For HR leaders, this moment carries both urgent risk and opportunity. In terms of risks, current trends on both ends of the talent pipeline threaten leadership continuity, organizational performance, and long-term business success.

On the other hand, HR leaders have the most clarity to anticipate where leadership vulnerabilities will emerge by leveraging visibility into workforce demographics, engagement trends, capability gaps, and succession risks. HR also sits at the intersection of talent strategy and business strategy, giving it the authority and insight needed to redesign roles, reshape career paths, and build modern leadership development systems.

Current leadership shortages are not the result of a single issue but a convergence of trends that are reshaping the future of leadership. In this blog, we will provide clarity on the challenges of succession as well as actionable steps HR leaders can take to bolster pipelines and rethink organizational readiness.

Two Questions to Consider

Before organizations can redesign leadership pipelines for the future, they must first understand the scope of the succession challenge unfolding today. Two equally urgent and interconnected questions must be asked: Who is leaving leadership roles, and who is prepared to step into them? By examining both sides of the equation, HR leaders can more clearly identify where vulnerabilities lie and what strategic interventions are needed to sustain leadership continuity.

1. Who is going to retire? 

A significant percentage of today’s leaders are approaching retirement simultaneously, creating a major drain on institutional knowledge and capability. Since 2020, an estimated 5 million workers have left the labor force, and more than 80 percent were aged 55 or older.

For many organizations, this age group includes long-tenured individual contributors, seasoned managers, and a meaningful portion of director-level leaders. Their accelerated exit is driving critical vacancies and shrinking the leadership depth that organizations rely on.

2. Who is going to replace retirees?

Historically, management was the primary path to advancement, but shifting economic pressures, rising workload demands, and expectations for flexibility and well-being have changed this calculus. Nearly three in four Gen Z professionals prefer to deepen expertise rather than manage others—as a potential means of avoiding stress, limited autonomy, and misalignment with their values.

Another key factor contributing to the lack of interest in leadership roles is the confidence gap in current leaders: Only 46 percent of employees believe their manager is effective, for example. Collectively, these dynamics weaken the leadership pipeline that organizations have traditionally depended on.

Three Ways the Retirement Cliff Is Impacting Traditional Succession Models

To understand the full impact of the retirement cliff, it is important to examine the forces that are transforming leadership transitions. In response to increasingly rapid change, HR leaders are actively engaged in reworking priorities in talent development, employee data analysis, and workforce planning.

1. Retirement timelines are unpredictable

Senior leaders are retiring at uneven rates. In many organizations, some are postponing retirement due to economic uncertainty, while others are exiting early because of burnout or shifting personal priorities. This unpredictability makes it challenging for HR to plan leadership transitions and ensure a strong bench.

2. Mentorship is more necessary than ever

HR once relied on stable hierarchies and gradual leadership turnover. Succession planning focused on identifying a small set of ready-now leaders. But with more frequent and less predictable exits, those models are no longer adequate. New interventions such as long-term mentorship or multilayered leadership development are essential to rework succession and reduce the cost of acquiring talent for retirement-driven vacancies.

3. A leadership readiness strategy is now essential

As patterns of retirement become more volatile, HR must broaden talent identification and evaluate whether leadership roles need to be redesigned. A modernized approach to identifying and developing leaders is necessary to maintain continuity and support organizational performance. Rather than depending on traditional career ladders to naturally create pathways for the next generation of leaders, HR strategy must play a more active role in recognizing the skills and core competencies that the current workforce brings to the table, what needs to be developed, and how that translates to long-term needs.

Engaging the Next Generation

Factors such as hybrid work, artificial intelligence, and rising expectations around purpose and well-being are reshaping what the next generation of leaders wants from their careers. In many organizations, we are seeing that many traditional candidates for future leadership are “consciously stepping off the leadership track,” reflecting skepticism toward roles that feel stressful, inflexible, or disconnected from personal values.

One contributing factor influencing leadership development pipelines is that employees often see leadership experiences as neither motivating nor well supported. Of course, leadership is not for everyone. However, the issue seems to be less about who wants to be a leader and more about the traditional value propositions of organizational leadership, including financial gain and influence.

In fact, many early- and mid-career employees question whether leadership paths conflict with their personal values such as autonomy, meaningful impact, transparency, and well-being. They want roles that allow them to lead through collaboration and expertise—not hierarchy—and it is not clear whether current leadership roles are designed for that priority.

In response, HR leaders should take practical steps to address these concerns, including clarifying leadership role expectations, designing more manageable spans of control, strengthening coaching and development support, and creating pathways that allow for influence without sacrificing balance. These efforts to support future-ready organizations can ensure that leadership roles are motivating, sustainable, and supported by resources that enable leaders to succeed.

Bottom Line: Acting Now Saves Resources in the Long Run

Long-term investment in leadership development has been shown to increase both performance and bottom-line impact. This is particularly true when comparing the cost and performance of internal development to hiring external talent, showing that HR’s greatest source for future leaders already exists within the organization.

Organizations are experimenting with leadership models that better reflect today’s workforce expectations. Some are building dual career ladders that allow high-performers to advance through expertise instead of people management. Others are piloting shared or distributed leadership structures that reduce dependence on overstretched managers and elevate collaborative influence. There is also progress in modernizing manager support systems, such as AI-enabled workflows that reduce administrative burden and leadership training programs designed specifically for frontline supervisors.

These innovations are promising; however, many efforts remain isolated or stuck in the pilot stage. If an organization lacks a cohesive leadership architecture, it will continue to experience an uneven and insufficient leadership pipeline that will be worsened by rising rates of retirement. However, when HR steps into this moment with clarity and intention, the future of organizational leadership can look vastly different from today’s strained reality.

The post Who Will Lead Next? Rethinking the Leadership Pipeline appeared first on Seramount.

Meanwhile, the expectation to have expertise in the space feels overwhelming, and HR leaders want to ensure their organizations are prepared to get the most out of AI capabilities. Thus, they’re performing due diligence work to avoid the “garbage in, garbage out” problem. For example, a CHRO whose company has partnered with mine, Seramount, said they recently completed creating an AI governance structure. Now, they’re focused on understanding where AI can be deployed and what they can fully automate.

