Angus MacGregor is the Head of Global HR at MUFG Bank. He has been in senior HR roles for 16 years, having started his career as a solicitor. Angus moved into Human Resources in the banking sector in 2006, with Barclays Bank.

How do you feel that the workplace and working styles have changed post-pandemic?

We are not quite out of the pandemic. Thinking globally, I have travelled around most parts of the globe, so I have seen it in action. The major change is absenteeism in the office; there’s generally lots more space. I’ve been able to see about 15 different countries in Asia, Americas and EMEA, and the common theme is there’s a lot less people in the office: it’s an obvious statement that’s happening everywhere.

Employers and employees are currently both trying to work out the most efficient and productive way of working, rather than just focusing on compliance or safety. So, it’s moved to trying to benefit the firm around getting the right balance.

I don’t think it has worked itself out yet; a range of employees are adjusting to how they want to work, which requires time and discussion.

I think the workstyle change will move to less office time. This will include using the office more effectively and “selling” it as a place to come and brainstorm, have on-the-job training, and the necessary social interactions. Sometimes, it will be a requirement to be in the office to get something done, for example, a transaction.

I think it will work itself out into a range of full-time, hybrid and remote for most workers in most businesses. However, there’ll be stresses when individuals make demands which are different from the company’s requirements - a gap between what the employee thinks and what the employer thinks - and that will be assessed by performance and outputs. That is very difficult to measure, because most jobs are a discretionary effort and quality of product.

The last comment I’d make is about travel appetite. It is currently quite low - I’m referring to international travel predominantly. You would think that lots of people want to jump on a plane, but I think a lot of those trips are now seen as not necessary and the worker feels that they probably don’t need to make the trip, because they can do it remotely. Add to this that it's currently very expensive to travel. Obviously, there are certain trips that are required, but they are either revenue-based, risk-based or control-based, rather than about engendering purpose and engagement.

The main worry I have is about levels of engagement and purpose of workforce, because - if there’s not something positively done to address - it won’t manage itself. Like before, we all came to work and engaged with each other in various ways; now it’s more disparate and people have got to have active strategies to engage with other team members.

In terms of the role of leadership, I think a lot of people have managed remote working in some sense, but some people found it quite difficult, so I think the big element is trust. New training will come out over the next few years, such as “productive hybrid” management. This training needs to find a way to discern between (say) two employees' performance and adjudge fairly who is the better employee over time for promotion.

We are respecting local management and local teams as to what they require, and I think the sense is there is an importance of the office, but it is about articulating that in the local market. Currently, people are still not certain about returning to the office, and it is a mixture of concerns for their safety and current remote working being perfectly suitable in the situation, from the employee perspective.

How do you think the HR function and the wider discipline is likely to evolve if we fast forward five or ten years? What does the function look like and how does it serve its purpose for the business?

COVID has put it further up the corporate pecking order, no doubt.  

I think, over time - let’s say ten years - most businesses of size should have reasonable systems, digitalisation and probably some robotics within their HR services. So, all the services of payroll, plus anything required for the employee, should be self-service and usable by most levels in the organisation.

You will get fewer “dinosaurs” at the top who will want their HR person to do their admin, but I think - supposing you get the systems pieces right - then you must get into what I would like, which is basically the strategic advisory OD markets like that, but stick to your guns and your judgment. I just quite like listening to him and he’s done extremely well from lowly beginnings.

Then, there’s a woman – again, I won’t name her - she was my first HR mentor. She basically took me in at Barclays and said, “Why don’t you come and work in HR?”. She said to me, “I think you could do this job.” A lot of the time, I buy into the person, and her work ethic was just unbelievable.

Her time management, her approach to work, but also, she would go “deep”, and she knew how to work a long day, but she did it in a way that was positive, and was very data-driven and analytical about her decision-making. The significant bit - her focus actually - when she was talking to me, I was the only guy in the room: “What do you think about this?” and I’d give an answer. There was no distraction; that’s quite a skill to be at that level - she’s got 110 things on - so I tried to bring that skill into my job.

Are there any books, podcasts, blogs that you particularly enjoy that you could recommend?

I listen to quite a lot of podcasts, and I also read quite a bit. There’s a guy I’m really into now called Tim Ferriss. Basically, he interviews people. He’s done about 600 now. He’s a 42-year-old American, he’s semi-famous, as he wrote the 4-Hour Work Week, which distils down how you can do your job effectively in four hours, and the content is very good.

The podcast that I’m listening to now is on the three brains, which is basically your brain, your heart, and your stomach are all brains; they’ve all got brain cells and they all operate as a brain, and he was just talking about how you manage those three, so that’s quite interesting.

There are two books that I’d recommend to everybody. One is Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink. Gladwell writes a lot of stuff on psychology, mostly personal work, and Blink is about taking a short-term view and then a long-term view and acknowledging your gut reaction. The last one is Think Again by Adam Grant. The basis around that is changing your mind and why that’s not a bad thing. It’s quite good to dip into those books.

Thank you to Angus for speaking to Katie Insley, Associate Director in our HR recruitment team in the Netherlands. 

