The Data Driven Leader. Dearborn Jenny

with a light coating of January snow. She smiled to herself as she imagined the 70-degree weather back in Palo Alto, but Pam knew she’d made the right move.

      Pam never expected to become the chief human resources officer of Exalted Industries. With a meteoric career in sales, she had been recruited to Trajectory Systems, an Exalted subsidiary in Silicon Valley, as its chief sales officer. Weak revenues had threatened the company’s survival, and Trajectory CEO David Craig had brought her in to turn things around. A chance meeting with a young data whiz led Pam and her team to embark on a series of data analytics initiatives, transforming sales enablement. In a relatively short time, the company was back on track to hit its revenue targets, and David Craig was promoted to CEO of Exalted.

      After just a year leading Exalted, David had flown Pam to Chicago for a mysterious dinner meeting, revealing that the company faced more serious challenges than he’d expected: revenue was down, as were margins, customer satisfaction ratings, and the stock price. The media was extolling competitors’ innovations, while Exalted, although still the market leader, hadn’t launched a new product in three years, instead making several acquisitions that were only moderately successful. Making matters worse, attrition was up, with some high-profile exits. The competition was taking both customers and an alarming number of top sales reps.

      Pam had been caught off-guard – something she rarely experienced – when David offered her the role of CHRO.

      “I’m flattered, David, of course,” she said, “but why would a new HR leader be the answer to Exalted’s challenges? And why wouldn’t you fill the role with an experienced HR professional?”

      “I’ll answer your first question first. Losing key talent is part of it,” David explained, “but I also can’t ignore my leaders across the company who point fingers at HR when they talk about our problems. Sales jobs are going unfilled for months at a time, and our best reps are leaving just when we need them most. The latest employee engagement survey scores show morale at an all-time low, especially in Sales. And we’re desperate for fresh talent to get new products to market, but Talent Acquisition just isn’t bringing in the innovators we need.”

      “I can’t imagine that any one department could be the source of all the company’s problems,” Pam countered.