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A McKinsey article by Ignacio Fantaguzzi and Christopher Handscomb reveals that M&A deals with strong cultural management significantly outperform others. Jochen Werne, CEO of Experian DACH, led Experian's acquisition during the COVID pandemic, highlighting this. Werne's Navy experience shaped his leadership, emphasizing cultural awareness, effective communication, and early successes to build trust. Despite challenges, Experian successfully integrated the new organization, maintaining strengths from both companies.

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Jochen Werne

Jochen Werne is an author, transformative leader and influential figure in the tech and finance scene, recognized as one of the 50 most influential Germans in TytoPR’s 2020 ranking. As the CEO of Experian DACH, he spearheads growth in Europe’s tech and data sectors. With a rich background that spans roles at Prosegur, Accenture, and global banking giants, he’s renowned for driving business transformation. As a member of the Chatham House and former German Navy navigator, he is a passionate proponent for international diplomacy, having founded several NGOs. His efforts have been recognized by top publications internationally, earning him accolades for promoting global understanding and environmental awareness.

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This podcast episode explores the complexities of total reward strategies in today's competitive talent landscape. Key points include the challenges of pay equity, pay transparency, and the integration of AI in compensation planning. Harvard Business Review highlights a trend where new hires often receive higher pay than existing employees, exacerbating pay gaps. John Radford, founder of Radford Surveys, emphasizes the importance of up-to-date market data and manager training to address these issues. He discusses pay transparency, noting the regulatory push for salary range disclosure and its impact on employee satisfaction.

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John Radford

John originally founded Radford Survey and built it into the "Gold Standard" of Surveys for the Tech industry. He is now retired yet still focuses on a wide variety of compensation issues and total rewards strategies.

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The podcast highlighted the critical importance of refining a company's mission, vision, and values to drive growth and align leadership. Pat Walsh, Chief People Officer at Potbelly Sandwich Works, emphasized the need for a solid foundation in these areas to support the company's ambitious growth plans as it transitions from a smaller to a larger-scale organization. Potbelly recently revamped its mission, vision, and values to align with new growth and leadership. Pat detailed a structured approach involving leadership team alignment, change management principles, and extensive input from across the organization to craft a unified direction. This process aimed to ensure clarity, consistency, and alignment with Potbelly's heritage while paving the way for future success and employee engagement.

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Pat Walsh

Pat Walsh is the SVP and Chief People Officer of Potbelly Sandwich Works, an iconic chain of neighborhood sandwich shops with over 400 locations across the US. He has held HR leadership roles in both the CPG and restaurant industries over the past 19+ years.

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The podcast discusses challenges in global business expansion, including cultural differences, resource management, and internal alignment. Naveen Kumar, CEO of Nityo Corporation, emphasizes the importance of aligning vision and strategy across diverse markets, advocating for a strong presence of local talent. He highlights using AR/VR for immersive onboarding to instill company values globally. Kumar stresses fostering a culture of continuous learning and collaborative innovation to drive growth. His insights underscore a pragmatic approach to navigating global complexities while maintaining strategic alignment and fostering a unified organizational culture.

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Naveen Kumar

Naveen Kumar, CEO at Nityo, based in Cupertino. Naveen Kumar has turned his passion for building large technology businesses into a massive portfolio which is now spread across 40 countries, 30,000+ workforce in 33 companies. He is well-known in the technology industry and is rapidly expanding his presence in the world of venture capital. Renowned for his investments in technology companies and multiple startups, Naveen has established a strong track record with the support of Karma Free Capital Ventures.

Due to the group's substantial growth, global presence, and success, it has become a highly sought-after platform for businesses, entrepreneurs, and aspiring tech visionaries. The group's backing not only provides startups with a crucial growth engine but also serves as a seal of approval, attracting attention from other investors and industry leaders.

Naveen's interests extend to diversified industries, as he believes in cultivating the complete ecosystem for any business he engages with. His business interests have expanded beyond technology into wholesale trade, real estate, and more. Alongside these ventures, Naveen's portfolio continues to grow in areas such as artificial intelligence, FinTech, EdTech, TravelTech, HR-Tech, clean energy, e-commerce, professional services, and more..