For CHROs, the challenge is clear: cutting through the noise to discern where AI can truly elevate the employee experience, workforce planning and organizational agility. My own reflections tell me this moment is less like a technology race and more like a leadership test. Are we willing to ask the harder questions—not just what AI can do, but what it should do?

Understanding The Hype Cycle

The AI transformation is well underway, but excitement peaked in 2023. Headlines declared the technology would revolutionize business and replace many, if not most, human workers. In just a year, however, sentiment shifted. In 2024, Indeed analysis indicated that there are no skills that an AI could fully take over.

The Hype Cycle, a model developed by Gartner to illustrate the stages of interest and adoption that new technologies typically undergo, serves as a helpful reference for understanding GenAI’s journey. There are five stages: innovation trigger, peak of inflated expectations, trough of disillusionment, slope of enlightenment and plateau of productivity.

In the beginning, new technologies generate substantial excitement and unrealistic expectations. Over time, as real-world applications and limitations become apparent, this enthusiasm tends to wane. Finally, genuine advancements and practical applications emerge, but this outcome can take a long time and effort to reach.

Just as there wasn’t a single rollout of the internet, GenAI isn’t a single technology with a single adoption curve. It’s a series of technologies, so we should expect multiple AI hype cycles with each new advance.

Where Should CHROs Focus During Hype Cycle Swings?

Whether we’re riding a high or navigating a low, there’s real work for HR to do when it comes to GenAI. This moment calls for action on three levels: embedding AI into our own workflows, preparing our people for AI adoption and tracking broader shifts in the labor market.

1. Integrating AI Into Team Workflows

From talent acquisition to performance reviews, there are many ways HR teams can begin leveraging GenAI. But success isn’t about chasing the latest tech. It’s about solving real problems at the department level.

One example is Accenture’s “Feedback Coach” (registration required), a tool that drafts written feedback based on post-project assessments. Embedded in Microsoft Teams and Workday, the Feedback Coach has been used by staff more than 3 million times and has increased input by 89%.

When choosing GenAI tools, follow three key steps: start small, identify practical use cases, then build from there.

2. Organization-Wide AI Readiness

AI enablement can’t be IT’s job alone. According to 2024 Gallup research, few employees feel they have the skills needed to incorporate AI into their day-to-day work. HR leaders need to foster a culture of readiness and ensure employees have the necessary skills to integrate AI into their workflows.

Hearst presents a useful case study in the benefits of customized training around GenAI adoption. The major publisher implemented a function-specific GenAI training program. The initiative trained advertising operations employees on AI technology to streamline their sales and media planning processes. The resulting increase in efficiency and desired outcomes demonstrates that when organizations invest in relevant training, successful adoption is not only possible but attainable.

3. Macro Labor Market Changes

Beyond internal application and employee readiness, CHROs must keep an eye on AI’s impact on skill demand in the market. The real risk now is a skills mismatch. AI will disrupt and displace many jobs, requiring mass reskilling for workers considering industries with more resilient or new AI-driven jobs. As demand for AI-skilled talent continues to rise, HR teams should focus on fostering critical soft skills like leadership, problem-solving and interpersonal skills.

Where We Go From Here

As generative AI continues to evolve, the temptation is to chase the latest tools or mirror competitors moves. But true leadership means resisting the allure of hype and instead grounding decisions in clarity, ethics and long-term value. CHROs are uniquely positioned to lead this discernment—not as technologists, but as stewards of culture, talent and trust.

The choices made today will shape both how organizations leverage AI and how employees experience its impact on their work and well-being. The question is not whether generative AI will transform our world; we know it already is. The question is whether we will meet this moment with foresight, responsibility and a commitment to putting people at the center of progress.

The post CHROs’ Role In Separating Hype From Reality When It Comes To GenAI appeared first on Seramount.

According to McKinsey’s 2025 “State of AI” report, 78% of organizations document using AI, yet less than 1% consider themselves “mature” in its deployment. Even as adoption rates remain high, a 2025 MIT study found that 95% of GenAI pilots fail to produce meaningful ROI, largely because experimentation never evolves into enterprise-level change. The data is clear: AI adoption is accelerating, but organizational capability is not keeping pace.

HR’s role in AI implementation needs to go beyond calming anxieties that “robots will take our jobs.” The real risk is a growing divide between employees who have AI skills and those who don’t. For HR leaders, this moment presents a critical opportunity: Help employees see AI as a tool that enhances their impact, not one that undermines it.

AI is accelerating and the stakes are rising. But culture—not code—is the secret weapon that keeps transformation on track. Managing AI responsibly means protecting the data that powers change and aligning people and purpose around how it’s used. That alignment now falls squarely to CHROs.

Three Reasons Why AI Efforts Stall

Despite significant investment, most organizations struggle to convert AI ambition into measurable impact. The challenge isn’t the technology—it’s alignment. Leaders can communicate AI’s potential, but employees need clear insight into how that potential affects what they do today, what will be expected tomorrow, and where they fit in the organization’s future. That alignment gap shows up across three persistent barriers.

1. Strategy Without Translation

AI strategies often look compelling on paper, yet employees still ask, “What does this mean for me?” Companies communicate transformation plans, launch new tools, and promote enterprise-wide vision, but employees rarely receive the practical translation they need to change behavior. Many hear about AI in broad terms but cannot see how it integrates into workflows or how their responsibilities will shift. Without that clarity, even well-designed strategies stall. Organizations invest heavily in messaging, yet employees often remain disconnected from the very changes they are expected to adopt.

2. Change Without Trust

Concerns about trust extend far beyond whether employees are using AI appropriately. Increasingly, the deeper question is whether employees trust their organization to use AI fairly, transparently, and in ways that support—not jeopardize—their opportunities. These internal concerns mirror a broader societal trend: Public skepticism in AI still circulates, shaped by constant headlines about biased outputs, misuse of data, and human replacement.

Inside organizations, those same issues show up in tangible ways. Research from the Algorithmic Justice League and Brookings finds that women, people of color, lower-wage earners, and later-career professionals are significantly less likely to receive AI training or be included in early pilots, clear signs of inequitable access. When employees see AI advancement as something happening around them rather than with them, skepticism grows, confidence erodes, and the cultural foundation needed for innovation becomes increasingly fragile.

