Women Now Hold Majority of CHRO Jobs at Fortune 200

06Jun

CHRO_Trends.width-500 | Green Key Resources

Women dominate the human resources profession. Three out of four HR professionals are women, a ratio that holds true at every level until you get to the most senior management position. Until recently, women didn’t hold even a majority of the executive HR jobs at the largest public companies..

The good news today is that women now hold two-thirds of the CHRO roles at the Fortune 200.

A study by The Talent Strategy Group says that in just the last year, the percent of women holding the top HR job at these companies grew from 60% to 67.3%. Only a few short years ago, the HR trade group SHRM reported only 49% of HR executives at the top 100 companies were women.

More women CHROs were appointed in 2019 than in the previous three years, the study found. 78% of the CHROs hired last year were women. Of the 36 new CHROs, 43% of them replaced a man. In only 7% of the hires did a man replace a female CHRO.

The report also offers strong evidence that CHROs are being valued as business partners. Of the departing CHROs, 31% assumed larger responsibilities within the organization “most notably,” the report says, “a Chief Administration Officer role or Advisor to the CEO role.”

Overall, the report identifies 7 “CHRO Trends.” In addition to the increase in female leaders and the move into other senior internal positions, the report says:

HR experience dominates – 83% of the new CHROs have “significant” HR experience.
Advanced degrees are prevalent – 65% have a master’s or law degree.
Internal promotion declines – “In 2017, 70% of CHROs were internal successors compared to 61% in 2018 and 53% in 2019.”
CHRO turnover is linked to CEO turnover – ” Of the 35 new CEOs who came into the role in 2019, 40% replaced their CHRO.”
CHRO turnover increased in 2019 – 19% of the Fortune 200 CHROs turned over, with those in the financial and health care sectors 3.5 times more likely to turnover than those in other industries.

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Human Resources

Jun 6, 2023

Hire People Who Can ‘Look Around Corners’

Human Resources

Jun 6, 2023

Hire People Who Can ‘Look Around Corners’

When Genpact hires, it looks for people with curiosity, humility and learning agility.

Instead of focusing entirely on the usual talent indicators of background and experience, the 90,000 employee global professional services firm decided a few years ago that, as Piyush Mehta, Genpact’s CHRO, explains, “We need people who can look around corners.”

In an interview, Mehta pointed out that, “No single person has all the answers. And the answers today are not going to be relevant one or two years from now.” Leaders and future leaders are needed “who are curious and who will learn and unlearn every day.”

It began as a sort of experiment, at first hiring 100 people using that criteria. “You’d be surprised how easily curiosity and learning agility comes through when you get them talking about a topic that is important to them,” Mehta said.

Hiring managers asked behavioral questions about “How they’ve approached projects they worked on. How broad was their thinking? How were they able to connect the dots?”

“You get to understand how and what they have learned,” said Mehta.

Many of the roles those first 100 hires filled were jobs that traditionally would go to people with years more experience. Today, he said, “Many of these people are in some of the most important roles in the company.”

He, himself, was promoted to CHRO from a junior HR position several rungs down. It happened, Mehta explained, because he impressed the CEO by speaking up at a meeting he was covering for his superiors. He took a different position from the views of nearly everyone else in the room and turned out to be correct.

It’s a lesson that’s shaped his leadership style and one, he urges, new CHROs should learn. In sensitive discussions, he counsels, be transparent and avoid becoming enmeshed in the politics. “You have to lay out the facts and say, ‘This is the way it is. You may not agree with the interpretation of the facts, but if these are the facts, how would you react to them?’”

“It’s important that people see you as being transparent and trustworthy. That’s not learned overnight, and that doesn’t come with your title.”

Photo by Zach Lucero

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