Stacey thinks about his career in three stages. First there was a foundation period based at Associated Ports where he learned the fundamentals of the profession and gained relevant qualifications. His time at the business was varied and this resulted in him building a strong knowledge base alongside plenty of practical expertise. 

I’m motivated by the blending of commercial realities with community impact.”

He then moved to the Royal Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI), which offered him more experience within a public sector setting, and one which was undergoing transformation and change. Those changes included relocating the organisation’s headquarters, introducing new technology and reframing the relationship the organisation had with its customers: “The change programme touched every part of the organisation,” says Stacey. “It was demanding but also incredibly fulfilling”.

For Stacey, this work cemented the importance and influence of people management across organisations. While he says he spends a lot of his time making the connection between overall business strategy and the people mission, he also believes the standing of HR within organisations has improved over the years he has worked in the function. There is a clear acknowledgement that people issues go hand in hand with overall success.

“Certainly there is now the recognition that culture has a part to play in supporting competitiveness and growth, and therefore HR has a role to define and embed that culture” he says.

The Covid achievement

Stacey has been with Serco for 15 years and identifies the Covid years as giving him a particular sense of achievement. Working against a backdrop of ‘profound uncertainty’ Stacey was part of the Serco team that was not just affected by the pandemic but was actively trying to help deal with the crisis too. Work was continuous, with long days 7 days a week, with Serco involved in supporting the UK Government response setting up and operating test centres and supporting the contact tracing ecosystem. At the same time the business itself had to manage closures, work to protect vulnerable employees and recognise the stress employees felt as they juggled work with home schooling and other personal issues.

Stacey says the sense of fulfilment for doing an important job was significant, but there was also a sense of freedom about the work. This kind of project had never been done before and there was an acknowledgement that mistakes would be made along the way. However, there was also a great deal of resilience and commitment to getting the job done.

Q: Please give a short guide to your career

A: I studied history at university, and all the way through my degree I worked full time in retail and hospitality. That naturally led me into retail management/area manager roles when I graduated. I progressed quite quickly and was managing people fairly early in my career.

After a period of reflection about what I really wanted to do, I narrowed it down to HR or marketing, with a brief flirtation with becoming a history teacher. I even spent a week shadowing my old history teacher and very quickly realised that wasn’t for me.

A close friend of mine at the time was an HR Director, and over a glass of wine she talked me through what her average week looked like. I found it genuinely inspiring and decided I wanted to give HR a go. I had no HR experience and no CIPD qualification, so my original plan was to go into an external recruitment agency to get a year’s experience, move into internal recruitment, and then transition into HR.

I spent two months in external recruitment before being offered the opportunity to join HSS in recruitment. I was actively reaching out to internal recruitment teams across the North West at the time, and a friend recommended HSS. I joined, spent six months recruiting full time here  – around 2014 – and then an opportunity came up within the HR team.

After six months in recruitment, I moved into HR, started studying for my CIPD, and stepped into a frontline HR advisor role. That move from recruitment into advising on HR issues was one of the most challenging transitions I’ve made professionally – it was a steep learning curve in a discipline I had no formal background in.

From there I progressed to HR Business Partner – which is probably one of my favourite roles – and then into a Head of HR role, and eventually into my current position as HR Director. I’ve been with the organisation for around 12 years, and all of my HR experience has been built here, from the ground up.

Q: What have been some stand‑out achievements?

A: One of the clear stand‑out achievements for me is the business separation and disposal project last year.

It was a large‑scale, complex corporate transaction involving multiple businesses and hundreds of colleagues. When the project was first briefed, it felt almost alien in its scale.

From a people and TUPE perspective, the challenge was enormous: crafting processes that were legally compliant, fair to colleagues, well‑timed, and well‑communicated, while coordinating with other HR and communications teams across different organisations. There were nights when we were still working at 11pm, just continuing the day.

What I’m most proud of is that we didn’t default to a minimal, tick‑box compliance approach. We put a huge amount of emphasis on empathetic, clear, and timely communication, recognising that these changes carried a significant emotional impact for hundreds of people. We worked hard to over‑communicate where necessary, maintain consistency of message across three businesses, and ensure colleagues were supported throughout.