3. Learning Without Context

Most employees don’t feel prepared for the future of work, not because they resist learning, but because the learning they receive lacks relevance. Here at Seramount, we found that only 23% of employees believe they have the skills they need to integrate AI into their workflow. Simultaneously, only one in five organizations has a defined AI adoption strategy. Managers, too, often lack the tools to model new behaviors or guide their teams through change. Without contextual learning anchored in real work, capability gaps widen and adoption stalls.

These barriers aren’t technical failures. They are cultural ones. And until organizations address the alignment gap between strategy and the human experience of change, AI will continue to advance faster than the culture needed to sustain it.

What Leading CHROs Do Differently: From Technical Rollout to Culture Redesign

AI transformation has become a test of leadership, and CHROs are now the linchpin. They are the only executives with line of sight across trust, culture, workflow friction, skills, manager capability, and workforce risk.

Organizations that break through treat AI adoption as a culture redesign, not a technical rollout. Leading CHROs are shifting their strategies in three ways:

1. They redesign workflows, not just introduce tools. Rather than pushing AI at employees, they co-design new processes that pair human judgment with machine intelligence. The goal isn’t automation—it’s collaboration.
2. They operationalize transparency. Rather than limiting the use of AI to specific pilot groups, they make implementation visible. They open discussion on where it’s used and governed, how decisions are made, and what resources employees have available to them to learn and experiment safely.
3. They build cultures that learn faster than change. Instead of one-off training, they invest in continuous, role-specific upskilling tied to actual workflows. They equip managers to model curiosity, normalize questions, and share what they learn.

Above all, effective HR leaders are partners in AI implementation. They start by listening to their employees—not to check a box, but to diagnose the friction beneath the surface. Scaled listening reveals where trust is fading, where skills gaps persist, and where employees have lost the thread of the “why” behind strategy. That clarity becomes a strategic accelerant: When people understand change and see their role in it, adoption, trust, and innovation rise together.

Bottom Line

AI doesn’t stall because the technology isn’t ready. It stalls because organizations haven’t aligned people, purpose, and culture with the strategy behind it. Employees resist change only when they can’t see where they fit, when the process feels inequitable, or when the “why” behind decisions remains unclear.

CHROs now sit at the center of this alignment challenge, responsible for connecting vision to behavior, strategy to capability, and innovation to trust. It’s a complex mandate that requires both foresight and a strong peer community to navigate what comes next.

Organizations that integrate these capabilities will build a workforce ready not just to adopt AI, but to thrive with it. Those without that alignment risk falling behind—not just in capability, but in credibility.

The post Why Your AI Strategy Needs HR More than Ever appeared first on Seramount.

This public debate has collapsed two separate issues—productivity and physical presence—into one narrative. But the evidence tells a far clearer story.

Well-designed hybrid work consistently improves engagement, retention, and, in many cases, productivity itself. Employees report they are able to work more efficiently, protect focus time, and better manage their energy when given flexibility in where and when they work.

For HR leaders, this disconnect presents both a challenge and an opportunity. The debate isn’t really about where people sit; it’s about how organizations define, measure, and experience productivity. And no one is better positioned to lead that redefinition than HR leaders.

Hybrid Didn’t Create a Productivity Problem—It Revealed a Measurement One

Most anxiety surrounding hybrid work stems from measurement systems built for another era. As the research shows, many organizations still rely on legacy metrics—time in seat, output volume, visible activity—systems built for an in-office world that can’t capture how value is created in a distributed one.

When those signals stop working, leaders understandably look for the most visible cue to latch onto, usually attendance. But visibility is not value. And surveillance is not measurement. Monitoring keystrokes, scanning badge data, or tracking idle time won’t restore productivity; it will erode trust.

Research continues to show that cultures built on trust outperform cultures built on visibility. Stanford researchers found that hybrid employees not only maintained productivity but had one-third higher retention rates, a clear sign of what’s possible when autonomy and clarity reinforce one another. When employees feel trusted, engagement rises and teams bring more energy to their work. Strengthening productivity, in other words, comes from setting clearer expectations and building the alignment people need to do their best work.

This is where HR leadership becomes essential: making productivity transparent by defining clear outcomes and the behaviors that drive them, and doing so with employees at the table.

What HR Leaders Must Do Now to Redefine Productivity

Redefining productivity in a hybrid era starts with transparency—making expectations visible, shared, and grounded in how work actually gets done today. Research from Deloitte and RAND shows that sustainable performance comes from clear outcomes supported by engagement, autonomy, and well-being. To sustain excellence within flexible work arrangements, business leaders must redefine productivity through the following interconnected outcomes:

• Business impact measures the results, quality, and innovation that advance strategic goals.
• Collaboration captures how teams connect, share knowledge, and generate new ideas across locations.
• Engagement reflects the energy, focus, and well-being that enable long-term efficiency and effectiveness.

But transparency only works when it’s grounded in employee experience and input. In one mid-size organization we supported, the CEO wanted to make “Boosting Productivity” a top priority for 2026, driven by a lingering belief that performance had never fully recovered post-COVID, even with new tools, hybrid flexibility, and larger teams.

Before introducing any new expectations, leaders needed to understand how these norms would land and what was actually hindering productivity in the day-to-day. With Seramount’s support, they brought roughly 1,000 senior leaders together for an Employee Voice Session to pressure-test a draft of their new “Ways of Working That Strengthen Performance.” Leaders were asked directly: What feels clear? What feels unclear? And what won’t work, given the reality of how your teams operate today?

Instead of resistance, employees surfaced practical friction points—meeting overload, unclear priorities, inconsistent modeling—that would have quietly derailed the rollout. Their input allowed the company to refine expectations around impact, collaboration, and engagement so the standards were clear, usable, and culturally aligned.

This is the work HR must lead: co-creating outcome-based standards and the everyday behaviors that bring them to life. When employees help build the system, expectations gain credibility, trust strengthens, and productivity becomes something people can meaningfully achieve—not something measured through outdated proxies.

The Enablers of a Modern Productivity System

Once productivity standards are clear and co-created, HR leaders must ensure the rest of the system reinforces them.

Managers must lead with consistency, connection, and fairness.

In hybrid environments, proximity should not determine opportunity. Yet research shows remote employees remain less likely to be promoted or recognized. Managers must support their employees by communicating expectations, mitigating bias, and maintaining meaningful weekly conversations that anchor performance and well-being. These habits are what create equitable, high-performing hybrid teams—not physical visibility.

