PEOPLE
GLOBAL HR LEADER
THE POWER OF TEAMWORK HRDC caught up with Chris Taylor, chief HR officer at Best Buy Canada, to chat about his unlikely path into the industry and what he believes younger HR leaders must do to rise to the top
HRDC: How did you start your career in HR? Chris Taylor: I began my career as a retail leader with a large retail company in Canada – I thought this was going to be my career path. However, I was asked to take on a training and development role that I didn’t feel I was wired to do, nor at the time did I believe I had the relevant skills to train my colleagues. But, after a number of conversations, it was clear to me that this was something my organization really wanted me to do. Sometimes you don’t see what others see. I had enough trust in the company that if it didn’t turn out well, I’d always have my operations path open to me. So I took a leap of faith and stepped into an HR role. And honestly, I’ve never looked back. It was a fantastic decision. I could never have imagined that it would set me on the path it did. I’ve been able to move through a number of different positions, progressing over time, before finally ending up as CHRO at Best Buy Canada.
HRDC: What does your role at Best Buy Canada entail? CT: My role by structure is a fairly traditional
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one. At Best Buy Canada, we have around 12,000 employees across the country. We’ve got about 175 stores, and I have an HR team of around 100 staff who deal with all the various outputs, such as recruitment, HRIS, rewards, engagement, benefits, learning, and health and safety. My personal transition went from leading the function across all of HR to setting the
challenges you’ve faced, and how did you overcome it? CT: I’ve had so many challenges throughout my career, but the one that really sticks out for me happened just a few years ago. For many years, we operated under two separate and distinct brands. As the retail landscape shifted, we reacted by making the decision to consolidate these two brands into one.
“The days of HR being purely about solving people issues are gone. We do play a huge part in that, but we also focus on creating leaders who can do all this on their own” entire people strategy for the company. Supporting Best Buy’s overall business objectives in such competitive times has been my biggest challenge. Now, along with my team, my role is to evolve the organization from a people and culture perspective.
HRDC: What’s one of the biggest
For me, as an HR leader, it was a daunting task to be a part of figuring out how we were going to bring this to fruition in such a short timeline – we completed the reorganization in four short months. What stays with me most from this experience is that you should not attempt to do everything on your own. Surround yourself with top talent and take a
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22/10/2019 4:36:48 AM