TL;DR: Kathy Jennings shares her journey from employment lawyer to HR business partner to head of employee relations. She highlights how the HRBP role helped her become a better ER leader by connecting with the business, employees and managers. The discussion emphasizes that ER is not just about solving problems but also about preventing issues and supporting people after resolution, with HRBPs playing a key role in maintaining workplace relationships.
Three Key Takeaways from the Video: Career Path for ER Professionals
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The HR business partner role is essential for ER leaders to understand the business, employees and managers, which leads to stronger employee relations leadership.
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Employee relations work involves not only fixing problems but also preventing issues and helping people work together after a resolution.
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Aftercare and ongoing support are critical parts of ER and require collaboration between ER and HRBPs to keep workplace relationships healthy.
Video Transcript: Career Path for ER Professionals
00:00:12.639
Deb Muller: Hi everybody, it’s Deb Muller. I’m the CEO and founder of HRQ and welcome back to Two Minute Matters. I am so excited to be here with Kathy Jennings. Kathy is the former global director of employee relations at Estée Lauder and she is here to share some wisdom and talk about something I think we all think about — what is the career path for ER professionals? Is that a good opening?
00:00:36.800
Kathy Jennings: Got you there, absolutely and Deb, thanks for having me. Just a tiny bit of a start yet—wait, don’t start yet because I’m gonna start—don’t start! We got you two minutes to—oh, I have it on 21 minutes. I gotta update my timer here.
00:00:51.239
Deb Muller: Alright, you ready? Give me 21 minutes! We could talk about this probably all day.
00:01:01.600
Kathy Jennings: Alright, here we go. Just a little bit of background about me. I’m an employment lawyer by training. I actually spent almost 10 years at a law firm then I went in house at Estée Lauder. I was the global employment lawyer for my first 10 years there, then spent eight years in HR—first three as an HR business partner and then as the head of employee relations for North America.
One of the things I think about when I reflect on my career is how important that HRBP role was to being a better ER COE leader. It wasn’t my favorite job by any stretch of the imagination. I was really happy when I got out of it. But doing it for three years, being closer to the business, closer to the employees, closer to the managers, and having to be the day-to-day person holding their hands in addition to ER things was really valuable.
In terms of figuring out how an ER COE helps the business, helps managers, helps employees, helps the HRBPs — particularly in a hybrid ER model where HRBPs do some investigations, which is what we had at Estée Lauder — this role was crucial.
00:02:14.120
Deb Muller: Yeah, I think that’s so true because in ER you are at a point that matters — something has gone wrong. So what happened before that maybe you could have been more proactive or preventative? And then what happens after that to make sure the organization and the individuals involved can get back to their best capacity for doing great work and feeling great about working in the organization?
I think that what happens afterward is so key because sometimes in ER you’re called in when there’s a problem. You help fix it and unless you fired the bad actor, frequently you haven’t. You’ve given a warning or something like that and the people are still there, still have to work together, and then you’re kind of out of it. It’s the HRBP who has to figure out how to make the relationship continue working.
I also think for tools, if you’re doing any sort of policy, programming or education, figuring out from that HRBP role what makes sense format-wise, content-wise, and timing-wise for your HRBPs, managers, and employees is super important.
00:03:19.799
Kathy Jennings: Yeah, I love that. Aftercare — something we’ve been talking about and will continue to talk about. We’ll probably be back here talking about it, but that full circle — it’s not just the moment in time, it’s how it affects the after.
00:03:31.040
Deb Muller: Thank you so much Kathy. This was great, another great Two Minute Matters. Let us know in the comments what you think was the most valuable piece of experience you had in your ER career. Give us some thoughts or tips for others in our community. We love hearing from you and we’ll see you next time. Thanks so much everybody.