AI must be implemented in ways that protect human engagement.

AI can accelerate output, but research from Nature and the Harvard Business Review shows it can also dampen employees’ sense of ownership and connection if introduced without intention. HR leaders can guide organizations to adopt AI through structured experimentation, transparent communication, and the reinforcement that AI augments—not replaces—human judgment and creativity.

Well-being must be treated as a performance system, not a perk.

Burnout is one of the most expensive drains on productivity. Gallup estimates global burnout costs $8.9 trillion annually. Seramount research shows burned-out employees are 2.6 times more likely to leave. HR leaders can redesign work to sustain energy, protecting focus time, balancing workloads, and supporting caregivers and historically marginalized groups who benefit most from well-designed hybrid flexibility.

These are not “extras”—they are the conditions that enable people to meet the outcome standards business leaders set.

The Step Leaders Still Underestimate: Listening as Strategic Infrastructure

Even the best-defined standards will fail if employees don’t see their experiences reflected in them. What matters isn’t just listening—it’s structured listening that feeds directly into change management. When organizations gather real insight through voice sessions, focused dialogues, and ongoing feedback, then use those insights to shape decisions, productivity stays grounded in reality and employees trust the process.

Listening shows employees they are partners in shaping how work evolves. It reduces skepticism. It surfaces friction early. And it turns productivity from something policed to something co-owned.

Listening is the system that keeps transparency alive.

Redefining Productivity Is HR’s Leadership Mandate

The future of productivity will not be restored by mandates, monitoring, or nostalgia for pre-pandemic norms. It will be shaped by whether organizations define productivity with clarity, measure it transparently, and refine it continuously with their people.

HR leaders are uniquely positioned to lead that shift—not by choosing sides in the hybrid debate, but by establishing the frameworks that move the conversation beyond presence and toward performance.

Hybrid work can expose fractures or fuel transformation. The difference depends on whether HR leads the redefinition—or lets legacy assumptions write the next chapter.

The post The Productivity Strategy That Actually Boosts Performance: Build It with Your People appeared first on Seramount.

Proactive Inclusion in a Complex World

Barry shared encouraging data, illustrating how inclusive hiring efforts are paying off. In a study of recruitment practices across the UK, Canada, and India, companies employing “tried-and-true” inclusion tactics – diverse candidate slates, diverse interview panels, mandatory bias training, and targeted sourcing – saw tangible results. In the UK, for example, 50% of new hires this year were women, up from 46% in 2023, with similar rises in Canada (55%, up from 51%) and modest results in India (37%, up from 36%). These upticks in women’s hiring underscore how inclusive talent strategies can drive measurable progress, reinforcing Barry’s point that inclusion can be a competitive advantage in every market. Barry also highlighted partnership as a catalyst for innovation: The StepStone Group, a global leader in digital recruitment and the summit’s host, exemplifies how embedding inclusion at a platform’s core helps connect talent to opportunity at scale. StepStone’s own Head of Diversity & Inclusion, Bianca Stringuini, echoed this vision of inclusion-fueled innovation in her welcome remarks, setting the stage for a day of learning and collaboration.

From Compliance to Influence: Aligning HR Leadership

The first session dug into a foundational question: how can Chief Diversity Officers (CDOs) and Chief Human Resources Officers (CHROs) join forces to amplify impact? James Cowling-Vega, shared insights from a new Seramount study based on interviews with over 100 CHROs. The research revealed that while most HR leaders support Inclusion in principle, truly integrating inclusion into business strategy requires moving beyond compliance-driven approaches to ones centered on influence and collaboration. Cowling-Vega noted that effective CDO-CHRO partnerships hinge on speaking the language of business outcomes. This theme of “shifting from explaining inclusion to executing with influence” resonated throughout the day. In fact, Seramount’s latest pulse survey found that only 1 in 5 CDOs feel they can effectively influence their C-suite on Inclusion, even as 90% say securing senior leadership buy-in is their top priority. Closing that gap is critical – without the ability to clearly link inclusion to business value, Inclusion efforts risk being sidelined or defunded in today’s environment. Cowling-Vega’s session underscored a clear call to action: HR and Inclusion leaders must continue to evolve from box-checking to business-aligned strategies, using data and influence to embed inclusion into executive agendas.

Moving with Trust in AI

A lively fireside chat on emerging technology examined the cutting-edge of inclusion practice: AI in HR. Nicola Weatherhead, StepStone Group’s VP of Talent Acquisition & People Operations, joined Subha Barry for a candid discussion on the promise and perils of artificial intelligence in people management. Weatherhead, a veteran tech industry people leader, and Barry emphasized moving forward with trust in AI – harnessing AI’s efficiencies in recruiting and talent management while maintaining human oversight and fairness. Attendees openly shared their experiences via live poll: many organizations are still in early exploratory stages of integrating AI in HR, and the top concerns on everyone’s mind are bias, transparency, and compliance with rapidly evolving laws. Weatherhead addressed these head-on, citing the forthcoming EU AI Act as a prime example of why HR leaders must stay proactive. Her guidance: treat AI as a tool to augment, not replace, human judgment, and build diverse teams to vet AI-driven decisions for unintended bias. She described StepStone’s approach to ethical AI – from rigorous bias testing in algorithms to cross-functional governance – as a model of balancing innovation with responsibility. The takeaway was clear: trust and innovation can co-exist. With the right guardrails, AI can help streamline hiring and expand talent pools, but earning employee trust means prioritizing ethics and transparency at every step.

Navigating Legal Headwinds in Inclusion

Legal and regulatory shifts have rocked the Inclusion landscape worldwide, a reality brought to life by Chris Bracebridge, Partner at Covington & Burling LLP and a leader on the firm’s global Inclusion Council. Bracebridge led a session on inclusion under pressure – how recent legal changes demand agile strategies from Inclusion and HR teams. He noted that in just the past 18 months, dramatic changes have altered what’s permissible or practicable in corporate Inclusion programs. From high-profile court decisions on affirmative action in the U.S., to new European regulations like the AI Act and pay transparency directives, to evolving UK compliance requirements – the rules of engagement for Inclusion are being rewritten in real time. Bracebridge broke down these complexities with practical clarity, reassuring leaders that inclusion and compliance are not mutually exclusive. For instance, he pointed out that even amid political pushback, companies can focus on inclusive practices that are universally beneficial, such as mentorship programs or diversity in recruitment, which carry low legal risk but high cultural impact. The key is to stay informed and creative: adjusting language, reframing programs, and doubling down on business relevance can help inclusion initiatives survive external challenges. Bracebridge’s bottom line: Inclusion leaders must become deft navigators of change, influencing stakeholders with both vision and vigilance. His insights – coming from a firm that’s been advising global companies through these storms since 2021 – provided a roadmap for turning legal “disruption into opportunity”, sparking ideas on how to future-proof inclusion efforts.

