo of me on the slide at work, and that’s exactly the sort of work environment we’re trying to create. We have game rooms and outdoor fitness facilities, and at first you go, ‘Does that really belong in the workplace?’

But yes, it does. It helps you get into other parts of your brain, and if your job is to innovate, that’s a good thing. Our sporting competitions also help connect people. We’ve now got 800 people at our headquarters, so we started to run into trouble with the development team not collaborating with the marketing team, and so on, due to the distance between people that growth can create. These cross-functional, fun competitions help build connections.

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FEATURES

CSR

HOW GIVING BACK PAYS OFF Sam Neo outlines why CSR is more than just a ‘nice to have’ and how HR can unlock the true value of CSR initiatives basis or have a group of passionate volunteers to get things going.

For the former, instead of randomly assigning, a more purpose-driven approach could be taken. Young leaders or highpotentials in companies can be tasked to spearhead such programs to test their ability to lead in a controlled environment. Besides that, they will have the opportunity to work with people outside of their comfort zone and develop skills that may not be readily honed in their current scope of work. Areas that talent can be exposed to may include project management, strategic planning and even external stakeholder management.

This can be supplemented with the donation dollar to create a win-win situation for both the beneficiary and the organisation.

Create shared experiences

CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY (CSR) activities are often seen as a tool to enhance corporate image and make individuals feel good. But is that all CSR can deliver? Is it really a standalone portfolio? Can it actually complement your organisation’s people agenda?

Back in my earlier days when I was heavily involved in driving a charitable foundation and volunteer group, I came to realise that

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CSR activities actually have more potential than most people perceive. In fact, they should be a key pillar for HR and the organisation.

Why so? Let’s explore further.

Talent development platform Activities don’t just happen. In most cases, companies will either assign teams to organise the volunteer activities on a rotational

Volunteering activities are a good tool that companies can employ to bring employees together and foster greater bonds. Whether it involves working with young children or the elderly, activities that require collective effort will help employees get closer and work together more cohesively outside a work context. Of course, activities should be planned in such a way that they don’t leave employees in silos or allow freeriding. Everyone must have a part to play so that with collective effort they can achieve a desired outcome together. An example might be building a herbal garden for

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elderly folk at a nursing home. After setting an outcome, employees can be asked to form teams and explore ways to best run the activity together. In turn, shared experiences are created and employees will develop a better understanding of one another while deepening their relationships.

Opportunity for cross-entity interaction For bigger organisations with multiple entities or companies with regional coverage, it is often difficult for employees across different units to meet up. Volunteer activities can provide the much-needed opportunity for employees from different areas to finally meet and interact.

Employees will be able to finally put names to faces or simply make new friends during these activities. The additional platform for connecting with other groups of people within the organisation can help build invisible bridges that are necessary to enhance communication for cross-entity assignments.

CAN CSR REALLY IMPACT ENGAGEMENT? Many studies have been done to examine the effects of CSR initiatives on employee engagement, and they have all come to the same conclusion: CSR contributes significantly to productivity and loyalty among employees, and creates a competitive advantage for companies.

Back in 2011, Deloitte published a Volunteer IMPACT report, which discussed “the connection between workplace volunteerism activities and employee engagement”. The study focused on the millennials, who now comprise a sizeable portion of the workforce. The survey showed that half of the millennials are after the professional benefits of volunteerism, and 70% showed a strong preference for companies who demonstrate commitment to the community.

According to the report, millennials who participated in workplace volunteer activities were: • twice as likely to find the corporate culture positive (56%) as compared to those who rarely or never volunteer (28%) • more likely to feel proud of being part of their company (55% vs 36%) • more likely to feel very loyal towards their company (52% vs 33%) • more likely to be very satisfied with their employer (51% vs 32%) • more likely to recommend their company to a friend (57% vs 46%) Great Place to Work also crunched the numbers in late 2015 to show how CSR drives engagement: Average workplace

Best Workplaces

I feel good about the ways in which my organisation contributes to my community

56%

85%

My workplace is working to reduce its environmental impact

62%

86%

My organisation manages its impact upon society responsibly

60%

89%

59%

87%

Average CSR score

Source: Great Place to Work data and Population Survey Research, Nov 2015

Boost mental wellness Providing employees with time off from work to get away from their daily routine is a good way to boost mental wellness. During tough situations in the global market, we can expect the pressure faced by businesses to be passed on to employees. Individual workers will be expected to take on more work while facing a higher level of stress in delivering results. During such times, opportunities for them to take a breather will be crucial to prevent burnout and help enhance their productivity over the longer run. Taking their mind off work for even half a day will allow them to recharge momentarily while being engaged in meaningful work.

