This month in our HR Advisory practice we are recruiting for the following Advisory job roles:

• Senior Human Resources Advisor
• Senior Talent Acquisition Advisor
• Human Resources Business Partner
• Director of Human Resources
• Vice President of Total Rewards
• Senior Compensation Advisor

Interested? Please contact us to learn more at recruitng@fredericksonpartners.com.

We partnered with SquareTrade to hire Nicole Kelley-Rose as Vice President of People. Kelley-Rose will be responsible for the people function of the company’s North American business, including Employee Relations, Talent, Workplace, and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI). As a cultural champion she will lead team and cross-company initiatives to help the company build a strong culture as it grows. Kelley-Rose will also serve as a key member of the leadership team, setting people strategy and vision and innovating processes and programs to drive the business forward.

Kelley-Rose brings exceptional HR experience to SquareTrade. She most recently served as VP of Human Resources (HR) for CDK Global, the largest global provider of integrated information technology and digital marketing to the automotive industry. During her five years there, her other HR roles included Senior Director of HR and Director of HR. Kelley-Rose also held earlier positions as HR Manager for Sage and Floor Solutions, and HR Business Partner for Cessna Aircraft Company. She is a military veteran, having served for the United States Air Force as F-15 Crew Chief. Kelley-Rose holds a Master of Business Administration from Marylhurst University and a Bachelor of Science in Management and Human Resources from Park University, where she graduated summa cum laude.

Nicole, welcome to SquareTrade and congratulations!

We worked with Sama to recruit Molli Barnes as Vice President of Global People. In the role, Barnes will lead the organization’s global people strategy and deliver on their unique employee value proposition as a disruptive technology startup that drives measurable social impact. She will create a talent strategy to support Sama’s hypergrowth goals and elevates the organization’s employer brand to attract, grow and retain the people who are transforming how AI will advance humanity. Barnes will report to the company’s CEO Wendy Gonzalez as a critical member of the executive team, helping build and scale the global people team in Sama’s fast-paced, start-up environment.

Barnes’ exceptional HR experience includes a 13-year tenure at PATH, a global nonprofit organization, most recently as Chief People Officer, leading the organization’s global Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) strategy with a team of 40+ talented HR professionals across Africa, Asia and the United States. Other roles at PATH included Senior HR Director of Global Business Partners, Africa HR Director and Director of Global Talent Acquisition. Earlier she served at Heller Ehrman LLP as Senior HR Manager for 10 years. Barnes holds a Bachelor’s degree from University of Washington.

Congratulations Molli and welcome to Sama!

• Pelican Products, Inc. welcomed Fabienne Smolinski-Lopez as the company’s new Chief Human Resources Officer. Previously Smolinski served as Chief People Officer and Corporate Social Responsibility for Arbonne. She has held other HR leadership roles at The New Home Company Inc., Bausch & Lomb, Allergan, Fluor and TRW. (Announcement)
• Marqeta announced the appointment of Sunaina Lobo as Chief Human Resources Officer. Lobo joins from Navis where she served as Senior Vice President and Chief People Officer. Other roles she has held include Head of Talent Development for SVB Financial Group and Global HR leader at ANZ. Lobo worked at Cisco during an eight-year tenure in multiple HR leadership roles. (Announcement)
• Spirit Airlines Inc. appointed Linde Grindle as Chief Human Resources Officer. Grindle brings over 20 years of experience to Spirit, having most recently served at Optum as Chief Talent Officer. Previous roles include VP of Human Capital Partners at UnitedHealth Group, HR Manager at Cigna and Human Performance and Change Management Consultant at Accenture. (Announcement)
• Syntax welcomed Dessalen Wood as its new Chief People Officer. Wood joins Syntax from ThoughtExchange, recently serving as Chief People Officer. Her previous roles include VP of Talent Development for Cineplex Entertainment, Senior Director of HR for Airborne Entertainment and HR manager positions earlier in her career. (Announcement)
• The Aspen Group announced Jeri Doris as the company’s new Chief Human Resources Officer. Doris brings exceptional HR experience to The Aspen Group, recently serving as Chief People Officer and Chair of the Diversity Advisory Board for Delivery Hero. Earlier roles included Head of HR for Rakuten USA, Global HR Director for Groupon, and HR Business Advisor for Deloitte. (Announcement)
• Tradeshift welcomed Marissa Mattson as Chief People Officer. Mattson joins from Amazon Web Services (AWS) where she was HR Director of AWS Global Infrastructure and Customer Support. Prior to AWS, Mattson has held various HR leadership roles including VP of HR for Honeywell. (Announcement)
• Pegasystems announced Katherine Parente as its Chief People Officer. Parente brings over 20 years of HR global experience to Pegasystems, recently as Senior VP of HR at FactSet. Her earlier roles include VP of People at Axiom, Director and Global Head of Total Rewards at ITG, and Compensation Benefits Manager for Texas Instruments. (Announcement)
• Diageo has announced the promotion of Louise Prashad to Chief Human Resources Officer. Prashad has been at the company for 20 years, previously as Global Talent and Organizational Effectiveness Director. Other roles she has held within Diageo include Global Talent Director, HR Director – Europe and Talent Development Manager. (Article)
• Moody’s welcomed Maral Kazanjian as Chief People Officer. Kazanjian brings exceptional experience in employee relations and talent management, with her most recent role as Chief People Officer at WeWork. Previously Kazanjian was at Moody’s for an 11-year tenure, holding different HR roles from Assistant General Counsel to Managing Director of Employment Law and Employee Relations. (Article)