Macro Trends and Inclusion: An Economist’s View

After lunch, the summit zoomed out to a macro-economic lens, examining how broad labor market trends influence workplace inclusion. Julius Probst, Appcast’s European Labor Economist, presented a data-rich look at the British economy and job market in 2025. Probst, shared sobering statistics: the UK’s unemployment rate has crept up to 4.6%, and job vacancies have declined to their lowest since before the pandemic. After a long post-pandemic boom, Britain’s labor market is edging closer to a downturn, with hiring freezes and lower turnover as economic uncertainty rises. Yet within this challenging climate, there are silver linings for inclusion. Probst noted that a cooling labor market can push employers to focus on quality ofhire over quantity, presenting an opening to double down on inclusive recruitment – reaching talent that may have been overlooked in hyper-competitive Probst added perspective from on-the-ground in the UK: even as overall hiring slows, skills shortages persist in sectors from technology to care services, meaning companies that cast wider nets and invest in upskilling diverse talent will weather the storm better. This economist’s view reinforced a theme from earlier in the day – inclusion as innovation under pressure. When macro headwinds blow, inclusive practices like reskilling, internal mobility, and flexible work can become engines of resilience. The session vividly connected the dots between global trends and daily inclusion work, reminding leaders that Inclusion strategy must flex with economic realities.

Collaborative Solutions: Evolving ERGs and Beyond

Caroline Waters, OBE – a veteran HR executive and Deputy Chair of the UK’s Equality and Human Rights Commission – led an eye-opening breakout session on global demographic shifts and what they mean for inclusion. Co-facilitated by Angela Lacerna, an Associate Director of Partner Development at Seramount, the session challenged participants to think bigger about where talent and consumers will come from in the future.

Waters highlighted several striking facts as signals of a massive demographic transformation unfolding worldwide:

• English speakers on the rise: China is poised to become the largest English-speaking nation in the world.
• Talent pool scale: The top 25% highest-IQ individuals in China outnumber the entire population of North America (and India’s top 28% does as well).
• Workforce surplus: Even if every current U.S. job were transferred to China or India, those countries would still have a huge surplus of workers to spare.
• Skyrocketing birth rates: In the time it takes to read this sentence, dozens of babies are born around the globe – about 38 in the United States, 92 in China, and 241 in India. As Waters put it, “the speed of global diversification is almost too fast to grasp.”
• Shifting majorities: In Birmingham, UK, the balance of demographics flipped within a decade. The city went from roughly 58% White and 42% Black in 2011 to about 49% White and 51% Black in 2021 – a complete reversal of majority and minority representation in just ten years.
• Youth resurgence: In the UK, church attendance among young adults has quadrupled, from only 4% in 2018 to 16% today. This unexpected surge in youth participation is another example of how quickly social trends can turn.

Each of these data points, Waters explained, is more than just a statistic – it’s a wake-up call. Together, they paint a picture of a world where diversity is the new normal on a global scale. Populations and workforces in Asia are booming, educational and linguistic advantages are no longer confined to Western nations, and even local communities are seeing dramatic shifts in composition and behavior. For inclusion strategists, the implication is clear: we must anticipate and embrace a far more diverse future. Inclusion efforts can’t rely on old assumptions about where talent comes from or what “majority” means in any given context. Instead, leaders should prepare for a reality in which the so-called ‘minority’ groups may become majorities (and vice versa), and cultural patterns may shift unexpectedly.

ERGs: From Passion to Strategic Impact

Katie Oertli Mooney, Managing Director at Seramount, shared that even as some organizations pull back on formal DEI programs, employee resource groups (ERGs) remain resilient and continue to evolve. She introduced a new ERG maturity model with two dimensions – operational and impact – urging companies to move beyond grassroots passion to a structured infrastructure with leadership alignment from the top down. On the impact side, Mooney challenged leaders to think past what ERGs do (hosting events or programs) and focus on what they enable for the business and culture. The message was clear: leading organizations treat ERGs not as extracurricular networks, but as strategic partners in driving inclusion and innovation.

Mooney illustrated how high-functioning ERGs serve as pipelines for relationship-building and talent development. ERG leaders and members gain vital experience – from cross-functional collaboration and strategic planning to mentoring others – that hones their business acumen and inclusive leadership skills. These experiences build executive presence and influence among diverse talent, empowering employees to drive cultural fluency across the organization. In short, ERGs can be incubators of future leaders, translating grassroots energy into tangible business capabilities.

Spotlight Stories of Resilience and Innovation

As the summit’s final segment, two industry leaders delivered inspiring spotlight stories illustrating how they are driving inclusion forward in challenging times. Sharlene John, Head of Inclusion, Recruitment and Onboarding at Selfridges, spoke about cultivating talent and culture in the luxury retail sector. John described how Selfridges partners with the King’s Trust to promote internal talent development, creating avenues for underrepresented employees to advance and lead with continued support at the close of the program.

Next, Annika Allen, Head of Inclusion at All3Media, offered a candid look at building inclusion in media and entertainment – an industry known for creative dynamism and, often, systemic inequities. At the summit, Allen spoke passionately about the link between employee well-being and inclusion. In an environment prone to burnout and high stress, All3Media has made employee mental health a pillar of its Inclusion strategy – from inclusive storytelling workshops that give employees a voice, to equitable parental leave and flexible work arrangements. Allen’s core message: creativity and inclusion thrive together when people feel safe, valued, and cared for as whole individuals.