Build a company with strong ‘heartware’ As important as the financial figures may be, companies that are truly successful are those that do not neglect the importance of their people. In order to ensure that the company

With the right moves and synergy, the pie can be expanded to benefit more groups advocates a culture with strong ‘heartware’, it is key for leaders across various levels to develop empathy. Empathy can be developed through CSR activities, whether by giving donations or doing volunteer work, once participants are able to appreciate the impact of their giving.

Consistent exposure will help shape their beliefs over time, and that is essential to developing leaders with a people-centric mindset who can then drive a company with strong heartware.

Not only will this impact existing staff, but it will help boost the company’s reputation as well as trust in stakeholders; an organisation’s success lies in its people.

Closing thoughts

as tools for delivering a separate agenda instead of truly giving back to society. But instead of viewing them through a one-dimensional lens, why can’t there be multiple winners from such initiatives? After all, this does not need to be a zero-sum game in which either the community or companies have a larger share of the pie and must cannibalise one another. With the right moves and synergy, the pie can be expanded to benefit more groups. So next time someone tells you that CSR is a mere branding tool, remind them to think twice.

Sam Neo is the assistant manager, HR business partnership and scholarship, at Changi Airport Group.

It may seem that CSR activities are now viewed

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FEATURES

TECHNOLOGY

THE NEXT ITERATION OF WEARABLE TECH We all know that wearable technology can enhance employee health and wellbeing, but what happens next? Iain Hopkins investigates

WHAT DO Usain Bolt and the average HR director have in common? Looking purely at standards of health and fitness, possibly not a lot. However, there is a shared bond, and it comes from an unexpected source: wearable technology.

The elite sporting world has been utilising wearable technology for years in order to identify the conditions in which a person’s body can achieve optimum performance. The data provided by this technology indicates what we probably all know: peak performance is difficult to maintain at all times. Elite athletes need periods of rest. They will focus on intense bursts of high performance followed by periods when they replenish themselves with rest or lowerstress physical activity. Contrast that with the

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expectations of high performance in your organisation: it’s not just expected nine to five but possibly around the clock.

It’s this disconnect that technology is helping to close.

Kicking wearables to the next level Wearables in the business world have been utilised in several areas – wellness and safety programs being the two obvious examples. It’s commonplace to hear of employers buying Fitbits for employees in order to shift them towards healthy activities. Meanwhile, companies like Rio Tinto have been building sensors into equipment and clothing to monitor fatigue and guard against micro-

sleeps. However, according to Aaron McEwan, HR advisory leader at CEB, this barely scratches the surface of what’s possible.

“For me there are much loftier goals that we can work towards,” he says. “This technology can be an effortless collector of data which could enable organisations to do so much.”

Using the right algorithms, HR managers could greatly reduce the impact of workplace stressors, engagement obstacles and unconscious bias so that organisations can more accurately make informed decisions regarding appropriate work environments, task distribution, promotions, pay and overall performance.

“By using technology in this way, HR can

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Paying a debt to neuroscience, psychological ‘nudges’ will gently push people towards the right behaviours ensure greater and faster access to information about individuals and networks that can more accurately measure the true impact of employees on the business, rather than just relying mostly on managers or 360-degree viewpoints,” McEwan says.

Nudging towards greatness Fitness trackers have been very effective at

changing behaviours and doing so in a way that doesn’t require an intervention from a manager or coach: people simply get a kick out of hitting their step count. That feedback is immediate and (hopefully) a positive inducement to keep doing it.

Then there’s the ‘nudge’ factor. Paying a debt to neuroscience, psychological ‘nudges’ will gently push people towards the right

behaviours. McEwan cites an example in the UK. Rather than punishing people for not filing their tax returns on time, the government opted to use psychological ‘nudges’ to gently make them do the right thing. Another example comes from Norway.

Exiting the local subway system, commuters had a choice of stairs or escalator. Around 90% of people used the escalator and 10% the stairs. However, once the stairs were turned into an interactive piano keyboard, the usage rate flipped.