It was all‑consuming at times and felt, on occasion, almost unachievable – but we got it over the line. It’s a major professional milestone for me.

On a personal level, that project also stands out because it happened around 10 months after I returned from maternity leave. Balancing the demands of a large‑scale corporate transaction with being a working mum for the first time added another dimension to the challenge, and I’m proud of how I managed both.

Q: What attracted you to HR?

A: Like many people who end up in HR, I do genuinely enjoy working with people – but for me it goes a bit deeper than that.

In my early retail and hospitality management roles, I found myself leading teams without really being given the tools or guidance on how to do that well. I enjoyed the job, but there was a point where I realised I was responsible for a team of people and was essentially figuring it out as I went along. I didn’t always get it right.

That integration between people and commercial performance is a big part of what continues to motivate me.”

When I sat down with my friend who was an HR Director, she talked me through what she was responsible for as a senior HR leader and the impact HR can have on culture, leadership capability, and the management population in a business. It was clear to me that this was exactly the gap I’d been feeling in my own development as a people manager.

That conversation opened my eyes to HR as a function that equips managers, shapes culture, and has a meaningful influence on how people experience work.

“My original role was linked to the hotel,” Bruno admits. “But I moved around a lot, from general services, security, project management and then, 15 years ago, into HR.” Even in HR he covered many different roles – health and safety, employee housing, operations training, assuming his current position five years ago.

Broadening experience

He’s been open to new challenges and positions within the business across his time at Disneyland Paris, and notes this isn’t something everyone would do. While others have stayed in their line of business, he has chosen to take on new projects and challenges wherever they may lie. Some of those challenges – such as preparing for the opening of the resort’s hotel – were directly linked to his past career, but others were entirely new and have broadened his experience of working for the business and his understanding of how a company of that size and type operates.

It’s an element which has stood him in good stead with colleagues as he’s undertaken subsequent HR tasks: On the one hand the people he works with know that he understands what it’s like to be working on the frontline (and elsewhere) in the business. On the other hand it has informed his own approach to the HR function.

I understood that it was paramount for leaders to keep up to date with the latest skills and developments in their areas.”

Bruno’s view from his current position is that it’s not just about training people but also about developing great leaders. He feels his own experience has effectively guided him to work towards his full potential, addressing certain aspects of his skills, undergoing training and building experience before moving forward with more responsibility. Throughout this development he has appreciated the time he’s been given to achieve more: “I always had the time to develop myself through projects and assignments,” he says. “I understood that it was paramount for leaders to keep up to date with the latest skills and developments in their areas.” Unsurprising then that when Bruno made the move from operations into HR he took an HR course with a Paris business school in order catch up with the key concepts he required.

A: Prior to HR, I initially considered a career in the performing arts and attended a school focused on that area. Following my studies, I decided to change direction. After travelling and exploring options and professional paths, I joined a software company in an administrative role. The business had lost its HR representative and I was looking to build a career. I put myself forward for the role and convinced the business that I could learn quickly and would commit to studying at night alongside completing all my existing duties, which enabled them to give me the opportunity. I then set my mind to completing the professional CIPD qualifications I needed to succeed.   

After working in software for three years, I joined a contact centre where I was exposed to a high level of employee relations work in a very fast-paced environment. 

I joined Dennis Eagle in 2009 as an HR Advisor, and that’s where I’ve been ever since. I never thought I would stay so long, but the company gave me a position where I’ve been able to develop professionally and personally, with the autonomy to shape a new function and effect real change. This has continued to challenge me for more than 16 years. I have had the opportunity to take on additional responsibilities, joining the Board in the role of HR Director in January 2024. At the same time, I also joined the Extended Board of our division of companies, Terberg Environmental, and started working with our international subsidiaries all over the globe. 

Dennis Eagle was a team of 500 people when I joined the business and now we’ve doubled to over 1,000 employees, so I have seen a lot of growth and change in that time. I continue to build on my knowledge and skills, and recently completed a coaching qualification. For me, learning is never finished and I’m now considering my next learning goal. 