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment. 

Faraz Naseem Syed is the Europe Head of Commercial Finance – eComm & Omni Retailers at Unilever, having joined the organisation as Europe FP&A Controlling Lead – Logistics & Supply Chain. He previously spent over ten years at A.P. Moller, as Senior Manager – Corporate FP&A.

Within your career, I can see that you were given some good opportunities to travel and experience different countries. Can you tell me a little bit about how you adapted to, not only different cultures, but the change in diversity of your roles?

Yes, I’ve been lucky in the sense that, within APM Maersk specifically, they had great emphasis in giving global exposure to the key talent. I particularly chose China because I was interested in that part of the culture, along with experiencing the fastest growing economy in the world. Plus, if you're any sizeable global company, it's imperative that you will have a large footprint in China. So, this is a good experience to have under your belt.

One of the things I realised when moving to a new country was that you need to adopt to the ways of working and cultural business practises in that country, even if it's within the same company, it also has a lot of local influences. One thing that helped me was having a cultural mentor and I also tried to make some local friends - from my work and outside - and that helped me speed up learning about how things work.

So, you have to stay humble and respectful, adapt to local norms and culture, and work on fostering work relationships.

I know from our previous conversations that you’re passionate about making Finance more digital-savvy and data-driven. What have you implemented that you’ve found to be most effective and why do you feel it's so important in the Finance world today?

In one of the recent McKinsey CFO reports, they noted: "Finance organization’s adoption of digital is more common at the best-performing companies."

In one of my recent roles, I had a team of eight Finance Analysts and Managers. They're all quite smart, but large part of their time was spent on preparing monthly and quarterly reports, different performance review decks - so a lot of manual content. That left them very little time for driving performance-driven conversations with the stakeholders.

That’s where we decided to do a bit of reset and to bring in some technology to help us, as well. Started with the simplification of our reporting landscape by culling 20-30% of regular management reports based on their usage and effectiveness. We used data visualisation tools, like Power BI, to automate the maximum numbers of our standard reports and leaned on robotics and AI to automate certain accounting and workflow management tasks.

We co-created this with our stakeholders and used agile ways of delivering and running iterations. Eventually, we managed to release about 50% of the capacity within the Finance team and this unlocked more time for business partnering for our Finance teams.

What do you think are the skills that helped you adapt as a Finance professional to partner with functions from Technology to Logistics to Retail?

As a commercial-minded Finance leader, I feel that having sound business acumen helps to succeed with your business stakeholders. Understanding competitive landscapes of your industry, value drivers for your business, having a view on potential disruptions and innovations can help you earn the seat on the table with business leaders.

Secondly, the art of storytelling. Often, you're working on a project for two or three months, but you must present the whole story to the board in 30 minutes. While you need to know the details, you need to also tell a story in a way that you can sell the idea to get this business case signed off, keeping the numbers simple enough so that they can also understand it, and key decision-points clear enough for the leadership to act.

That's a skill which I think, as a Senior Finance professional, is a very important art to master.

What would you say is the most rewarding part of your role?

I think the most rewarding part is being able to experiment and try new things. This means looking at things from a fresh perspective. I personally believe that moves between divisions within a company or across companies gives you a bit of an opportunity to look at things from a fresh pair of eyes. And, if you have the mandate and bring enough experience, then you can also reset a few things and experiment around it. That’s something which I enjoyed generally in my roles.

How can a jobseeker stand out in the current market?

My perception is, right now, the market is favouring employees and they have lots of options. That's good for certain people who are looking for those career growth opportunities or to challenge themselves in a different environment.

One of the key things is to be clear on why you are going for that particular job in that particular company. Do your research well and have the answer of how this job fits in your career trajectory. So, you come across not just a casual job-hopper, rather someone who knows what he/she is doing.

Opportunity to work in different industries and geographies also adds breadth and depth to your career. Something I advocate strongly.

Do you think, from your experience, learning the company culture and adapting to that change is almost more difficult than doing the role?

Yes, I think especially for senior roles. I read an HBR article that said a lot of people who were superstars in a certain company, but then when they move to another company, they often struggled. And one of the key reasons was because they're starting over, having no network within new the company or understanding about inner workings.

Then it’s important to quickly learn the ways of working within that new company, understanding stakeholder map, key decision-makers and how the structure really works. It’s very helpful to work with an internal mentor who has a vested interest in your success.  

What are the recruitment challenges that you're facing, if any?

Overall, the market is quite competitive. It's also difficult to hold on to good resources, because they can easily move on if they are not happy with one thing or another, so that is a challenge as a manager, as a company.

Specific to our particular team and in terms of profile, I think, personally, I prefer Finance professionals who are also data savvy, because I think it's good to have the Accounting base - that's something you need as a Finance professional - but you need an affinity for data and technology, especially if you're starting a career in Finance. Because often we are working very closely with Data Scientists, which was not common many years ago. And more and more Finance professionals are expected to be familiar with basic SQL or Python to help with massive data-crunching efficiently.

What would you say is the best compliment that you've ever received?

