IN A NUTSHELL:
First job: Waitressing
Childhood ambition: To be a psychologist
Best boss and why: They challenged me to deliver at my highest potential, in
a way that was real and true to myself. They also empowered me to deliver
on what I thought was important to the overall good of the organization and
placed importance on the wisdom and guidance I had to offer.
Current source of inspiration: The employees of Green Shield Canada. As
a newcomer to the organization, I’ve been so
inspired by how committed they are to giving
back to the community and how dedicated they
are to our mission.
Best piece of advice ever received: Be an
authentic leader. People will admire and
respect you most for this.
Favourite music: I like all types. I choose my
music depending on my mood and how loud I
want it to be.
Last book read: Essentialism: The Disciplined
Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown
one of the strongest indicators of someone’s
future potential is their coachability.
Go above and beyond in every role that
you hold, no matter what it is, to let others
imagine you in future roles.
The HR field has been evolving.
What changes excite you the most?
ML: I’m really excited about the strides
that the Human Resources Professionals
Association (HRPA) has made having HR
recognized as a profession, through the new
competency framework and related designations.
It establishes us on a level showing
competency and credibility, similar to other
credible professions. The other aspect I really
love about our field is that it’s evolved
from a transactional role to a strategic
business partner, integral in the key decision
making that allows the organization
to deliver on its strategy – that part is really
exciting to me as a senior HR practitioner.
What’s the future of HR?
ML: The notion of HR providing value
to the organization as a key business
partner, which is really about removing
the transactional stuff to the degree possible,
and delivering as a strategic problem
solver. Our ability to quantify our decisionmaking
and leverage the use of analytics to
drive key decisions will become more important
and critical.
As the world and industries become
more competitive, the key differentiating
factor will remain our people. We will,
therefore, need to have a better understanding
of the jobs of tomorrow and how we can
develop employee knowledge and skills to
be able to deliver on the expectations associated
with those new roles that, in some
cases, don’t even exist yet. We will have
to factor in the different motivations and
needs of our growing millennial population.
And how does all of that translate into
future employment models, further challenging
the whole concept of flex hours and
part-time versus full-time roles? We may
find ourselves partnering more with our
school systems to understand and influence
the degrees and diplomas being taught
so we can have graduates with the skills
we need coming out of the post-secondary
school system. Our future is exciting! n
In Human Resources
every rule has
an exception
Umana handles
your rules and
your exceptions
Rule-based software
that puts you in control
Meet Umana! — the unique fully integrated
system that truly understands both HR and
payroll processes.
Umana’s unified design melds HR + Time-andattendance
+ Payroll into a consistent, seamless
whole, with date-in-time logic to see where you’re
going and where you’ve been, and power-tools to
make life easy.
Made for medium-size business
Umana is designed for organizations of 150 to
1,500 employees, with complex needs and a modest
budget.
If you deal with collective agreements you know
what we mean. That’s where Umana shines. It
can automate your processes while keeping you in
control. And Umana’s extensible architecture allows
it to be customized to your unique needs.
We work together with you
Let us train you, work with you to implement your
rules and processes, and transfer your existing data.
Our step-by-step process insures success and lets
you implement features and modules at your pace.
Guaranteed to succeed
• A single fully-integrated system
• Extreme flexibility to meet your needs
• Empowers your managers
• Automate your processes while keeping control
• Easy integration with existing systems
• Power tools: alarms, wizards, watches
• First-class support
Exceptional software
from Carver Technologies
www.umana.ca
614-861-9796
HRPATODAY.CA ❚ OCTOBER 2016 ❚ 53