Think Bigger, Act Smarter: What’s Next

After a full day of insights and exchange, the Think Bigger Summit concluded with a unifying call to action. In closing remarks, Subha Barry observed that through every panel, spotlight, and hallway conversation, one theme came up again and again: “This work lives or dies by our ability to influence.” Influence – built on trust, backed by data, and aligned to business priorities – is the linchpin for turning inclusive ideas into sustained action. Barry challenged every leader in attendance to carry the day’s learnings back to their organizations and “engineer influence” for the changes that matter. Some key messages emerged from the summit’s conversations:

• Moving with trust in AI: Leverage AI-driven tools in HR and recruiting, but do so ethically and transparently, addressing biases and ensuring human oversight at each step.
• Inclusion as innovation under pressure: Treat inclusion as a source of innovation and resilience, especially in turbulent times. When under pressure – whether from legal, economic, or social forces – doubling down on Inclusion can reveal new solutions and growth opportunities.
• Shifting from compliance to influence: Evolve from check-the-box diversity compliance toward true influence in the C-suite. Build the business case with data and storytelling, and speak to what drives your particular organization. Inclusion isn’t a “nice-to-have” – it’s a strategic imperative, and it demands the same rigor and buy-in as any core business initiative.
• Evolving ERG maturity and impact: Invest in the maturity of Employee Resource Groups so they become strategic partners in talent development and innovation. Provide ERGs with executive sponsorship, clear objectives, and metrics to showcase impact, moving them from affinity communities to engines of business insight and leadership development.

Looking ahead, Seramount is committed to keeping this momentum going. Seramount’s Global Inclusion Index remains open for organizations to benchmark not just what they say, but what they do, across 29 countries. And the upcoming Global Member Conference will reunite this community to continue the conversation, dive deeper into new research, and turn ideas into action. These efforts are part of Seramount’s broader 2026 thought leadership agenda,  all aimed at one goal: helping inclusion leaders think bigger and act smarter to meet the demands of this changing workplace.

Together, we are turning aspiration into action, and ensuring that inclusion not only keeps pace with change, but drives the innovative workplaces of tomorrow.

The post Strategic Inclusion Under Pressure: Think Bigger Global Summit Highlights appeared first on Seramount.

As Inside Higher Ed recently reported, more law schools are embracing AI, reflecting a profession already reshaped by tools such as ChatGPT, CoCounsel, and Lexis+ AI. Nearly all executives responding to a 2024 LexisNexis survey of Am Law 200 firms indicated they expect investment in generative AI technologies to increase over the next five years, with nearly half currently exploring new lines of business or billable opportunities made possible by generative AI. For today’s students, the challenge isn’t just learning the law; it’s learning how to practice it effectively in a world where AI is part of the workflow.

Practicing the Lawyer’s Craft

Legal education has long wrestled with the gap between theory and practice. Now, that divide is widening as routine legal tasks—such as document review or research—become more automated, shifting a lawyer’s focus to client communication and strategic analysis. Students need more than just exposure to these tools; they will need hands-on experience as clients begin to expect the incorporation of AI into a firm’s offered services.

Through Forage simulations from leading firms such as White & Case, Kilpatrick Townsend, and Latham & Watkins, students step into the shoes of associates to practice real responsibilities: drafting privileged correspondence, conducting due diligence, preparing litigation letters, and even pitching strategies to clients.

By collaborating with the top law student resource in BARBRI, Forage virtual simulations gain a wider exposure to students globally as they utilize these services in preparation for SQEs or U.S. bar exams. These collaborations bring experiential learning to thousands of aspiring lawyers, enhancing their skills as part of their journey to workplace readiness. With Forage simulations appearing alongside essential study materials, employers know that students are receiving the most modern legal training.

These simulations aren’t classroom hypotheticals. They mirror the work that junior lawyers can expect to take on from day one, building confidence in the skills that matter most.

Strengthening Skills AI Can’t Replace

Generative AI may draft contracts or surface relevant case law, but it can’t replace human judgment, communication, or empathy. Forage simulations give students the chance to practice and hone valuable client-facing interactions, supporting their transition of theoretical knowledge into practical application. In White & Case’s Intellectual Property simulation, candidates draft client memos and respond to “cease and desist” letters. In Kilpatrick Townsend’s Corporate Law experience, they conduct due diligence while executing redlines in a contract negotiation. Through the Latham & Watkins Antitrust module, students conduct internal antitrust investigations as part of witness preparation.

Equally important, law students and recent grads sharpen the skills needed to check AI’s work, such as spotting inaccuracies, evaluating sources, thinking critically, and writing with clarity. These abilities are exactly what law firms emphasize when hiring: AI fluency paired with ethical human judgment.

Outcomes That Matter

For law firms, corporate counsel, and legal organizations competing for top talent, virtual career experiences such as those offered by Forage bring measurable advantages. Being integrated with a globally recognized legal exam prep such as BARBRI guarantees a firm’s brand visibility in an overcrowded market. Hiring managers recognize that graduates who have completed Forage simulations often signal the combination of ability and engagement that is highly desirable in junior associates. The outcomes are evident. Eighty-seven percent of Forage learners reported gaining new, practical skills. Students who complete a Forage job simulation are 2× more likely to get an interview and 3× more likely to receive a job offer. Beyond the marketing impact, participation in Forage simulations translates into more efficient onboarding and quicker contributions from new hires. Firms that focus on building AI fluency alongside real-world training aren’t just winning talent today; they are future-proofing their workforce.

The Path Forward

Firms that focus on building AI fluency alongside real-world training aren’t just winning talent today—they’re shaping a generation of lawyers ready to practice with confidence.

See how Forage helps forward-thinking organizations build a workforce ready to thrive in an AI-enabled future.

The post The Future of Legal Talent: Why AI + Human Skills Will Define Success appeared first on Seramount.

Recruitment is particularly difficult as HR leaders are struggling to fill open positions, spending considerable time, money, and recruiter capacity to reduce high-impact vacancies. This increase in spend is primarily driven by an increasingly selective talent pool and a low-hire/low-fire employment environment.

The challenges don’t end there; retention is also causing headaches as HR leaders are facing a workplace culture crisis. Since 2020, Gallup has found a 36 percent decrease in job satisfaction, a 20 percent decrease in connection to mission, and an 18 percent decrease in engagement. These considerable dips are driving rising attrition rates.

Within this ambiguous talent market and amid a culture crisis, one thing is clear: Employers need to invest in building stronger workplace cultures.