Q: Please give us one or two stand-out achievements

A: At Dennis Eagle, we gained Silver status with Investors in People in 2022 and achieved this recognition again this year with even better scores, which was a really proud moment for us as a business. A lot of work, sustained commitment, and passion goes into achieving consistent and positive engagement results. This accreditation focuses on all elements of the employee journey, giving us impartial insights into our leadership culture, employee engagement, and continuous improvement practices. Where we are today is a reflection of our ongoing commitment to continuous improvement and excellence in how we support, develop, and engage our teams, and we are continuing to reflect and improve, working towards achieving Gold in our next assessment. 

We’ve also focused on mental health and wellbeing and were very early as a business to recognise the importance of Mental Health First Aider (MHFA) training. As a male-dominated traditional sector, it was important to us to start this open conversation around mental wellbeing and the importance of talking and reaching out for support, breaking down the stigma around mental health. 

We embrace hybrid working, flexitime, and job sharing, all of which have made a difference to the work-life balance of our people.

As a result, we now have a cohort of MHFAs across our sites and Service Centres. We also rolled out mental health training for all our managers, have an employee assistance programme in place, and offer opportunities for occupational health support, counselling support, and general wellbeing check-ins. This includes internal events hosted around the business such as our Tea and Talk sessions that took place all over the UK to mark World Mental Health Day. 

I am also proud of the flexible working environment we’ve introduced in the business. We embrace hybrid working, flexitime, and job sharing, all of which have made a difference to the work-life balance of our people. We are committed to considering how we can afford accessible working options for employees in all roles within the organisation. This is challenging in a manufacturing organisation but compressed hours, staggered shifts, job sharing, and flexible holidays can work when you make flexibility a priority. 

Q: What attracted you to HR? 

A: Truthfully, I totally fell into the world of HR. But I quickly realised how much I enjoy the people side of business and the variety that HR brings.

With such a high level of contribution across the HR agenda and throughout the wider businesses where she’s worked, it may come as a surprise to learn that Jenner could have stayed in her initial lane, concentrating only on employment law and immigration. Having successfully completed her education to become a lawyer sudden ill health led to three week’s off during which time she realised the legal profession was not for her. A brief stint in recruitment followed – in which the sales angle didn’t suit her – before an HR opportunity arose which seemed perfect.

It came in the form of a lead generation business who were looking for someone who could fulfil their recruitment needs while also overseeing the employment law side of the business – two areas where Jenner knew she could deliver: “My first HR job was as leader of HR,” she says. “I didn’t start as a specialist in a particular role, I needed to be a generalist from day one.” While this may have been something of a baptism of fire Jenner notes that her career has since progressed, moving her away from official structures and systems for HR, focusing instead on the more psychological aspects of people management – how to get the best from the talent with whom she works. 

“I’ve always been fascinated by the intersection of human behaviour, business strategy, and organisational design,” she explains. “HR is one of the few functions that influences all three.”

If you do it right you can have an impact on how people feel about work and that affects how they work for the business.”

Indeed, structures have been something of a target for Jenner as she’s realised how much potential organisations can waste through traditional ways of handling people. Business structures, systems, communication and even encouraged forms of leadership can all get in the way of realising a workforce’s full potential.

Involved with organisations where restructuring was part and parcel of working life, moving between sectors as opportunities emerged and offers made, he now has an executive position at Skanska, where he helps to lead a company working in a challenging environment.

It seems a far cry from his initial roles in retail. Beginning in a store management training programme he worked as a buyer at a Canterbury department store, until he decided he would combine his passion for music with his work and switched to run a Virgin record store. In retrospect he admits this ended up being somewhat chaotic and unstructured, although successful, and it also taught him that working for your passion wasn’t always the best thing to do: “A hobby and work are two separate things,” says Francis. “I exhausted my passion for music as I was listening to it for 9 hours a day.”

He joined the House of Fraser as a departmental head and was promoted to assistant store manager. He then moved on to BT who at the time had a high street retail presence. Francis managed the company’s Southampton store – which enjoyed the highest turnover in the chain – and in doing so also took responsibility for training other branch managers.

This led to a more structured national role to help shape training across the business. At the time training took place at the company’s Stockport centre but this arrangement was seen as being detrimental to diversity in the business as some courses required participants to stay in the centre for two weeks. Francis’ role was therefore to devolve training activities making them more accessible but still consistent. This, then, was Francis’ first contact with an HR oriented role.

