THE PERFECT PAIR: THE CHRO & PEOPLE ANALYTICS LEADER
Synopsys
CHRO
Jill Larsen
Chief People Officer
PA LEADER
Ian Bailie
VP, People Strategy & Operations
INDUSTRY
Technology
Jill Larsen & Ian Bailie
This pair has worked together for a number of years—most recently teaming up at Synopsys, a Silicon Valley-based technology company specializing in silicon to systems design with over 20,000 employees.
Jill and Ian’s long-standing professional relationship, starting when they worked together at Cisco, underscores their effective collaboration. They complement each other’s strengths and work together to solve complex business problems. Ian drives the operations engine for Jill, enabling her to focus on strategic initiatives while trusting the HR function will continue to run smoothly.
Why people analytics?
"It's about helping the business drive the outcomes they need to achieve. I oversee the largest P&L at Synopsys because 80% of our spend is on humans. How can you manage that without insights and intelligence?”
Jill
"You have to show your value. If you understand the biggest pain points for the business and then help to solve them using data and insights, then I would hope your CHRO finds that impactful because it helps them with their most important stakeholders."
Ian
"We are at a place right now with AI where there are a couple different roads you can take. There are critical choices we need to make in terms of our data."
"For CHROs, it all comes back to data because you need to understand trends, outcomes, and the business impact of your talent strategy. If we arm the business with insights and talent intelligence, then they can make agile and informed decisions. If you think about data only in terms of what dashboards, historical attrition, and hiring data you can provide, then you are never going to get there as an HR leader. From an AI perspective, we need a mindset shift within HR because people fear what they don’t understand—when we demystify it, AI is such a huge opportunity for us."
Jill
On the value of leveraging people data insights to solve business problems
"If people are looking for certain information, then provide that data and use it to tell a story. Show how it impacts the business and the decisions that could be made. If you’re solving a problem that the business has, I promise you they will come back to partner with you more."
Ian
"Find the business problems to solve. Go become an ally with the CFO and the finance team because they're constantly faced with figuring out things they don't have the answers to. Help them find those answers.”
Jill
“Ian is a good yin to my yang."
"He's laser-focused on solving business problems and I need that capability in my people partners.”
Jill on Ian
“What I'm always trying to do is help Jill to help the business."
"The beauty of what Jill can do is grasp the big picture without getting lost in the details. I work to ensure she has enough information to tell a story that motivates the business to act. Adding data makes that story even stronger.”
Ian on arming the CPO with the right insights at the right time
How Visier plays a role in illuminating work patterns and improving HR decision-making by leveraging data from various tools
"I think we are at a point now where we can better understand the work that's going on and how people are doing it. There is a lot of data that sits outside of our HR systems—in places like Jira and GitHub—and we need access to that information. There weren't as many cloud tools in everyday use 10 years ago, but now there is such an opportunity to bring all of this data together."
Ian
"We probably shouldn’t have CHROs in the role that are uncomfortable with data and analytics. It should be a core responsibility for the job because human capital is the largest investment that any company makes."
Jill on why CHROs need to get comfortable with data
DATA MOVES THE CONVERSATION FORWARD
"When HR leverages data and insights in their recommendations, it mitigates some of the bias and anecdotes that leaders tend to bring to talent discussions. The conversation can shift to the decisions needed based on what that data tells us. I often find with our engineering leaders that data and insights level the playing field in our discussions and build credibility for the HR function."
Jill
About Visier
Visier is the recognized global leader in people analytics, workforce and compensation planning, embedded solutions, and genAI for people answers. At the core of Visier’s innovations is a simple premise: People impact is business impact, and you can’t manage what you don’t measure. Visier gives people-powered organizations the tools and insights to drive productivity, performance, and business outcomes through people impact. Founded in 2010 by the pioneers of business intelligence, Visier has over 60,000 customers in 75 countries, including enterprises like BASF, Panasonic, Experian, Amgen, eBay, Ford Motor Company, and more. Visier is headquartered in Vancouver, BC with offices and team members worldwide. For more information, visit www.visier.com.