HR Most Influential Strategic HR
HR Most Influential Hall of Fame
The HR Lifetime Achievement Award is the highest accolade
bestowed by HR magazine on an individual in recognition of their
outstanding and exceptional contribution to HR thinking or practice.
Winners take their place in the HR Most Infl uential Hall of Fame.
Valerie Hughes-D’Aeth, group HR director, BBC
There have been few higher-profi le HR jobs over the
past few years than heading up HR at the BBC.
People-related issues at the broadcaster have
regularly hit headlines, whether top talent pay
disclosures, China editor Carrie Gracie standing down
over a ‘secretive and illegal pay culture’, the Equality
and Human Rights Commission launching an
investigation over equal pay…
But Hughes-D’Aeth has weathered this all marvellously and in her
characteristic calm down-to-earth way. Yet her achievements since
joining in 2014 from support services fi rm Amey are anything but modest.
The introduction of a Career Path Framework with transparent pay
ranges has reduced 5,000 job titles to 600. The BBC has reduced its
gender pay gap by nearly a fi fth, from 9.3% in 2017 to 7.6% in 2018,
with the National Audit Offi ce reporting that this gap is ‘lower than the
national average and most other media organisations’.
By January 2019 it had reduced the number of senior managers by
46%, from 540 in 2010-11 to 245, and the senior management pay bill
by £24.5 million (38%), from £64.1 million in 2010-11 to £39.6 million. And
it has reduced its spending on all on-air roles. We could go on…
Hughes-D’Aeth has been a stalwart of the HRMI top three pretty much
since arriving at the Beeb. And so we’re delighted to award her this Hall of
Fame recognition as she leaves the BBC at the end of the year to pursue
a non-executive director portfolio career. She’ll no doubt achieve more
great things in the years to come.
Rob Briner, professor of organisational psychology,
Queen Mary University of London
When Rob Briner topped our HRMI thinkers list in 2016
he quipped that the ranking process must be highly
rigorous and evidence-based. And so it must be, as
he’s featured in our top fi ve ever since.
Topics he researches include wellbeing, emotions,
ethnicity, the psychological contract, absence from
work and motivation. Briner also writes and presents for practitioners and
is involved in a huge number of evidence-based HR initiatives.
His work on evidence-based HR will always be hugely relevant and
needed within the HR profession. And it’s impossible to imagine a time
when Briner is no longer generously dedicating huge amounts of time
and energy to ensuring HR practitioners understand what it’s all about
and how to embed this day to day.
This year seemed a fi tting time to celebrate his ongoing commitment
to championing and challenging the profession – particularly given that
his work has now been embedded at the heart of the CIPD’s new
Profession Map, launched in November 2018.
So evidence-based HR has very much ‘arrived’. And yet, even though
he’s reached the pinnacle of HRMI recognition and we’re ‘retiring’ him to
our Hall of Fame, we suspect Briner will continue to do much fantastic
work for many years to come.
pieces for Harvard Business
Review, The Guardian, Fast
Company, Forbes, the Huffington
Post and of course HR magazine.
“In an age of increasing
visibility of incompetent men in
leadership positions, Chamorro-
Premuzic’s latest publication and
ongoing work in this area become
all the more relevant as someone
who actively challenges our
mindsets around talent and the
dangers of personality,”
comments judging panellist and
founder of HR Hero for Hire
Shakil Butt.
Indeed such challenge yet
practical relevance is a defining
attribute of all those featuring
on this year’s thinkers list –
offering hope that HR
practitioners and thinkers will
strongly inform each other and
work in even closer partnership
well beyond 2019.
“A while back there was a lot of
criticism of HR being too navalgazing,
too academic, too
theoretical… So it pushed itself
to be more business focused and
commercial,” comments Strategic
Dimensions’ Caro. “Which is
all what HR should be doing;
but maybe in some circles it
lost a bit of focus on that strong
academic underpinning you do
really need.”
So HR practitioners and
thinkers alike take heed. There
may be even bigger challenges
coming over the horizon, with
ambiguity and uncertainty
potentially set to continue.
There has perhaps never
been such an important time
to work together on the big
issues of the day. Namely
ensuring organisations weather
economic storms through
creative, agile, talent- and techsavvy
operating models. But
all while keeping wellbeing,
diversity and inclusion,
ethical responsibility – and
most importantly humanity –
front and centre. HR
hrmagazine.co.uk October 2019 HR 23
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