If HR professionals are to meaningfully enable and drive innovation and strategic growth, they cannot sit around and wait for the opportunity. HR must demonstrate that it offers more than just processes and performance improvement plans and that it can drive commercial outcomes.

In this episode of The HR Leader Podcast, host Jerome Doraisamy speaks with bolttech group chief people officer Scott Austin about having worked in HR across jurisdictions and in different sectors, why he finds the work so interesting, the headline challenges HR teams are facing amid voluminous market change, setting HR up to leverage its strengths, shifting how HR is perceived, and why HR professionals cannot wait for permission to drive needed business changes.

Austin also delves into how he has been proactive, rather than reactive, about driving innovation and growth, why the onus is on HR to take the initiative, the nuances of fintech and insurtech that he’s had to adapt to, overcoming roadblocks to HR’s driving of change, being data-driven, why HR is transferable across any sector, and his predictions for the market moving forward.

In the age of AI, concerns remain that artificial intelligence is coming at the cost of genuine human interaction. Against this backdrop, it is incumbent upon HR teams and professionals to ensure that AI is both an enabler of business success and helps prevent the acceleration of disconnection or disenchantment in the workplace.

In this episode of The HR Leader Podcast, host Jerome Doraisamy welcomes back Cranlana Centre for Ethical Leadership ethicist and program director Dr Matt Beard to discuss the myriad ethical dilemmas and considerations in the workplace in the current climate, whether AI is accelerating concerns that human relationships are being sidelined in the post-pandemic world, whether businesses are cognisant of such concerns, and what he sees as the biggest challenges for ethics and culture in the workplace right now.

Beard also delves into the extent to which “scut work” needs to be done versus pivoting one’s service offering for clients, how HR can view its responsibilities to ensure that workplace culture is at an optimal level and human relationships aren’t suffering, how technology can be an enabler of workplace connection, and how optimistic he is that HR teams can drive forward their workplaces in the right ways.

Financial stress continues to put downward pressure on workplace productivity. As a result – and in the face of broader market challenges – ensuring financial wellbeing must be a key priority for the HR function at this critical juncture.

In this episode of The HR Leader Podcast, host Jerome Doraisamy speaks with MoneyGPS co-founder and chief executive George Haramis and Howden head of employee benefits Chris Sinclair and their respective businesses and partnership, the urgency of addressing financial wellbeing in the current climate, the issues employees are facing on the ground, and how workers across generations are facing unique financial challenges.

Haramis and Sinclair also delve into the need for employers to take a holistic approach to financial wellbeing, what HR teams need to be asking, the solutions that can and should be implemented to drive measurable impacts, practical strategies their businesses are implementing and offer to clients, and what they’re both looking forward to when it comes to improving financial wellbeing for the market.