HR Business Partner at Cognizant in Dallas, Texas

Job Description:

POSITION & OVERVIEW

 

Global Human Resources Business Partner will be a highly commercially focused professional, able to work in partnership with technology focused Business Leaders to nurture and retain the new-age workforce in the fast paced digital world and effectively navigate a team in a global matrixed structure. A key accountability is to support the management of change across the Business Units. S/he will be future-oriented, recognize and contribute to the on-going transformation of the key dimensions of HR such as Talent Development, Employee Retention and HR Operations in a fairly distributed environment with workforce across the globe. S/he will have a strong commercial mindset, be familiar with modern technological solutions offered to our clients, and have a high orientation toward Collaboration, Innovation, Learning & Development and Talent Management within a uniquely empowered environment. 

Size and Scope of the role

 

The HR Business Partner (GHRBP) is an internal consultant providing an enabling business support role for the global Services Lines (DS&T, CDB and CDO). The GHRBP is a trusted partner and has a seat at the leadership table working on medium to longer term objectives to support organisational effectiveness. The role is part of the Corporate HR function and aligned to one of our 5 main business areas.

 

Purpose of the role

 

Drive people strategy for their business area, alongside teams of specialists and operational support teams. Work closely with business leaders to build organisational and people capability, plan and manage talent and develop strategic approaches that achieve shared organisational objectives.

 

RESPONSIBILITIES: The key responsibilities for the individual are listed below:

 

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  Establish HR as a key constituent of the overall business: The Human Resources Business Partner will act as a business partner to the DS&T global service line integrating HR and business strategy and effectively dovetailing HR with business planning as well as day-to-day operations with a vision to foresee opportunities and mitigate risks. S/he must view this role as a position of business partnership and leadership and not merely of functional support. S/he will need to strategically think and act as a thought partner, have a high degree of future orientation and prepare the organization for the next phase of growth, for example; What should the profile of the new age manager that is expected to manage both people and bots look like?, or How can our organization reskill and train the workforce in the age of automation to stay relevant?, and so on.  These efforts will also help him/her to subsequently build credibility for the HR function as a strategic contributor to the organization and create “maximum positive” impact on the business.

   

   

  
  


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  Develop and implement innovative HR policies and systems suited for a growth oriented organization: The Human Resources Business Partner will be required to develop and scale HR policies and systems best suited for a growth-oriented organization. S/he should strategize and align HR policies to business goals for enabling a performance-driven culture and fun-filled work environment. Moreover, as the leader of the HR function, the individual will need to think what works best in terms of the emerging needs of the business, broader macroeconomic factors and changing workforce, for instance, How can a Digital leader best manage the Work-from-Home model, What should be the organization’s policy on social media?, What changes are to be made to become a more Millennial-friendly workforce?, and structure the HR policies accordingly. Moreover, ease of implementation and sufficient room for modification in a constantly evolving environment is highly important.

   

  
  


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  Drive towards best-in-class: The individual will bring a global mindset across the organization and develop a framework to succeed in a global environment while integrating best-in-class processes and policies into the organization. S/he will drive synergies and best practices from individual pockets of excellence into the broader group t0 cultivate a compelling well-rounded brand. This will include “being digital” in the contexts of employee engagement, workplace learning and automation. S/he should champion learning programs that prepare the employees to maneuver through the changing technological trends. S/he should have managed and grown in a matrix organization, have the maturity and confidence to lead large multi-cultural/ national and multi-geography teams and the gravitas and credibility to influence diverse global stakeholders.

  
  

 

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  Reinforce a deeply performance oriented culture, with emphasis on strong collaboration and team work: The individual will need to set the tone towards building an even higher performance culture based on ‘best in class’ standards and a continuous effort to achieve stretch targets. S/he will facilitate the creation of high performance teams through skill building, potential development, and productivity-enhancement – through both people and structure focused interventions. S/he will foster a culture where senior executives overcome the inherent tendency to adhere to status quo and embrace change wholeheartedly

   

  
  


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  Manage and maintain relationships in a large organization: The individual should have the stature and credibility to command respect and acceptance and be able to deal with organizational complexity and matrixed structures (local & global) by being a strong influencer. S/he should have the ability to understand business, constantly question the value-add and develop innovative solutions to partners in the organization. S/he would also be required to keep HR business partners, HR functional leaders, and colleagues abreast of corporate and line initiatives and their impact on the HR construct.