Indeed it was then a project manager within HR who identified a vacancy for Francis: ”I thought it would be enjoyable and something else for the CV,” he admits, “I thought I’d do it for a year and then move back to operations.” However, regular restructuring and new initiatives kept Francis busy with new challenges and projects to manage. From Investors In People to developing a coaching programmes to managing reward and head count, Francis’ work continued to help develop the business, identifying new ways of doing things and making them happen. 

Francis then moved to Pfizer with a clear HR position and agenda. He took part in a global HR team which created a HR tech system to cover international markets, ultimately delivering across more than a hundred countries.

Back in the UK he implemented an Ulrich model of HR for the company, defining business partner roles and establishing shared services for the business. Perhaps unsurprisingly his work earned him internal recognition and an award for change management.

Carolyn Miller’s career has always been powered by the need to have a positive business impact. Having gained a Business Administration degree with German, her first role was a temporary job working for a small UK construction company who were getting to grips with the opportunities created by the historical reunification of Germany. Thinking she’d be in place for six months, six years later she’d been involved with every aspect of the business, her German language capability opening up the door into new markets and revenue growth for the company. From engaging with prospects and clients to sales negotiation to resourcing projects, Miller gained first-hand experience of what it took to build and run a business and make it profitable.

Having benefited from this solid grounding, Miller decided she wanted to specialise in HR. To help set her apart from the competition, she completed an MBA in her spare time whilst working, delivering a dissertation on change management. Shortly afterwards she landed her first HR role with a global IT organisation where she took on diverse HR Business Partner roles for some large client accounts. “It was fantastic experience with considerable levels of accountability,” she says. “There was no question about the importance of the HR function for the business and this was also reflected in the high levels of investment in a bespoke HR Academy to enable us to deliver to the highest level of capability.”

Career moves

From there she advanced through HR roles at two other tech companies CSC and VMware, taking on increasing responsibility and positions with both EMEA and global scope, as each business drove its digital transformation. Two stand out areas that she lead on were Mergers and Acquisitions and she introduced a ground-breaking Mental Health programme.

These roles culminated in her joining Capgemini two and a half years ago. The French owned business and IT transformation company employs some 360,000 people globally with around 13,000 in the UK. Miller is the Vice President of HR for the country, giving her a seat on the UK Country Board. In this position her focus in on delivering an exceptional employee experience through all the “moments that matter” to provide both individual and business growth. 

The importance of that experience has been demonstrated by some of her latest work for the business. In October of last year with Miller taking the lead, the UK was one of the first countries globally within Capgemini to deliver an HR transformation programme, deploying smart digital tools and harmonised processes into the business along with an integrated, agile new HR model and an elevated People Manager role. 

Transformation for the better

The transformation work has seen the introduction of new technology which offers an enhanced user experience which is also mobile enabled. It has automated many routine activities, empowering managers and employees to do their work faster and more efficiently. The experience of the UK undergoing this change is already informing further roll-outs in other parts of the world. “We’re enabling our HR partners to step away from the administrative tasks and add value to the business in ways they haven’t done before,” says Miller. “If there is less operational work we need to do we can concentrate on more strategic initiatives that focus on getting the best from our people, delivering on their career and learning aspirations and driving enhanced organisational performance.”

Getting the best from their people is critical of course but the impact goes beyond the internal impact. Miller is very much aware that satisfied and engaged internal customers creates value for Capgemini’s external clients. Equally she recognises in turn that HR needs to look out into the external world of customers and partners to help inform and shape Capgemini’s people practices in the UK and places considerable worth on her external network to achieve this. 

Scale and efficiency

He was offered his first real job before completing the graduate course when a member of the HR team left and subsequently offered him a position as lead for the manufacturing part of Revlon International. With that move, Simmons became responsible for around 1000 people.

“That really grew my experience and career,” he says. “It gave me experience as an HR generalist, dealing with everything including Trade Unions and employer relations.”

Simmons moved on to become HR manager across a number of sites for Body Shop before taking on a role at Christian Salvesen as an HR Business Partner. He’s stayed in the transport and logistics sector ever since, working for Norbert Dentressangle, XPO and finally GXO. Unsurprisingly his career has included foreign experience and given him a view over international businesses. He has also guided the people function – and through this the wider businesses – through a number of take-overs and significant business deals, as well as ensuring the companies he works for have not just the people they require but the skills necessary to lead in their sectors.