“What we’ve got are basic fitness trackers to give us these feedback loops around positive behaviours – whether it’s the number of steps taken or the number of times we

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FEATURES

TECHNOLOGY

PATTERNS, CONNECTIONS AND COMBINATIONS: ALGORITHMS IN ACTION When combined with the right algorithmic-based talent management platforms, wearables have the potential to change many elements of people management – but what are the ‘right’ algorithms?

“We have the same problem with big data: you’ll find what you go looking for. Often we develop a hypothesis and then go through the data. You’d be better off not going in with a preconceived notion of what the data is going to tell you. Instead, look at the right patterns, connections and combinations of variables. That’s what we mean by having the right algorithms in place.”

An outbound call centre, employing thousands of call centre operators, provides a case study. The company wanted to know what differentiated their high performers from their mediocre performers and whether it would be possible to predict who might become a high performer. Instead of creating ‘success profiles’ off the back of psychometric assessments of high performers, and then looking for the correlations between high performance and cognitive output, EQ, outputs, etc, algorithmic processing was tried. This meant looking for patterns in the résumés of all call centre operators.

The best predictor of high performance was a surprise: it turned out to be a background in the performing arts. “It makes sense in hindsight,” McEwan says. “These employees have to act all day, be flamboyant and interesting. The implication for that company was rather than outsourcing their entire operation to Manila, which was planned, they moved their operations 15km down the road and set up next to one of the country’s leading performing arts colleges where they had contingent workers on tap.” stand up from our desks each day. All these things can create certain conditions for high performance,” says McEwan. “Then you have the nudges as well. The Apple Watch is probably the closest to getting us using those types of nudges. There’s an app called ‘Breathe’, which prompts you to take a moment to take some deep breaths and relax.”

For McEwan, wearable technology is

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the “dark horse” which, when combined with algorithmic-based talent management platforms, “has the potential to change the landscape when it comes to engagement, performance and wellbeing”.

He believes wearables will be able to track workflow, as well as peaks and troughs of activity. They’ll also keep track of who employees are working with.

“Our research clearly identifies that more than 50% of performance is driven by their network – that’s how people contribute.

Wearables are also a way of understanding who the hubs are in the network and who are the people being drained. From there we can see how to spread that impact so we don’t overstress certain individuals.”

The other obvious use is when any type of survey is required, such as engagement, or any other process needs to be measured.

“I dream of a future where businesses don’t have to do that sort of survey; rather, employees contribute to that data set effortlessly and it’s just a matter of collecting it,” McEwan says. “For example, if I walk out of a particularly uninspiring meeting with my manager, I don’t have to tell anyone about it; we just know thanks to the data being collected by wearable technology. By aggregating that data we can see there are particular points or activities that are actively demotivating our staff and we don’t have to wait 12 months to find out.”

He cites an example of a large US retailer. The company was frustrated that the highest rates of staff turnover coincided with their busiest periods – ‘Black Friday’ sales, Christmas holidays, etc. They couldn’t determine why this was occurring and their engagement surveys did not reveal anything useful. An old-fashioned precursor to today’s Apple Watch – which allows the user to draw a smiley face on the watch face and send it to someone – provided the answer.

“Someone had the idea of getting every staff member as they clocked off their shift to write down whether they felt engaged, not engaged, disengaged, and drop it off anonymously on their way out,” McEwan explains. “Within a couple of weeks they’d identified what the problem was – it turned out there were several managers who weren’t allowing staff to change shifts directly with each other; they had to go through the manager.”

Of course, both examples – the unhappy retail workers and the employee dissatisfied with his meeting – required manual input from the employee. This too is changing.

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Right now, there are mobile apps that act almost like Tinder: you’re engaged or not engaged through a process or workflow or activity. While this all still relies on manual input, McEwan believes we’ll rapidly get to a point where heart rate, sweat levels, cortisone levels, blood pressure and biometric data will be picked up by sensors – and obviously the wearable technology will be less clunky than it is today.

Hurdles on the way to the future McEwan concedes that there are hurdles to clear before we get to the point where employees will readily agree to having technology attached to them that will gather information on behalf of and for their employer. “It’s pretty out there for us today

if it means they get the flexibility they desire.