As part of the recruitment process at APM Maersk, they used to have a psychometric assessment. That had a strong say in which function you’d be most suited. And the output described me as someone who is sociable, pushing boundaries, resilient and influencing. Even though it was a personality assessment, I took it as a compliment!

Thank you to Faraz for speaking to our Finance recruitment team in the Netherlands, led by Hannah Mallia and David Harper.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment. 

Casper Zorg is a senior HR professional based in Amsterdam. He is currently an Interim HR Executive/PMO at HR Advance, having previously been VP Human Resources at AEG Power Solutions and EMEA HR Director for Hoya Vision Care.

What was the best interview experience that you have had to date?

The best interview experience that I’ve had was very early on in my career. I remember the interview at the time was with a Dutch HR Director. He was very much focused on my areas of strength and weakness and my personal interests within the HR field. I guess that had to do with the fact that I didn’t really have much work experience at the time - maybe two or three years in total - so there wasn’t very much to dig in there, which meant it became a broader conversation around what I was interested in focusing on.

It was my first step into the international HR field, so it was quite a broad role with various projects in a number of countries. It was quite a diverse role to begin with and a good role to start a career with.

Out of all the positions you have held over your career, which position excited you the most?

I would have to say Global Mobility Manager. It’s a position where a lot of different things come together. From a content perspective, you have a legal and a compliance side relating to employment contracts, visas, permits, that kind of thing.

It also puts into play Comp & Ben in multiple countries, migrating a person from country A to country B. That’s a comparison that goes beyond your standard salary and bonus, also looking at tax climates, things like that. And then there are also the cultural differences, moving someone from Brazil to Vietnam, for example. So, there are a lot of different HR elements in that context that come together.

What changes have you seen to the employment market in the Netherlands over the years and, in your opinion, what have been the drivers for the changes?

In the 15 years that I have spent in my career, there have been a couple of macro developments that have really shaken the employment market in the Netherlands.

I remember, when I started my career, we had a credit crisis - companies were restructuring in difficult economic times. Right now, we are in opposite times, where we have a shrinking labour market in western countries, combined with a decreasing interest to work with your hands - that presents challenges for companies in specific sectors.

It goes beyond the war on talent; it’s kind of “social status-driven”. People nowadays are more and more driven by the title they hold and the salary they earn, and that just means that working with your hands is not sexy anymore.

Looking ahead to the next five years or so, what we will also see is a concerning and profound discussion that I’m expecting will take place in the Netherlands - and probably in Western Europe as a whole. There is a very strong increase in convenience - or middleman jobs. There are a lot of people these days who get groceries delivered and order everything online, meaning there is a lot of workforce consumed in the convenience area and, at the same time, we have increasing shortages in what I would call critical occupations like nurses, teachers and probably transportation.

I expect that, in the next five years or so, we will see some societal discussions on how we can refocus the labour force.

What risks have you taken throughout your career and how did they help you get to the level that you are at today?

I’ve chosen my career steps quite specifically, focusing on getting the experience and the knowledge in different fields of international HR. So, HR project management is a great starting point, because you get involved in a whole range of HR topics and aspects, performance management, Comp & Ben development… From there, I specifically moved to Comp & Ben, which was mainly driven by the fact that there’s quite a high demand for that.

The natural step from there was global mobility to get the legal/compliance side, the contract set-up, and get that knowledge, and then the leadership experience. I guess in all those positions, I’ve taken a fair chunk of risk in the sense that I didn’t really have the knowledge and background at the time for those roles, but I basically decided that I would work for the experience and knowledge up to my 30^th, and later on for the money. Up until my 30^th, I would say that I spent probably ten to 15 hours a week to gain the knowledge and capabilities that I needed to perform my current job well.

The fundamental question in building your career is whether or not you are willing to spend personal time to increase your knowledge and capabilities. More than once, I have had people ask if I could make a certain amount of time available to teach people how to become proficient with Excel and other skills, and I am always willing to do that… between 5pm-7pm; outside of work time. Interestingly enough, about 80% of people are then no longer interested, because they don’t want to spend personal time building their capabilities; they want to spend company time.

What is your favourite business motto and why?

I have a favourite motto, which is actually hanging in my bedroom. Not necessarily a business motto, but it’s a big plaque that just reads, “Life starts at the end of your comfort zone.”

Throughout my career, I’ve had many tips and advice on what I should or shouldn’t do but, ultimately, of course, you need to assess that for yourself.

There were two in particular that stood out for me. One is, work until age x for the experience and thereafter for the money. If you want to bump up your salary earlier, you need to be aware that you will face higher expectations, which means you will no longer be that star talent, because, if you’re paid as a professional, you are expected to act as a professional.

Advice that I remember from my very first job was from the CFO. He recommended that, whenever someone asks you if you’re willing to pick up a certain challenge, first say yes and then consider what you just said yes to. That kind of attitude will automatically push you to take on challenges that are outside of your comfort zone, which will give you the strongest learning curve ultimately.

What advice would you give to aspiring HR leaders?

The best advice I can give is to not go over people’s backs. I have seen too many people elbowing their way to senior positions - it never really works well; you leave a trail of bodies behind. Certainly, for an aspiring HR leader, I think authenticity and the people side are ultimately the most important.