In January I wrote about Gartner’s survey of HR leaders’ top priorities for 2022. This month we asked two Chief People Leaders about their priorities. Both recently took over HR leadership at fast-growing, emerging companies.

Question: What are your top HR priorities in 2022 for your organization?

My prime concern as People Leader, just coming into a rapidly growing organization, is making sure that we have solid foundations in place to scale, including the right people-related tools, training, benefits and onboarding.

A couple of the priorities of top HR leaders in the Gartner report will be very important to me in 2022 also. The first is building a foundation for leadership development, so our leaders are equipped to support both existing employees and new folks coming in rapidly. Some may have had leadership experience before, but now will be leading or coaching new leaders. What skill sets do they need to do that effectively? As we scale, we’ll ask people who haven’t led teams to do so. How do we identify that next round of leaders and give them opportunities for growth so they’re confident and excited to move into those roles?

A second top priority is making our employees central in everything we do, in our benefits, recognition programs, and new ways to take care of our teams. We value a high-performance culture while also supporting the physical, social and mental well-being of employees. We’re also growing into this hybrid work environment, and maintaining a high trust, high autonomy culture in a distributed team will take focus. Related to that is promoting a sense of inclusion and belonging as we grow, especially with new employees who have never worked together, and are in different places and time zones.

For me the top HR priority and common thread goes back to how our leaders show up and perform for our employees. The people team will provide them the training and tools that they need to successfully lead their teams, with empathy and with that human person in mind.

We have 3 top priorities for the next 6 months.

FinancialForce is in growth mode and in order to meet our hiring plans, we’re building a comprehensive employer brand that showcases the company strength – in everything from our amazing culture, global outreach and leadership team to the opportunity for new employees to learn and make an impact on the IPO journey.

The next big task is to establish an employee value proposition (EVP) that showcases programs for retention, global benefits, our learning and development strategy and incredible culture. We’ll also establish an annual engagement survey and NPS evaluations for our employees to feed information back to us. And we’ll be clicking into diversity, equity and inclusion in the spirit of connecting our employees in a closer way with each other.

Our third priority will be automating and enabling our systems as we scale for IPO. We have different individual systems and would like to implement a more sophisticated human capital management system to analyze our data, automate our processes and increase their efficiency.

So there’s a lot to do, and it’s great that in early days our people team has established our vision and are aligned on the priorities.

My top priority will be our employee value proposition.

At the end of the day, we’re only as good as our people. We have uniqueness in our strong leadership, products, programs and benefits. Our opportunity is to string it all together to tell that story outward, in a way that connects with people on a human level. People are longing for a connection with their business, with colleagues, with the world. Companies that have strength in their programs and culture will find it easier to create that story for people to read about, understand and hook into.

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