If it means someone telling them that coming into work at 8am is not ideal for them and they’d be better off coming in at 10am, that’s only going to be beneficial to them.”

He adds that this is already occurring – Facebook, LinkedIn, even supermarkets and airline loyalty programs all thrive on the data collected about users. “Airline loyalty programs are the prime example,” McEwan says. “They are among the most advanced at collecting this data, at nudging our behaviours in gentle ways, and making it incredibly attractive to share that data. In return we get free flights, a higher level of service and treatment based on you as an individual. Employees want all of that too – convenience, work-life balance, and respect.

“I dream of a future where businesses don’t have to do that sort of survey; rather, employees contribute to that data set effortlessly and it’s just a matter of collecting it”

WEARABLES IN THE WORKPLACE: ARE EMPLOYEES READY? A PwC study of over 2,000 working adults in the UK found the following:

65% of employees

believe that technology has a real role to play in their health and wellbeing

61% of employees

are keen for their employer to take an active role in their health and wellbeing

38% of people

do not trust their employer to use the data they collect to benefit the employee

Aaron McEwan – it’s a bit sci-fi,” he says. “If I was a glass half empty person I’d be looking at the horribly scary dystopian future of Orwell.”

However, he believes that certain changes occurring at societal level will make this sharing of data more likely to occur.

Firstly, there’s the burning desire of employees for flexibility. While some employers have been slow to embrace this – possibly, according to McEwan, due to a fear that customer expectations won’t be met if flexibility is offered – there will come a time when refusing to offer flexibility won’t be an option.

Secondly, McEwan has seen evidence that millennials are much more inclined to give up their data if they get something for it (see boxout).

“If those two things coincide with the ability to manage big data and manage the associated privacy issues around it, employees will likely be willing to give that up – especially

If we can give those things to employees they will share their data relatively freely.”

A brighter future McEwan readily admits he is an optimist. He hopes for a ‘softer’ future, one that allows people to live the lives they want to and to feel enriched by their experiences. He adds that industrialised nations currently have the highest levels of depression, anxiety and suicide and the lowest levels of happiness and wellbeing.

“We’ve been continually putting the onus on individuals to fix that themselves; my belief is it’s our institutions that perhaps have the greatest role and responsibility – and maybe this is the way we get there. What I’m most interested in is the acceleration to that future whereby we can understand the conditions that create not just optimum performance but optimum human functioning.”

25% of people

who did not trust their employer would be willing to share their data if they were given an incentive, such as increased pay or flexible working hours

1 in 4 people surveyed would have a chip fitted to help them manage their lives – the chip would be used like a passport, in money transactions and as a health tracker

73% of millennials

believe their employer should be involved in their health and wellbeing. This age group is also the most likely to share data and use new technologies in the workplace

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FEATURES

MEDIATION

TURNING WIN-LOSE INTO WIN-WIN Disagreements between colleagues are part of corporate life. How can we manage conflict more effectively? Susan de Silva shares her tips

IF UNRESOLVED, conflicts can greatly drain office morale and productivity. On the other hand, workplace conflicts that are effectively managed can produce new ideas and innovations.

And that’s where mediation comes in.

Mediation is an informal method of dispute resolution that has been used to settle milliondollar claims between corporations and employees, as well as small tiffs between colleagues. The mediator is a neutral third party who guides the two sides towards a mutually beneficial resolution.

Here we focus on seven principles used by experienced mediators to show how you can be the mediator in your workplace.

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1

Revealing fundamental interests

Almost all disputes can be viewed in terms of positions and interests. A position represents someone’s stance towards the conflict. Interests are deeper needs and concerns.

For example, two managers both want the lion’s share of their company’s marketing budget. Peter’s position is that his business unit has proven itself and needs to sustain its position in a mature market. John argues that his new initiative has tremendous potential that can only be fully realised with aggressive marketing.

Mediators try to discover the underlying

interests and build a solution that will satisfy their needs once and for all.

Bonus tip: Look out for people who have a strong relationship with the conflicted parties, such as office friends or bosses. Do these third parties have interests and are they blocking a settlement?

2

Brainstorming possible solutions

Now, we are ready to brainstorm for options that can satisfy the interests of both sides. At this stage, let the parties raise as many options as possible without judging them.

Mediators like to think of solutions as ‘expanding the pie’. Imagine the benefits

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of a settlement as a pie that will be divided between the two sides. This pie is actually made up of contributions from both sides.