Three Questions to Ask About Your Culture Value Proposition

In recent years, cultural factors have significantly shifted for both the workforce and the workplace. Friction points between what employees (both prospective and current) want and the value employers are offering are causing many HR leaders to question their existing EVPs.

Below are three questions HR leaders should ask when assessing the strength of their current culture.

1. Do our material offerings meet employee flexibility priorities?

Traditional preferences such as commute distance and office perks have declined in importance. As more employees live farther from the office, remote flexibility has become one of the most attractive benefits.

2. Are we offering the developmental opportunities our employees need?

Professional development has become a key lever for improving engagement and job satisfaction metrics. However, HR leaders often struggle to ensure their organizations can accurately assess performance and provide timely developmental interventions.

3. Do our community-building efforts balance inclusion and flexibility?

Community-building has declined in many organizations. Although remote and hybrid work models are attractive benefits, they have diminished day-to-day connections. Many HR leaders are caught between prioritizing the flexibility their employees want and the community-building teams need for success.

Employee Benefits That Improve Culture

In response to workforce and workplace shifts, many HR leaders are exploring ways to increase cultural value. The goal of these levers and unique policies is to make roles more attractive to prospective candidates and to improve engagement for current employees. These efforts include changes to:

• Formal Learning Opportunities: Job seekers and current employees increasingly want structured professional development and upskilling. Visible investments such as financial support for continuing education or an internal gig program can improve engagement and commitment, addressing challenges that affect workplace satisfaction.

• Benefits and Rewards: Unique and personalized benefits can strengthen engagement and serve as key differentiators in talent attraction. Expanded mental health support, additional PTO, experiential rewards, and flexibility related to different life stages reflect organizational trust and responsiveness to evolving employee needs.

• Workplace Communities: Although flexibility remains highly valued, remote work can lead to isolation, and hybrid schedules can be difficult to work around. Customizable digital collaboration spaces and purposeful in-person gatherings help sustain community and belonging across dispersed teams. Investment in employee resource groups can serve as a strategic initiative to promote community-building and belonging.

Embedding Culture Across the Employee Lifecycle

When implementing new culture initiatives, HR leaders should ensure those efforts shape every stage of the employee lifecycle—from a candidate’s first impression to their long-term connection with the organization.

For example, your company has a strong culture of professional development. You’ve identified it as a talent differentiator, and you want to incorporate it more into talent branding and employee experience. How might you embed that across the different touchpoints HR has with the employee?

Attraction and Recruitment

During attraction and recruitment, the culture of professional development should be clearly visible across all talent materials. Career sites and job descriptions can highlight internal mobility pathways and tuition assistance. Articles on the talent page or LinkedIn posts should highlight employee stories that demonstrate how growth is supported in practice. Recruiters and hiring teams should be trained to speak authentically about these programs so candidates see professional development as a lived part of the culture.

Onboarding

Onboarding should make the culture of professional development more tangible. New hires can hear from colleagues who advanced through learning programs or internal promotions. Early feedback conversations help employees plan to participate in professional development opportunities and connect them to their individual goals. Mentorship and skill-building programs can reinforce professional development as an ongoing expectation.

Growth

In the growth phase, performance reviews and recognition programs should emphasize continuous learning. Highlighting achievements such as completing certifications or mentoring peers helps employees see how their growth supports the organization’s success. Opening pathways for team leaders to nominate employees for professional development opportunities in the review process can acknowledge efforts and show further investments. Regular feedback sessions can then capture employee insights on these programs, ensuring that developmental efforts evolve alongside both personal and organizational priorities.

Retention and Offboarding

Done right, a more intentional culture of professional development will improve satisfaction and retention, delivering measurable savings in attrition costs. 

However, if an employee departs, off-boarding should continue to reflect the same commitment to culture. Use the time during an exit interview to collect feedback on professional development experiences and surface insights employees may share only after leaving. Those findings can inform future initiatives and sustain organizational health.

The Bottom Line—Culture Drives Performance

When HR leaders focus efforts on culture, it does more than just support talent acquisition and retention efforts. By identifying culture strengths and opportunities, HR leaders have the opportunity to drive impact on KPIs across the organization. Why?

Strong cultures encourage and equip people to do their best work.

Investing in culture is an investment in the long-term productivity and development of an effective workforce. However, it’s not enough to simply build a great culture. HR leaders need to implement elements of culture across the employment lifecycle to impact recruitment and retention in an increasingly difficult labor market.

Given their ability to address current culture challenges and incorporate culture across the employee lifecycle, HR leaders are uniquely positioned to motivate and prepare employees to do their best work and contribute to a culture of success.

The post How Do You Make Culture a Talent Differentiator? appeared first on Seramount.

Not a Labor Shortage—A Skills Shortage

The workforce pipeline is shifting in ways employers cannot ignore. Between 2024 and 2032, 18.4 million experienced workers with postsecondary education will retire, while only 13.8 million younger workers with equivalent education will enter the workforce. That leaves the economy 5.25 million skilled workers short including 4.5 million roles requiring a bachelor’s degree or higher.

This is not a labor shortage; the number of age-eligible candidates will continue to grow. The real problem is a shortage of prepared workers: people equipped to lead, solve problems, and adapt to rapidly changing demands.

While this shortage will impact the entire global workforce, disruption will be most acute in knowledge-intensive fields such as operations, finance, and technology, where expertise is accumulated and can’t be built overnight.

The numbers paint a worrying picture: 84 percent of hiring managers state that most high school graduates are not prepared to enter the workforce. Meanwhile, 40 percent of managers say graduates are unprepared, according to Forage’s recent study, “From Coursework to Careers.” Executives cite talent shortages as a major concern keeping them up at night.

Meanwhile, students are realizing too late that workplace expectations far outpace their own perceptions. Eighty-eight percent of students surveyed believe their coursework alone will prepare them for future roles. When asked, early-career accounting and finance employees rated themselves 7.4/10 in preparedness, compared to their managers, who rated them 4.9/10. However, once hired, career starters are admitting difficulty with interpreting feedback, conflict resolution, and additional abilities, realizing that their coursework alone was not enough to develop their professional competencies.

AI is reshaping the landscape further. While automation eliminates routine work, it also eliminates environments to learn at low stakes. Instead, it raises the bar for human decision-making, which now demands higher technical fluency, adaptive thinking, and ethical judgment.