People will naturally know if you’re authentic and if you’re honest. Some people are born with it, most people learn it, but I would say authenticity is probably the biggest asset that you have as an HR leader.

What do you feel the future of HR is?

That’s a very difficult question, because I think the role and the profile of HR as a function has constantly changed and is always changing. I remember when I started my career in difficult economic times, HR was focused on process improvements, restructuring, business transformation, and - as such - was very internally focused.

With the current labour market, the focus is much more on recruitment, onboarding, and on retention, to a large extent, so we see that HR professionals will then automatically be more externally focused.

So, HR kind of follows the macro trends, what is happening in the bigger world, in the country, or maybe even beyond that, and then align our HR perspective accordingly. It depends on the company, the macro situation. This is the interesting thing about HR in general; its’s a bit fluid. The focus is different everywhere and it’s changing all the time.

For the last ten to 15 years or so, we had a pretty profound focus on HR as a business partner; transforming HR functions from administrative payroll/contracts departments into more of a business partnering component. Some people are capable of doing that and some people are not, but that was the worldwide focus, I would say.

The last couple of years, HR is more focused on digital transformation, getting HR systems up and running. I think most companies, by now, have implemented those digital platforms or are currently in the process of finalising that.

Now, we have Web3 and blockchain technology coming up, which is also going to present some interesting developments from a systems perspective. The whole internet and HR systems are moving away from the standard server systems towards a decentralised blockchain storage. That presents some interesting opportunities. When we work for a company, they will have an HR system that will contain a lot of information that you would put in there to create your own profile and, once you start storing that in a blockchain and follow the Web3 development, you would be able to transfer those records between employers, meaning you can build a lifetime profile and better align with the lifetime phasing that everybody goes through. This just serves as an example to indicate that change in one movement can step over into another.

Thank you to Casper for speaking to our HR recruitment team in the Netherlands, led by Katie Insley.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment. 

Sumit Chaudhary is the CFO, EMEA at Foot Locker in the Netherlands. His career has spanned the Big 4, telecoms, travel and FMCG sectors, in countries such as India, the UAE and the UK.

How do you see the Dutch economy evolving over the next five years?

As per recent publications, the expectation is that the Dutch economy in 2022 will grow anywhere between 3-3.5% and about 1.5% next year. Private consumption will continue to support growth and unemployment continues to remain low.

Having said that, the Netherlands is not isolated from the larger impact of the Ukraine war and the inflationary pressures that we are seeing. The Dutch economy drives strength from strong infrastructure that makes it the gateway for Europe.

The work environment is stable and flexible, the work force is well educated, and it continues to be a preferred destination for companies to open their offices. So, I remain very bullish about the future of the Dutch economy - the inflation is a blip, but I think there’s definitely a lot more in store for the Dutch economy.

What do you see as the biggest challenges over the next 12 months in your role as CFO, EMEA at Foot Locker?

If I step back and really look at the biggest challenges over the next 12 to 18 months, what I am going to say is probably not unique to Foot Locker. I think every CFO is probably juggling with the same set of challenges.

Probably three. One is really managing and maintaining talent. The war for talent has never been more intense. A hybrid work environment has created challenges in terms of how you pivot from historical norms of engaging with teams to a hybrid world. So, continue to find ways to invest in talent and your colleagues, and keep them motivated to bring their best to work every day.

The second is managing uncertainty - continuing to manage through the compression and margins and profitability created by inflation. Economic uncertainty is just one big challenge that every CFO or CEO is facing today.

And finally, another element which I do not think is unique is that every board, every business leader is now stepping back and asking the question: how do I stay ahead of the game? The challenge for the CFO, or for me, is to be able to balance being strong on governance and being strong as a strategic advisor to the business team and being able to answer questions. The duality between how you invest for growth versus get fit for growth - I think that’s a continuous challenge.

Having worked across multiple continents and within a diverse market sector, including the Big 4, telecoms, travel and FMCG, what risks have you taken throughout your career to help you get to the level you are at now?

Stepping back, I think three things. One is that you have to be comfortable to make yourself uncomfortable - I think that’s the only way to drive progress. Having been born and brought up in a small city in India and pushing myself to step out of India and work across geography, you have to be comfortable to make yourself uncomfortable.

Second is to be proactive in your work environment and asking for challenges; sometimes you will fail, but - more often than not - that’s going to open a lot more doors for you.

Finally, be willing to make mistakes, but acknowledge that you have made a mistake and learn from that. Vulnerability and honesty, if you bring that to your workplace every day, you will definitely find that doors are opening for you.

What is the most rewarding part of your role?

As a leader, my goal is to ensure that I create the right environment for my team to excel. So, essentially, building upon that, the most rewarding part is to see the impact of the work my team does and also, when colleagues reach out and stop by, acknowledge that. That’s the only momentum one needs as a leader, because that’s all you do as a leader - you’re there to remove roadblocks.

In your opinion, how can leaders create diverse teams?