   

   

  
  


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  Drive strategic talent development and management: The individual will play a pivotal role in ensuring that organizational talent needs are fulfilled in line with their growth objectives. S/he will need to quickly understand the organization DNA and innovate talent engagement and retention strategies. With a sound understanding of the business dynamics, market forces and local talent trends, s/he will lead the people agenda and build a strong value proposition to assimilate and retain the best talent. S/he will guide efforts to design innovative retention strategies and determine an optimal mix of reward components and customize it in different geographies if there is a need. S/he will also oversee business training programs and ensure sufficient effort is expended on developing next generation of leaders and succession planning.

   

  
  


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  Be a compliance and governance regulator: S/he will play the leadership role on issues of workforce compliance, risk management and broader governance across markets of presence. As Cognizant centralizes its key functions and moves to a global structure, ensuring compliance and accountability for key processes becomes increasingly important.

   

  
  


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  Lead and mentor a virtual team: In order to achieve the desired results, it will be critical for the individual to leverage the capability and experience of a wider professional HR community. In addition this role is a key member of the BU leadership team and this will entail emphasis on coaching and mentoring to upgrade the capabilities of existing leadership, reassigning individuals based on competency fit and/or new talent to fill organizational gaps. S/he essentially becomes the catalyst for managing the human capital – the most important resource – during any organizational change. 

   

  
  

The HRBP will be empowered to enable business strategy by delivering effective approaches that address the people challenges of their business area

• Advises leadership on strategic people imperatives: engagement, headcount planning, skill development, compensation and proposes action plans and interventions

 

• Defines BU specific talent strategy, including design on attract, acquire, hire, retain, develop, reward initiatives

 

• Performance Management: responsibility for developing a performance led culture through introduction of Talent policies developed in synchronicity with the corporate team, with true meritocracy and capability discernment at their core. Ensure quarterly check ins are supported and actioned. For Commercial/ Markets: ensure sales performance metrics are properly communicated and performance issues addressed.

 

• Promotion Process: Responsibilities for managing a professional merit based promotion process, supporting the business in grading the roles appropriately with affordability of pyramid, linking promotion with pyramid shape and ensuring diversity and capability is properly considered. 

 

• Work Force Planning: Responsibilities for working with the business to develop a 12-18 month perspective of workforce skills requirements, numbers, grades, locations and ensuring that delivery, recruitment, resource management  and academy colleagues get  sufficient line of sight of these requirements to meet demand.

 

• YEA: Year End Assessment: Responsibilities for ensuring a professional and calibrated process is run internally, to identify high potential and flight risk issues.

 

• Training/Workforce Development: Responsibilities for ensuring there is sufficient capability to meet client future demand.

 

• Run talent reviews, flight risk reviews, 9 box grid discussions and career pathway discussions to appreciate capabilities, ambition and expectation of a high performing workforce.

 

• Coach and support the business leadership community on their talent agenda, and personal interventions with their teams.

 

• Run Diversity deep dive reviews and create action plans accordingly

 

• Promote the annual employee survey and create action plans to ensure employee engagement is at the forefront of talent considerations

 

• Connect with the 3 other elements of the HR eco-systems: Global COE to provide business input for development of policy; Country HR for alignment particularly with local labor laws and customs: and Shared Services.  Change Management is a key function – navigating through monumental change

 

• Manages relationship between HR COE functions and the leaders – one tollgate to synthesize all input/requests / actions coming in for a one-HR experience to the business

 

• Build relationships and form alliances with internal/external counterparts, communities of practice and stakeholders to scan for innovations and opportunities to drive organisational performance

 

• Coach and build the capability of senior managers to pre-empt organisational issues and help improve business efficiency

 

• Use data and analytics to measure the effectiveness of HR policies and practices and understand the landscape to continuously drive further improvements

Cognizant desires to bring on board an accomplished HR leader, with a stellar track record and a rigorous grounding in generalist HR roles. The candidate must bring strong passion for people, and seek joy in making them successful. S/he should have managed and sustained in a matrixed organization, have the maturity and the self-confidence to lead large multi-cultural and multi-geographic teams, and the gravitas and credibility to influence diverse stakeholders. S/he should have a strong understanding of organizational culture and strategy to develop a shared vision and drive change to further employee engagement.

