Creating People-First Cultures Through Transformative HR

Get ready to reshape your HR practices with my guest on episode 88 of the Impact Makers podcast – Noah Warder!

Noah has been leading people teams across Canada and the US for over 10 years, and now leads the People Team at Guusto, a company that provides a recognition and rewards platform focused on both front-line and office employees. In this role, he gets to marry his passion for building a people-first culture that focuses on creating purpose, opportunity, and well-being for every member of Guusto team.

He’s also the Principal Consultant and Founder of PeopleOps Consulting, where he helps early-stage Founders to build people-first cultures in rapidly growing organizations, and he brings a fresh perspective to the role HR should play in advocating for a culture that stimulates open dialogue and forethought.

In our conversation on the podcast, Noah shares his thoughts on how to balance daily tasks and strategic initiatives while also debunking the misconception that effective people practices need to be intricate or costly. We also chat about the vital role of diverse leadership teams in recruiting a diverse workforce, and the significance of tying DE&I strategies to business objectives.

Finally, Noah share his views on trust-building within HR, and his strategies for providing constructive feedback, including the challenge of communicating with those skeptical of HR. He firmly believes that transparency in leadership leads to more openness and clear communication that can empower employees and foster greater engagement.

I think that you’ll enjoy our conversation, and will leave it with some actionable takeaways to create, or further build a people-first approach in your own workplace.

Topics Discussed in Today’s Episode:

Why HR leaders should get more comfortable with starting small, making mistakes, and avoiding perfectionism.
Strategies for prioritizing people initiatives when HR leaders have so much on their plates.
How to approach making a business case for important people strategies when the ROI is hard to quantify.
The importance of building influence and trust as a people leader, in order to get things done.
Why it’s important – and healthy – to embrace conflict in order to reach better outcomes.
Why transparency is so important for company culture and trust in organizations.
The importance of being intentional about adding diverse voices and perspectives to the people you listen to, follow and learn from.
Suggested communities and resources for people leaders to share ideas and best practices, and gain support from others facing similar challenges.