For the first time, the HR Game Changer Conference was held concurrently in New Zealand and the UK. Elephant HR's Angela Atkins looks at the main ideas that came out of the event for moving the profession forward.
On 4 and 5 September, a world-first in HR happened. The HR Game Changer conference took place concurrently in New Zealand and the UK. The conference was to start a movement to transform HR.
In recent times, HR people seem to have split into those who think what HR is doing is the right thing, and we just need to improve and modernise that. The second group sees that what we’re delivering in HR has to radically change and we need to reinvent our profession.
Unlike other conferences, the HR Game Changer had CEOs, entrepreneurs, sales and marketing people, thought leaders and HR innovators present but also had ideas jams and think tanks so participants could discuss what they’d heard and form a plan of action of what we need to do going forward.
The key outcomes from the NZ conference that make transforming HR very different from just becoming more strategic were:
• We have to create rockstar CEOs who lead our HR functions
• We need to build real leaders and include our managers as our delivery arm
• We must change our workplace structures to utilise technology, build collaboration, have career paths for non people managers and be flexible and purposeful in whole new ways
• We must reinvent our HR processes completely to achieve this
• And fundamentally we have to really believe that HR is the future of business. No more excusing or defending what we do. We have to believe and just get on and deliver.
The twitter feed was so alive that #hrgcnz trended second throughout both days.
The UK conference had similar discussions and had artist Simon Heath capture their discussions in a mural.
Can HR change the game, transform our CEOs and leaders, change our workplace structures and reinvent HR to deliver more than we can currently imagine? Those who attended are planning to show that we can!
For summaries of the NZ conferences please visit:
The HRGC official summary: http://www.hrgamechangerconference.co.nz/go-forth-and-change-the-game/
Richard Westney’s Game On blog: http://hrmannz.wordpress.com/2014/09/07/game-on/
Amanda Sterling’s Learning to fly: http://learningtoflynz.com/2014/09/06/hr-game-changing/
For an overview of what came out of the UK conference please visit:
Perry Timm’s from PTHR: http://adjusteddevelopment.wordpress.com/2014/09/04/ferns-freedom-and-fiduciary/
The overview of Simon Heath’s mural: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPN4U_6SZH4
We also did a summary of the twitter feed at http://www.elephanttraining.co.nz/HRGCphotostweets.pdf
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