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In this podcast episode, Robert Gardner, CEO of Rebalance Earth, discusses "toxic talent" in workplaces—highly skilled individuals whose negative behaviors harm team dynamics despite their competence. He stresses early recognition, setting clear expectations, conducting thorough reviews, and using tools like the nine-box grid for assessment. Gardner advocates for prompt action and strategic planning to mitigate risks associated with toxic talent.

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Robert Gardner

With 25 years of experience as an entrepreneur and investor with a strong sustainability background in pensions and wealth management, I've committed my career to making money a force for good. I previously served on the Executive Board of St. James's Place, managing £150 billion in investments. I co-founded Redington and Mallowstreet, two B-Corps in the investment and pensions space and RedSTART, a financial education charity.

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In this podcast episode, Bryce Hoover, former Head of People Analytics at Tesla, highlights the crucial role of people analytics in guiding organizational success. He emphasizes the need for clarity of purpose and organizational structure within analytics teams, advocating for direct reporting to HR leaders. Hoover underscores the importance of prioritizing HR leader success and fostering a data-driven culture. He also discusses the challenges of integrating people data across business units and the significance of operational independence and hiring the right data leaders.

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Bryce Hoover

Bryce served at Tesla for seven years and built analytics capabilities across BizOps and HR functions. He's a trusted executive partner that sits at the intersection of technical and business leadership to ensure that data assets are harnessed for maximum business value.

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Efficient succession planning can significantly elevate company valuations and investor returns, potentially increasing them by 20 to 25%, according to the Harvard Business Review. Today, we have the pleasure of hearing from Aleem Dhanji and Michael Rossi, who will share their experiences in navigating successful transitions and succession planning at Adidas Canada. In 2021, Aleem Dhanji smoothly succeeded Michael Rossi as President of Adidas Canada.

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Alim Dhanji

Alim Dhanji is Chief People Officer and EVP of Equinox Group – a luxury lifestyle collective of fitness clubs, SoulCycle, Blink Fitness and Hotels - focusing on creating compelling employee experiences that create high-performance teams & legendary consumer experiences.

Formerly, Alim was President, Adidas Canada, accountable for revenue, profit and brand development. Alim has over 25 years of international experience in HR, M&A, Sales and Operations across multiple industries. During his career, he has built a reputation for transformational change, innovative strategic thinking, growth acceleration, delivering strong operational excellence and efficiency founded on leading edge HR practices.

His advocacy and commitment for DEI and building community has been recognized by Yahoo Finance and the Financial Times as among the top 10 LGBT+ leaders in the world in 2021 and among the top 100 in 2020. In 2024, Alim was recognized as a LGBTQ+ Trailblazer by Attitude Magazine & Bentley Motors.

Alim has an MBA and completed the Advanced Management Program at the Harvard Business School.

Michael Rossi

An accomplished business leader known for delivering results and building great culture, Michael created Voce Leadership in 2021 to bring his unique blend of coaching training and over 20 years of real-world corporate experience to his work with leadership teams. Drawing on his own experiences leading high performance teams, Michael helps CEO’s and senior leaders sharpen their values, understand their strengths, and build deeper trust and cohesion on their teams through executive coaching, workshops and keynote speaking. Michael is also the Chair of the Terry Fox Foundation Board.

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In this podcast episode, Portillo's Chief People Officer Jill Waite discussed their leadership development initiative, the Ignite program. Designed to address managerial retention and skill gaps, the program focuses on promoting internal talent and instilling leadership skills crucial for maintaining Portillo's unique culture across all locations. Key competencies emphasized include communication, relationship building, and accountability.

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Jill Waite

Jill Waite is Chief People Officer at Portillo's Hot Dogs, a restaurant chain with more than 80 locations, headquartered in Oak Brook, IL. Prior to joining Portillo's in 2019, she held several Human Resources and Operations roles in the retail, grocery and fitness industries with companies such as Sephora and 24-Hour Fitness.

Jill was hired to reinvigorate Portillo's culture by reclaiming the hearts and minds of our then-6,000 Team Members. She is also responsible for building the talent pipeline to support the company's growth, retaining Team Members who are passionate about creating lifelong memories for our guests, and developing world-class learning and development programs.

She has a Bachelor's degree in Management from University of Florida. Go Gators! Jill lives in Chicagoland with her husband of nearly 20 years, and is a mom to two boys who have a passion for playing soccer competitively.

Favorite Portillo's Menu Items: Italian beef sandwich, cheese fries, and chocolate cake.

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