 

 

SKILLS & COMPETENCIES

 

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  Results Orientation - energised by a challenge, setting new and stretching goals for self or team and the ability to exploit opportunities to exceed goals, overcome obstacles, and plan for contingencies to ensure delivery. Also, the ability to execute at scale will be a critical pre-requisite for this role.

   

  
  


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  Strategic Orientation - can articulate evolving priorities for the business within 3-5 year horizon and the ability to integrate a variety of information into and translate corporate strategy into the definition of a business unit strategy.

   

  
  


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  Virtual Team Leadership - as demonstrated by the ability to actively engage the wider team to help form specific decisions and plans, resolve issues through collaborative problem solving, and the creation of a performance-oriented work culture. Also, the ability to gain commitment through logic and to recognise contributors.

   

  
  


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  Collaboration and Influencing Abilities - as demonstrated by the ability to work in teams and actively engage with colleagues to openly discuss issues and utilise their expertise and inputs towards achieving goals. Essentially, the individual will have a fundamentally collaborative style, with the finesse of managing within a matrixed environment and work with and lead a global and multi-cultural workforce. Additionally, the ability to build informal networks, both internally and externally, and to view them as part of the value creation process.

   

  
  


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  Customer Focus - identifies opportunities that will benefit the customer, focuses on developing, delivering and improving existing products and services, challenges and engages clients successfully and works in partnership to drive the business forward.

   

  
  


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  Innovation - as demonstrated by a high degree of comfort with digital tools including social media skills and familiarity with disruptive technologies and comfort with innovative learning practices, such as eLearning, and online academies.  As also the ability to ensure that the latest trends and innovations in HR are captured and integrated into the HR strategy.

   

  Change Management Leadership - as demonstrated by the ability to lead and drive change in the organization by effectively championing a change management mind-set across the business. The ability to identify potential points of resistance and develop specific plans to mitigate or address the concerns of key stakeholders; work closely with business leaders to align structures and behaviours to support change management initiatives, and also ensure that the business adopts a positive approach to managing talent across the broad employee base.

  Influences and builds relationships for effective collaboration across the organisation

  Role models great personal and team leadership and takes an active role in ensuring the HR Operating Model is embedded successfully;  collaborates as one HR team

  Questions and challenges others to get to the root of people and business issues faced by the organisation

  Good understanding of the organisation, its strategy and customers

   

  PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS

  
  

 

The Human Resources Business Partner will be required to participate in strategic business decisions and will be a thought partner – s/he must have the intellect, gravitas, and experience to contribute as a strategic stakeholder; at the same time, s/he must wear ‘operational HR’ hat as needed. The individual must be a “doer” with a high level of initiative and drive, and the maturity and credibility to lead initiatives in HR sub-functions.

 

The ideal candidate should have the ability to influence people and generate trust and confidence in them. S/he should be strong on relationship-building skills, stakeholder management and customer focus (both internal and external). Strong cross-cultural interpersonal communication with an ability to communicate effectively throughout all geographies / levels of the organization is vital.

 

It is important that the candidate exhibits flexibility in thinking and pragmatic problem solving skills – thinking ‘outside of the box’ and oscillating between the big picture and details. S/he should be a strong team player with the ability to work effectively with people and build good internal and external networks.  S/he should also be conscientious, transparent, open professional who shares information and shuns hierarchy and has a very strong operating discipline.

 

S/he should be a self-starter with a positive, ‘can do’ high-energy approach and someone who brings proven capacity to inspire, lead and challenge people constructively, has new ideas and enjoys empowerment. Ability to innovate and challenge past paradigms, manage change and have high stamina and determination to succeed in the role, would be desirable. Most importantly, the candidate must have impeccable integrity

 

PERSON SPECIFICATION:  Desirable Qualifications Include:

·         Undergraduate degree from an accredited College or University; Educational achievement plus 15 years senior experience

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  Relevant HR or business experience gained in large complex organisation(s) with multiple stakeholders (including matrix relationships)

  
  


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  Knowledge of current thinking in Human Resources issues and trends, and evidence of Continuing Professional Development.

  
  

 

Work Authorization

Candidates based in United States; must be legally authorized to work in the United States without the need for employer sponsorship, now or at any time in the future.

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