I would probably say two things. One is it really starts with being deliberate and intentional about talent acquisition, working in partnership with your HR teams; really ensuring that there is a healthy mix of talent that we bring onto our teams.

The other key is cognitive diversity, which basically says that, as a leader, you need to take the lead to build the inclusiveness in all our processes, in all our engagements, ensuring everyone gets a voice. I think that’s the only way one can truly build a diverse team and make sure everyone feels included and their voices heard.

What advice would you give to aspiring leaders?

I would probably repeat some of the advice I have received along the way. I have been blessed to have a lot of good mentors who can help me. Three things stand out for me. One is give your best to the job you’re doing; nothing speaks more than your performance.

Number two is to be proactive and asking for opportunities. Take charge of your career growth; no one else will canvas for you, so you have to take charge of your career growth.

The third thing is always seek and appreciate when someone gives you feedback. I used to take feedback very harshly, but then I realised over time that, if someone is giving me feedback, they are investing in me and they are investing in my growth. So, just having the humility to listen to feedback, internalise it and work upon it, I think that’s a big key to success.

What is your favourite business motto and why?

That will be: answer every question and question every answer. Again, the work we do, as leaders or as professionals that work in the office, is really to make progress. To make progress, you have to answer questions and then, once you get an answer, you do not have to be happy with the answer you get, because that’s being happy with the status quo. Innovation happens only when you challenge the status quo. So, it’s a very interesting mechanism, but answer every question and question every answer.

In addition, if I look back to my journey, I have been blessed with having a lot of mentors. Not all of them have actively coached me; some I have viewed from a distance and learnt from them. It is hard work, dedication and bringing yourself to work every day, I think that really is the key to success.

Thank you to Sumit for speaking to our Finance & Accountancy recruitment team in the Netherlands, led by Hannah Mallia and David Harper.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment. 

Chris Wallace is a senior Supply Chain leader within biopharma. His expertise is focused on building high performing teams and leading supply chains for groundbreaking areas, such as cell and gene therapy.

What have you learnt as a leader over the past 12 months?

The key thing for everyone, let alone a leader, is that you never stop learning. I think what the pandemic did was bring home the need for any leader to be very adaptable to the environment. And that environment was something that was not in our normal span of control; it was something that, despite the best efforts with our politicians, could be either worse or better through reasons that were way beyond our control.

I think one of the key things around that adaptability, as a leader, was making sure that you could obviously do the best you can, but - because the environment was so different - understanding that often it was the case of doing the best you can out of a series of suboptimal choices. You had to make the best of a bad job, try and make the alternative that you had work as best you can, knowing full well that when (if you can call it that) normality returns, that you are going to have to revisit it, revamp it, and so on.

It was the immediacy of having to do something and also keep the understanding of where you wanted to continue to go. You could not lose that vision and insight needed to adapt that solution further.

You saw that, in the initial days of the pandemic, with things like freight capacity. I can remember one incident where I was being asked to do things in a particular market and there just weren’t any drivers - there were none available, and it didn’t matter who you asked as a supplier, you couldn’t get any. So, we came up with a different methodology and different way of doing it. We had to really think differently and be incredibly adaptive to the situation. Acceptance was not an option, otherwise we would let our patients down, some who were seriously ill.

Towards the end of the pandemic period, we saw the shutdowns in China, which again impacted supply chains hugely and, again, leaders had to adapt to that situation. It was not something where they could pick up the phone, for example, lambast the supplier and get something organised as an alternative. It was a necessity to do what you could within the space and the environment that you had.

In terms of mentoring more junior people in their early careers, how could they have learnt to be adaptable through COVID?

I think it’s more of the same, albeit, obviously, it can be at a different level, but always be thinking and trying to adapt for that situation. One of the key things that I saw, certainly in my team, was the impact of being expected to do A and B and they couldn’t, for whatever reason. They either had to stop, rethink, reassess, reset and, again, most people rose to the challenge magnificently.

I’ve never seen Supply Chain have such a high profile. Part of that was obviously the media frenzy that went with the pandemic, but I think also more junior members of staff did the same adaptation; they started to look at alternative ways of doing things, challenged some of the status quo, which of course was no longer relevant in terms of that particular supply, because of some of the things that did happen with COVID.

What would you say were the bigger challenges for leaders overseeing remote teams?

I’ve run international teams for some time - the basics don’t go away. Yes, we’ve got the technology of Teams, Zoom, etc. - at least when they work, they’ve made things easier - and clearly you can connect with remote teams much more easily.

However, you need to retain that critical personal touch and that can take many forms. As a leader, you need to make yourself available, you need to have your team understanding what is essential, i.e., you don’t want phone calls as a norm at three in the morning, wherever you are. But, in an international organisation across multiple timezones, you need to be incredibly flexible with your availability. Being based in Europe, that means sometimes you have to have early starts if you’re dealing with Asia, late finishes if you’re dealing with the Americas, but you need to be flexible and available to do that mentoring and coaching to develop your team.

I would also add, inevitably, cultural factors come into play. As you know, certain geographies tend to start early, finish early, or work late or whatever it might be, and you, as the leader, need to be aware of that and adapt to it accordingly. It isn’t a one-size-fits-all – that will never work. Instead, you have to get under the skin of your team members and understand what drives them, what motivates them and, bluntly, also what turns them off.