However, it is often also possible to creatively increase the shared benefits.

For example, the experienced Peter could mentor John’s team, or talented staff could be seconded to the other team to broaden their experience. Perhaps the two teams could collaborate on the big-budget items. They could even jointly appeal to upper management for increased skills-development opportunities.

to a Negotiated Agreement (WATNA) and Most Likely Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement (MLATNA) in comparison to the proposed settlement.

Bonus tip: Encourage parties to make suggestions, but advise them not to jump the gun by making promises at the brainstorming stage.

While it is only normal for parties to be anxious to end the argument quickly, this could result in a half-baked solution that is unclear and difficult to uphold. It is important for parties to go through the full mediation process.

In arguments where emotions run high, it’s easy to focus on what you are saying, rather than what the other party hears. This leads to misunderstanding.

It is important to paraphrase in neutral

3

Setting fair criteria for settlement

Everyone wants to be treated fairly, and they are more likely to agree to a settlement if they believe it is fair. The problem is that everyone has a different idea of what is fair.

Thus, we need an objective standard that both sides can agree with. Using objective criteria produces sensible, lasting agreements and enhances the working relationship between parties. By sticking to objective criteria, parties are able to rely less on bargaining and produce face-saving and justifiable results.

4

Considering alternatives to a settlement

When deciding whether to accept a mediated settlement, parties need to ask themselves what would happen if there was no settlement.

Alternatives are outcomes that do not require the cooperation of the other party. In a business dispute, common alternatives include going to court, or giving up on the case. In a workplace dispute, alternatives may include ignoring the other party, giving in, complaining to the boss, or even quitting.

A mediator will often ask parties to assess their Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement (BATNA), Worst Alternative

Bonus tip: Alternatives should only be explored in private when the other party is not present. The mediator can also ask each party to consider the other side’s BATNA in order to better appreciate the strength of the other side’s bargaining position.

5

Facilitating effective communication

incentive to cooperate, resulting in the collapse of both the short-term deal and the long-term relationship. The experienced mediator will encourage parties to deal with relationship and substantive issues independently. One common phrase heard in mediation is “to separate the people from the problem”. It is important for parties to know that it is in their best interest to set emotional baggage aside and consider the practical benefits of a settlement.

7

Securing commitment

The best time to craft commitments is after all interests of parties are understood, the options generated have been considered, the criteria for selecting fair terms have been agreed upon, and the parties have evaluated the proposed commitments with their alternatives. Before this

When deciding whether to accept a mediated settlement, parties need to ask themselves what would happen if there was no settlement language what is being said and seek clarification to ensure that everyone understands fully. The mediator should also encourage parties to show that they understand the other side’s point of view. This will enable each party to present proposals that the other side can accept.

6

Dealing with complex relationships

Often, parties in a dispute have a relationship that goes beyond the problem at hand. This could be a friendship gone sour, an old grudge or even envy. Such relationship issues can be easily mixed with substantive issues, which are the actual points of the dispute.

A common relationship obstacle is a bias that causes a party to react negatively to the other side’s conduct. As a result, the party loses sight of the substantive issues, and fails to focus on a mutually beneficial outcome.

Another frequently observed behaviour is for a party to hold a long-term relationship hostage in an attempt to extract shortterm substantive gains from the other side.

Unfortunately, this gives the other side little

is done, the mediator should discourage parties from making premature commitments.

The settlement should be put down in writing to provide a clear record of the terms of agreement. In the case of business conflict, this can serve as a binding contract that is enforceable by law. In a workplace argument, it would be wise to summarise the agreement in an email that can be referred to if the argument recurs.

Bonus tip: When groups or organisations are involved, ensure that the parties attending mediation have the authority to make a decision. Some mediations fail because a manager who didn’t attend the session finally vetoes the agreement.

Susan de Silva is a founding partner of ATMD Bird & Bird LLP and heads the Corporate and Commercial Group in Singapore. She is also a mediator trained at the Singapore Mediation Centre. SMC welcomes any queries about mediation, mediation training or selecting a mediator to assist with your workplace disputes. Get in touch with SMC at mediation.com.sg.

