Q You are responsible for changing HR processes at ABN AMRO Bank N.V., as well as organizational structure and mindset for organizational agility. Could you share with us what is the current strategy of driving influential changes?
Just like many large organizations, ABN AMRO has to reinvent itself to stay relevant in the future. This does not happen overnight and takes a lot of effort because it requires a new mindset and skills. However, the need to develop organizations towards future relevance becomes more and more pressing as new technological, ecological and social developments take place in the context around these organizations. If you look at organizations as the sum of people working for it, it is evident that the way these people are treated, the way they are developed and facilitated to do the work is basically the key to success. Traditionally, these are the topics on the plate of HR, but HR also needs to reinvent itself. The instrumental approach is no longer sufficient. HR needs to develop a more holistic vision and an integrated approach regarding people and organization topics.
Q Your personal Specialties include: Change management, Breakthrough thinking, Organizational Culture, Leadership Development, Organisation and Relationship Systems Coaching, Employee Engagement, and Talent Management. No doubt, your life passion is Human Resources and everything related to it. Could you share tips for those who are stepping on this path?
Funny that you say my passion is Human Resources. I’d rather talk about the human side of organizing. Although I have been working in HR for years, I have never really felt like an HR person, because that feels like a box. Organizations are sometimes organized in a way that actually limits the power of an HR department. HR goes much further for me. It’s about social innovation. But how do you as an HR professional or HR department ensure that you can really focus on that? If you don’t do that, your impact will be limited. Then it stays with moving from what has been, instead of creating the preconditions of what can be. HR should be much more guiding from its vision of organizational development from a human perspective. But then that vision must be present. My tip: develop your vision and don’t let yourself be limited by what your job description is or what the duties of your department are, but start making the difference by doing what you believe is needed in the context of your organization and its purpose.
Q Do you follow up with any recent HR trends? What are they?
Yes, I do and I actually recently did so as co-author of the book The High-Performance Organisation. I wrote a chapter about high performing employees and in order to do so, I had to be up to speed with the latest insights in the field of HR. Why? Because I believe the context we create for people makes them being able to outperform or not. The thoughts on how a context is fostering performance is developing through years. Any HR professional that takes him or herself seriously knows the big trends in HR, but most important is to develop your own vision on these trends. Don’t blindly follow them, but create a vision about what trends are relevant for your context, what trends you want to follow-up on and which ones you want to ignore. And don’t underestimate yourself – what trends you want to set. Beware of copycatting everything you hear, but focus and make a difference on what is relevant in your context. Learn from insights of others, but realize that every organization is unique. Start listening to your people and learn what is needed in your organization and then use your expertise and insights to co-create that context with them. For me, that is the key to successful people empowerment.
Q What innovations are you fostering currently to help people thrive at work?
I do believe in creating a learning organization that can adapt easily to the changing needs of customers and society. Traditionally, organizations are very static in the way the work is organized. In the past few years, I have been conducting experiments with new ways of working and with HR policy to enable this adaptability. I learned that we do not only have to do things differently but also stop doing things that disable this agility. This is far from being easy in an organization that is focusing on being in control. That’s why experimenting helps in making people experience what works and doesn’t work in their own situation, fact-based so to speak. Letting go of some rules or for example job descriptions is scary and by starting small people can experience it is possible and even fun. You unleash the human potential, but it requires new sorts of guidance, based on trust. This requires a new vision of leadership and on how to enable leadership. Leadership does not come with the position, it comes with intention, human intention. Innovation in the field of HR is fostered by wanting to understand what is really needed and then make it happen. Just do it!
Q What is vitally essential for HRM to prioritize and focus in 2022?
I understood that a lot of topics on the agenda of HR Vision are about technology. Technology inspired, people-centred is the title I believe.
No less than three-quarters of the success of innovations is caused by investments in personnel, not IT. Social innovation is what is desperately needed. The moment HR is put away by top management as a place that the supervisor can go to if he can’t get things done or ask for advice, then things go wrong because there is no time left for the long term. HRM will be vital to make a difference in organizations to transform towards future relevance.
Positive work culture and purpose are also topics that will be important for HR in the coming year. These concepts are of course closely related. In a world that is changing rapidly, companies will have to make every effort to stay afloat. This is only possible with employees who feel psychologically safe and who really feel like contributing through a positive culture and an appealing goal. A considerable assignment that only succeeds if HR takes this role, to create the right context, seriously. This asks for a more integrated and holistic approach than the traditional way of HRM. So if not yet working on this, HR should also reinvent itself going forward and become a learning organization itself.
Meet Nathalie Hazenberg, HR & Transformation strategist, ABN Amro Bank N. V. at the TOP HR event of the year – Attend our upcoming HR Vision event – register now! THE MONTHLY CONTENT HUB NEWSLETTER