You don’t want your best performers to become demotivated. Your job, as a leader, is to keep that motivation high and also maintain that excellence that you want from your team members.

If you look through your career, the vast majority of it has been within the life sciences sector, more specifically, pharmaceuticals. What would you say to candidates who are considering a move into this sector for the first time?

Like a lot of people – dare I say of my vintage - I fell into Supply Chain by accident. It wasn’t something I’d particularly planned as a career move. I don’t regret it, as I love it; it has that incredible variety! No day, sometimes no hour, or even half-hour, is the same.

You also have so many touchpoints across the business, that you’re really integrated into all of those workings. And I suppose, lastly, you also see the fruit of your labours with the actual delivery of a drug to a patient for their successful treatment and hopefully cure.

I think one of the things I would say is that medicine is changing quite dramatically. As we know, there are major advances in life science and healthcare. We’re seeing the rise of personalised medicines that will continue. Supply chains are having to be developed to support all of that, which is quite exciting. There will be tremendous opportunities in the future and my comment to anybody coming into the industry is to go for it, because it’s a very exciting time.

Other industries have traditionally led the way in Supply Chain development. If we look back 25/30 years ago, automotive led the way with just-in-time and sequencing and things like that. Life sciences tended to be very conservative and has been slower to develop its life science processes in the same way that other industries have, but I think it’s getting there.

I think, also, a lot of the new generation of software is acting as a great enabler to that. Obviously, we haven’t touched on things like artificial intelligence, but it’s clearly on its way, and I see things like that having a huge impact in the whole of the life sciences sector.

What is it like having worked in cell and gene therapy?

Developments in personalised medicine are obviously exciting and those trends - without question, as we just touched on - are accelerating. Around 2019, there was a review of approvals at the FDA medicines and generics where bulk was king. This high volume lent itself to a lot of automation in things like warehousing and so on, which clearly are inappropriate for the personalised medicine space.

I can foresee certainly a lot more developments in that. But are we, as an industry, geared up to do that now? I don’t think we are. The different players in the industry, such as logistic service providers, are going to have a huge role to play in that. I see those supply chains that may be under the same umbrella of management, but being managed separately.

You already see the dichotomy in some of the bigger players, who will maintain their traditional warehouse network with bulk movements of goods and then local distribution to support that, versus this kind of highly specialist sub-sector. I think that sub-sector will of course become more mainstream as the industry ramps up to that and people get more used to it.

We are already seeing a real drive to treat the patient at home, which reduces the cost of those treatments, but what it can mean is extra demands upon the supply chain. If, for example, the patient is being treated in the afternoon, the product therefore can only arrive in that narrow window just beforehand. Evidence suggests, sadly, with the best will in the world, that patients are not particularly good at looking after their medicines when they arrive at home - they don’t follow the instructions - so we have to be very careful around that. However, do I see a greater number of treatments taking place in the home? Yes, I do. That clearly is going to require a very different delivery model for companies and the logistic service providers to support that.

There are also other side factors, and this is where there is a debate in the supply chain of our industry. Some say hospitals will become accident and emergency centres and really not much more than that for mainstream treatments. They will become specialist centres and many patients will be treated at home. However, some evidence suggests that, particularly rare disease patients who are often feeling very isolated by the very nature of their disease and treatment if they’re not common, actually like the interaction with their medical professionals, other disease sufferers, and support groups, and they actually want that personal interaction, which they can only achieve by being in a medical centre. It is going to be a series of interesting developments there. You’ve got a whole maelstrom of things that could or could not happen - it’s an exciting time.

In terms of the start-up environment, what do you think is the most important personality attribute for that environment?

I think it’s linked to one of your earlier questions - it’s that adaptability. In start-up environments, you have to get stuck in and you have to get your hands dirty. It is, however, a question of balance; you have to perhaps do things that can be occasionally considered menial, but it’s essential they get done and, in a start-up environment, there are often no alternative resources to do that.

I think there is that element of uncertainty in terms of what’s going to happen and what you need to do compared with the order of things in a more mature environment. However, you have to retain that focus and strategic perspective, no matter what you’re doing, so there’s that balance between the immediacy and also retaining that direction and focus, in terms of where you need to go as an overall business. It’s a very challenging, but very rewarding, environment.

Why is Switzerland ideal for start-up companies in pharma?

I think there’s almost been a tradition in the last few years that most pharma biotech start-ups have been by a couple of people in a garage somewhere in the US! Jokes apart, I think that is changing, because there is a lot more professionalism around the world that is being applied to these things, specifically for Switzerland. There are obviously some advantages around low tax and access to the major markets to the EU and its central geographic position.

But, in my experience, where Switzerland scores really well is via the workforce. It’s very internationally-focused - there are obviously advantages with the language skills. For example, I have regularly had members of my team who have spoken not just two or three languages, but five or six. If you are a developing business and you’ve suddenly got somebody who can speak the particular language of a target market, that opens up a whole world of possibilities.