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PEOPLE

CAREER PATH

STEADINESS AMID CHANGE For eBay’s Klaus Duetoft, HR is a bridge between career stepping stones

1990

Klaus Duetoft studied for his HR degree while also working in the field in Australia’s public STUDIES BOTH sector at the Department of Industrial Relations, THEORY AND Employment, Training and Further Education.

PRACTICE “I was fortunate in that I was able to experience a number of public sector 1994 organisations before going into the private sector. Often people get hit by BEGINS CAREER; FINDS NORTH STAR the reality of an organisation that might not relate to the study; the real world Duetoft’s move from the public sector to the private, oftentimes application was invaluable.” a difficult conversion, was enabled by a hybrid OD/HR role at pharma Reckitt & Colman, an experience that had a formative effect on him.

1999 “It really showed me the importance of HR leaders having a very clear set of FINDS HIGH-TECH, FINDS HOME values, articulating them, and being disciplined around them. The North Star of When he joined 3Com Asia Pacific in a regional HR/OD manager role a set of values takes courage and ultimately that flows into the relationship you during the dot-com boom, Duetoft’s two years with the company were have with the company’s leaders.” spent in an almost constant state of restructuring and evolution.

“I deal well with change; I wanted to experience an incredibly fast-moving 2001 environment. The moment I got into the high-tech industry I thought, TAKES THE STAGE FOR ‘I’m home’. I walked from a safe sector into a cauldron of fire.”

MAJOR TRANSFORMATION

2003

GOES OUT ON HIS OWN Duetoft conferred with an executive coach and realised that one of his life’s dreams was to build a company. This led to the founding of Irrelach Consulting, where one of his first clients was up-and-comer eBay. “I noticed a window in the market for small to medium enterprises that wanted the same sort of advice, insight and capability as a larger organisation from an HR perspective but couldn’t afford it. eBay was my foundation client.”

Duetoft joined Vodafone as a senior HR business manager as the company embarked on a massive transformation in a competitive landscape. As part of the launch of the values-based initiative, Duetoft participated in a stage production that toured the Australian states.

“There was song and dance – it was like a concert selling the values and the kind of future we wanted to create. It was a great lesson in the importance of authenticity, and being able to stand in the moment and the light of the values.”

2008

JOINS EBAY FAMILY

2012

GETS HIS BREATH BACK

At the prompting of a mentor, Duetoft took some time off to spend with family to get his breath back. eBay subsequently created a role for him to ensure his retention: the MyHR role for the Asia-Pacific region. It was a development that took Klaus back to his days as a consultant.

“All the traits of a consultant I very much bought to my senior roles in HR; the parallel is that MyHR personifies this approach.”

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Duetoft joined eBay as regional senior HR director for the Asia-Pacific; key for him was the fact that the regional role had the option of being based wherever he wanted to be. Over the next five years Duetoft made over 300 business trips.

“I could see the impact that eBay could have on the world. These sorts of opportunities that truly make history are pretty rare. It was perfect timing to jump on board”

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PEOPLE

OTHER LIFE

THE KARATE CONSULTANT

For HR consultant and author Karen Gately, karate is not so much a sport as a way of life

WHEN FOUR-YEAR-OLD Karen Gately started begging her karate-teacher father to join him in his training sessions, she couldn’t have realised that the martial art would become a passion that she would pursue for 25 years and up to a ranking of third-dan black belt.

Indeed, karate dominated the life of the now-HR consultant as a youngster. Often Gately – who started taking lessons at age five – would go straight from school to the dojo that was the family business and do homework in-between lessons and sparring sessions.

She started teaching classes of children herself at the age of 13, before taking on classes of adult students at 15.

At age 14, she became the youngest black belt ever in the karate style Shukokai.

“I was a really grown-up kid. Martial arts teach you discipline and focus; in my teens people would think I was mid-20s.”

Gately met her husband – now a third-dan black belt himself – through karate and continued sparring through each of her pregnancies, so it is fitting that the martial art provided the framework for her first book, The Corporate Dojo.

“I studied HR to become a better people manager, and remember thinking, ‘What would I do in the dojo to get more out of these people?’

“I’ve drawn heavily from that background,” she says.

“It’s embedded in who I am. I literally don’t remember not doing karate.”

18

Age at which Gately started her own business as a karate teacher

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9,000

Estimated number of hours Gately has spent teaching

75

Age of Gately’s oldest student (the youngest was four)

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