Strategy and tactics

The breadth of experience offered by these roles, alongside the influence achieved has always attracted Simmons and ensured he’s pushed forward in the function: “HR requires strategic and tactical leadership,” he says. “At the same time you have to be close to the business and be able to articulate the direction of the business. It’s a role where you can influence every part of the organisation.” His role at GXO has been particularly influential and incredibly important as the business has grown from 5000 people to 40,0000, now enjoying a £3bn turnover. 

His indirect career path has spanned multiple companies and countries. Working primarily in the professional services Wiggs points out that HR plays a central role in this sector. “Our people and their skills and experience are what we sell to our clients,” he says. “That makes HR integral to supporting their growth, and ours. It’s the perfect place for me.”

Rising to global challenges

Having started out in agency recruitment, working on the placement of temporary accountants across a variety of industries, Wiggs feels his career really got underway with an operational role at PwC. Working hard he took every opportunity that presented itself and progressed swiftly up the ladder. Five years on he took a place at EY, delivering on several operational, HR and project roles. He then transitioned from operations into HR and spent the next 15 years in various roles across the UK and US at one point becoming EY’s Global Talent Director for Transaction Advisory Services where he focussed on talent strategy for the business on a global basis. He then moved into global talent development, leading on the development of EY’s global career framework and career architecture. 

With so much experience of EY under his belt, Wiggs decided he needed a new challenge so joined the law firm Dentons, as Europe HR Director, a move which took him to Munich and then Madrid. Four years later he took on his current role as EMEA VP of HR at FTI Consulting, again based in Madrid.

The COVID challenge

Wiggs acknowledges that moving to Munich in March 2020 at the very start of COVID was a particular challenge. A new city and job is challenging enough, but doing so in the pandemic scenario ranks among the most personally demanding experiences of his career. “It taught me what resilience really means,” says Wiggs, “especially when you are new to the firm that you are helping to navigate the same challenges from a business perspective.” Wiggs found having his husband with him, and the great environment of Munich around him was more than enough to keep him going.

Part of the attraction of HR for Wiggs is this element of difference – the ability to be working and contributing in such vastly different scenarios: “I love the fact that I get thrown new and different challenges every day,” says Wiggs.

Having planned for a career in financial services she realised quickly that whilst she loved speaking to people, she wasn’t enjoying the products she was selling. “I took a chance,” she says, “and left my finance role, moved back in with my parents, and took a role in a department store so I had some money coming in whilst I worked out what I wanted to do with my life.”

The move was to be fortuitous and one which would lead to her realisation of what she found truly satisfying. Having been taken on as a personal shopper she was then asked to handle the temporary staff at Christmas, recruiting – for the first time in her career – which while proving to be a steep learning curve, gave her an insight into the HR profession.

Building reputation

Shortly after this a permanent role as HR Assistant came free. Kansagra built a strong reputation in this role and was approached by the HR Business Partner of their flagship store in Oxford Street, London store to do the same job. As Kansagra notes this was a case of delivering the same role but for a bigger group of stakeholders.

“Since then, I’ve worked with some amazing brands,” she says living her career with career luxury and premium retail and hospitality organisations as well as a couple of fixed term contracts with a private family members club and a PR & Communication Agency.

Along the way, Kansagra is proud to have been awarded a scholarship for the Retail Summer School at the Said Business School in Oxford: “There was a lot of competition for the places, and it was a real insight into how HR partners with other functions in different businesses as well as how to make sure HR has a place at the table when businesses make strategic plans,” she says.

Importance of team recognition

At Virgin, Kansagra is particularly proud that she led her People Team to win Team of the Year at the company’s annual awards ceremony. “Team Members vote over several categories, Team of the Year being one of them,” she explains. “As it’s peer to peer voting it was a great feeling seeing my team win for all their hard work over the year. In my experience, People Teams can be overlooked for internal awards because there is an expectation from the business that things just happen. For the team to be recognised in this way reassured the team that they are doing a great job and whilst it can be tough sometimes, people do see the effort that goes into the work we deliver.”

Kansagra says she was attracted to HR because of the balance between organisational needs and employee experience.