Culturally, the Swiss also have a high standard of work and commitment. This, combined with the strong pharmaceutical industry, means Switzerland is very well-positioned to support that start-up environment.

Are there any risks that you have taken throughout your career and how did they help to get you to the level that you are at now?

I have probably lost count of the number of risks I’ve taken in my career. I suppose you need to put that into perspective in that it is a measured risk; it’s not sort of gambling all your life savings on a horse race kind of risk. You need to have that measured risk and you need to have an understanding of the potential downside, as well as the upside.

Putting that into context, I suppose the biggest risk initially I took in my career was going for my first international appointment, which meant upping stakes, moving to a new country, having that completely new environment around me of no familiar infrastructure in the same way. I’m originally from the UK, which meant suddenly you didn’t have your favourite TV programmes, for example, to come home and watch and things like that.

You need to be adaptable. But, the second time you make an international move, you know what’s coming and you know what you need to do to make that change and make it a success. It isn’t just about the work environment, it’s about the complete cultural environment and making sure that you, as a person, gain the most benefit from it. If you have the opportunity, go for it!

Is there any memorable moment from your career and why?

There have been many memorable moments. I’ve obviously met and done a lot of different things, been to some fantastic places, met some incredibly talented and interesting people along the way.

Again, if I had to pick a specific one, it would be the first time I worked internationally. I was moving country, I didn’t speak the language, I had very little in the way of support mechanisms to do that, that kind of came later, because the business I was working in was expanding rapidly at the time and I was still relatively junior.

It took me out of my comfort zone completely and I think it developed me in multiple ways that I could never have foreseen. I think there is this kind of image of an expat lifestyle - somebody sort of sitting in the sunshine somewhere sipping coffee and not actually doing a lot. The reality is incredibly different.

There is almost an onus on you to do more than you would expect, but the benefit is obviously being part of a different culture, being part of a different set-up, and also, as part of that, I do believe it develops you. It certainly developed me as a person, not only in my career, but also in my outlook and personal life.

Thank you to Chris for speaking to our Procurement & Supply Chain recruitment team in Switzerland, led by Neil Cope.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment. 

Clémence Jacqueri is the CHRO People & Culture at Lynk & Co in Amsterdam. Clémence started her career as a Clinical Psychologist, then transitioned into HR while serving as a commissioned officer in the Royal New Zealand Air Force.

Clémence alternated between management consulting, executive Human Resources roles and board appointments for over 15 years, before becoming Senior Director Talent – Global Functions & Emerging Markets at Adidas.

How do you feel leaders can create diverse teams?

Fundamentally, it’s about owning and role modelling behaviours. It’s not something one leader can do on their own; there are very few instances where one individual creates something amazing. It is always about collective ownership.

It is really important to remember that it’s a team effort – often, the structure of companies is such that you employ this one person with a great title, but that’s not how EDI works. It stems from the whole leadership team and each person in a leadership position in the company.

Of course, you can focus on hiring diverse people, but if you don’t have a culture that values diversity, then all the hiring in the world is not going to help you. They will just leave.

This is where I come back to the behaviours - your whole leadership needs to understand the richness and the value that EDI brings. If everyone truly understands that, then their behaviours will reflect it. If all your policies, your processes - not only within HR, but across the whole company - are fully imbedded from a Diversity, Equity & Inclusion perspective, then you can build your leadership behaviours, your managerial behaviours, your organisational culture… but you do need the underlying strength of the policies and the processes to imbed EDI convictions.

I look at what Lynk & Co does in terms of the EDI space. There are a lot of fundamental things, like the rethinking of traditions. A really basic personal example - I am ex-military, right? I am the first one to say, “Hey guys”, and then I think, doh, I didn’t just say that. So, I’ve changed that to, “Hey team” - changing your personal behaviours slightly does make an impact.

From an organisation-wide perspective, I have worked for a lot of companies who give Christmas gifts as a tradition, but many of our employees do not celebrate Christmas, so changing that to end-of-year gift or a company success celebration has inclusivity impact. It doesn’t change the intent or the flavour of it, but it makes it accessible for everybody.

What do you see as the biggest challenges for your business and your own role over the next 12 months?

Just to give you context - for Lynk & Co, at the end of 2020, we had 150 employees. At the end of 2021, we had 500. At the end of this year, we will have over 1,000. So, for us as a company, our biggest challenge now is how we maintain our culture, our feel, our values, in such rapid growth.

At Lynk & Co, we talk about ourselves as an industry disruptor; I think that the way we see ourselves as a company is that we are trying to rethink how we do mobility. The car statistics are horrific - the average car stands still 96% of the time. The collective environmental impact is enormous. Our business model works towards ensuring that people have the car they need when they need it, but when they don’t need it, somebody else uses that car. That’s what we mean by industry disruptor. There is a move away from the car as a status symbol - which in many cultures it still is - and movement towards the car being something that you just use when needed.

Within my team, we are also taking a disruptive approach to traditional HR thinking, creating a more flexible, humanistic way of looking at our people. Again, at a time of rapid growth, I think the biggest challenge is how we can ensure that all our people get what we’re here to do and are enabled to achieve it.

How do you see the Dutch economy evolving in the next five years?

I think the last few years - with COVID and now the war in Europe - have taught me more than anything that life is unpredictable. When I look at a five-year time span, I couldn’t hand on heart say, “This is where I think we’re heading”, because the world suddenly stops on its axis and changes.

When I think about the Dutch economy, overarchingly, I believe the Netherlands is well advanced from a renewable resource perspective, being more sustainable and having a stronger focus on better utilisation of existing resources and assets. This is reflected in the fact that the Netherlands is currently Lynk & Co’s biggest market - we have 35,000 members here in the Netherlands.

The fact that we are a bit of an industry disruptor, the fact that we are looking at car utilisation from a more sustainable perspective, I think resonates with the Dutch population. From a mobility perspective, the Dutch economy seems to be more open and ready to exchange old school car ownership thinking for a more flexible ownership model, for the shared mobility.  

What are the biggest challenges for a leader overseeing a remote team?

My two-word answer - and I will expand on this – is, being human.

We all know about conscious and unconscious bias. Proximity bias is one of the big ones for remote teams. As human beings, we bond more strongly with people we see every day than people who are more distant to us physically. The first thing that we as leaders need to do is be conscious of that. Be aware and put in place equal time for our people, no matter where they are.

The second thing, which comes back to my two-word answer, is being human. To really connect with our people everywhere, leaders need to be human - COVID taught us that, as well. The importance of making those interpersonal connections, the importance of not just listening, but also hearing, is critical in leading any team.

At a team level, the absolute best meeting of the week that I have with my complete team is called the Friyay meeting. This is a meeting where we just say what the best of the week has been for us. It can be in our private life, at work, whatever, but each of us has the opportunity to say, “My best of the week was…”. Again, it’s simple – but I learn a lot about my people from listening to what touches them in a week.

On a macro level, at Lynk & Co, we have a weekly mega jam. Other companies may call this a town hall. Super high energy, our CEO opens each session and, essentially, they are all staff virtual meetings where the whole company updates on where we are at and some of the week’s highlights, Lynk & Co style; it is informal and conversational. It’s a mixture of commercial performance, fun facts and spotlights on individual achievements.

It is the combination of micro and macro behaviours that drive both collective ownership and belonging.

If you could go back and give your younger self some career advice, what would it be?

Careers don’t have to be linear.

Early on in my career, it was like, you must do this job, then this job, then this job, and it was all very linear. In reality, life happens and it is important to go with that. For example, I had time off being a mum, which I wouldn’t change for the world; it was really important to me and I learnt so much more about being a human being through being a parent.

When I lived in India, I took a year off as a street photographer. I literally roamed the streets with a camera and at the end had a solo exhibition - it was fantastic. Not at all related to HR, but my word, I learnt so much! About myself, about different cultures, about humility and generosity from the people on the streets in India.

Early on in my career, I was like, “Oh no, you can’t do that, as you’ll never achieve what you want to achieve if you indulge yourself in these things”. But actually, this would be the one thing that I would say to myself: there are other things that you can do to grow and learn.

Similarly, as a parent and globe trotter, I got into governance. I’ve had multiple board appointments in various countries over the last 20 years. Again, it’s a sideways move – not linear, but has added tremendous value to my commercial focus and understanding of strategic HR.

I would also go back and tell myself that no one is an island. I think there is a lot of pressure that we put on ourselves; yet there are very few things that one individual has achieved completely on their own. When you look at your career, it is about the relationships you build and what you learn from the people in your team who you have watched grow and develop. The people below, above and beside me - the richness that comes from that.

Who did you most admire when you were a child and why?

I wouldn’t choose an individual. For me, what I’ve always admired are character traits.

There are three character traits that I most admire. The first is curiosity. I really admire people who have high levels of curiosity - they don’t bring any judgment with it, but are just curious.

Second is optimism. This is one that I personally struggle with from time-to-time; at times I can feel a bit glass half-empty. I have huge admiration for people who can see the positive straight away.

The final trait would be resilience. I look around me through COVID, with friends and family in war-torn places, and I think, “Wow, people are truly resilient - much more resilient than we think we are.”

How have you seen your approach to HR evolve since the COVID-19 pandemic?

I have seen HR evolve over the last 20-plus years from an administrative function through to the strategic partner that HR is today.

I think COVID enabled not just HR, but the whole business, to be more strategic and humanistic in decision-making. I believe companies today better understand a more holistic perspective, that there has got to be purpose, there has to be meaning in what we do.

You look at the great resignation, the fluidity of today’s workforce, and I believe that a lot of it is based on a search for meaning. There must be a broader purpose for our people, there has to be something that makes a difference based on vision and values, and I think that COVID has taught us that.

The mindset of companies, big and small, has changed to be more people-focused, to be more balanced and humanistic in our approach.

Thank you to Clémence for speaking to our HR recruitment team in the Netherlands, led by Katie Insley.

Views and opinions contained within our Executive Interviews are those of the interviewee and not views shared by EMEA Recruitment.