The outlook is clear: Without new employees who possess vital communication, problem-solving, and analytical skills, employers are facing an increase in inefficiency, delayed productivity, and innovation bottlenecks. So what can companies do to raise readiness and ensure success?

What Leaders Can Do Differently

The skills gap is impending but not inevitable. Employers can take practical steps now to reshape how they identify, prepare, and support talent.

Three moves

1. Match Talent Where They Are

Most employers have gotten the memo to ditch credential bias, with less than 40 percent of companies screening candidates based on college GPA. But the next step is to prioritize exposure to real-life experiences for early-career employees to learn and practice critical skills. Internships are great, but they can be inequitable to candidates with additional responsibilities, such as those who are caring for children or aging parents or pursuing advanced degrees. Additionally, many companies lack the capacity to scale internship programs. Around 50 percent of employers mentioned lack of resources or lack of manager buy-in as obstacles to expanding skills-based hiring.

Employers who focus on skill tests have open access to larger pools of talent while ensuring candidates are educated on role expectations before day one. For instance, allowing a candidate to practice data trend analysis or compliance assessments can increase the candidate’s confidence and clarity.

2. Meet Candidates Earlier

Companies must meet talent earlier in the pipeline. Waiting until the interview stage is too late, and even the application submission process can delay locating prepared employees. Simulations, such as the ones offered by Forage, give candidates a way to try real-world tasks before applying and give employers visibility into how those candidates think and perform. A student can explore engineering by troubleshooting a design flaw before making a recommendation. These experiences not only build skills but also expand awareness of career options, especially for underrepresented groups.

3. Make AI Fluency a Must

Finally, employers should treat AI fluency as a core workplace skill. Few roles will require deep coding knowledge, but nearly every role will require the ability to use AI responsibly. That includes knowing how to prompt effectively, evaluate results critically, and apply outputs ethically. For operations positions, employers should protect future projects from delays and failures by utilizing process mapping and diagnostics simulations. Training in these competencies should begin at the earliest stages of career preparation, not years into the job.

By employing these three steps, companies will not only bridge the skills gap but also have a competitive advantage against peers who are slow to change. Only 15 percent of employers reported making changes to their recruitment programs in 2025; most are still relying on traditional strategies to surface talent, despite all evidence to the contrary.

Taking Action Means Better Outcomes

Left unaddressed, the gap in workplace readiness will widen, decreasing productivity, talent equity, and competitiveness. But employers can act now to close that gap in tangible ways. Forage partners report 20–40 percent faster recruiting cycles and 3.3 times higher hire rates among candidates who complete a Forage simulation. Ninety-five percent of students report a stronger understanding of a role after completing a Forage simulation. On average, Forage saves employers $1200 per hire by engaging and educating quality candidates.

Forage’s virtual simulations give students a way to learn and demonstrate their capability and give employers a way to measure readiness. Leaders who adopt these strategies will not just fill roles; they’ll cultivate a workforce that is prepared, motivated, and committed from the very start.

The post The Shortage Employers Can’t Afford to Ignore appeared first on Seramount.

Below are some key takeaways and themes from the conversation.

Employees Will Keep Using Outside AI Unless Internal Tools Improve

Leaders acknowledged that staff are already using tools like ChatGPT on personal devices, often because they feel easier and more responsive than company-provided platforms. Several CHROs said the real risk is not curiosity itself, but that unsanctioned use of these tools may expose organizations to data security and IP risks. Leaders agreed that internal tools must be safe and user-friendly; otherwise, employees will continue to bypass them.

Recruiting is Where AI Has Gained the Most Traction

AI has gained the most traction in recruiting, likely because the business case is straightforward. Leaders described how AI tools are being used to guide candidates toward relevant roles, automate scheduling, and reduce the amount of administrative time recruiters spend on each search. One example shared was from a large professional services firm that built an internal assistant to support candidate engagement. The tool streamlines interactions and connects applicants to opportunities but deliberately avoids delivering rejections, a choice made for both legal and cultural reasons. Participants agreed that this type of human-centered approach, where AI handles repetitive tasks while people retain responsibility for judgment and empathy, is the basis for adoption moving forward.

Rolling Out AI is a Cultural Choice

Leaders noted that decisions about when and how to deploy AI carry cultural weight. Some described holding back on certain applications because the timing didn’t feel right for their organization. Others pointed out that transparency around data, fairness, and legal guardrails matters just as much as efficiency gains.

Leadership Development is a Missing Piece

Technical capability alone is not enough. Several HR executives pointed out that leadership development was “decimated” during COVID, leaving many managers without the skills to support employees effectively. Today, those same managers are being asked to juggle hybrid work dynamics, employee burnout, and the uncertainty brought by AI, often without the tools they need. Leaders agreed that organizations must reinvest in leadership development and coaching to rebuild empathy, adaptability, and change management so managers are prepared to guide their teams through this period of disruption.

Employee Burnout and Culture Remain Top Concerns

Breakout sessions reinforced that well-being and culture are still pressing concerns. Leaders in healthcare and other sectors described employees facing constant new demands, leading to burnout and exhaustion. Several noted that hybrid work policies have created tensions and perceptions of unfairness between different groups of employees. Others highlighted the importance of reducing stigma by positioning mental health within broader wellness conversations. Across these perspectives, participants agreed that organizations must stay focused on supporting employees holistically, even as they explore new technologies.

Join our growing community of HR Leaders transforming the future of work—together.

The post 40 HR Executives Gathered to Discuss Today’s Biggest Challenges: Here is What They Said appeared first on Seramount.

Whether your score rises, flatlines, or dips, the number alone won’t protect you from losing top talent, productivity, or credibility with the C-suite. If you stop at the score, you’ll miss the signals that could help avoid a costly performance or retention crisis.

High Score ≠ Low Risk

Whether scores look strong or start to fall, the number alone can be misleading because scores never explain the why, and employees don’t always tell the full story. Organizations with high scores still battle quiet quitting, stalled change efforts, and lost productivity. Why? Surveys only capture surface-level sentiment, and actions are rarely taken once the data comes in.

Even when scores look strong, many employees don’t believe surveys are anonymous. They hold back, give “safe” answers, or click through quickly because they don’t expect follow-up. Others tell leaders what they think they want to hear. That means your score may reflect disengagement as much as engagement. What’s left unsaid has greater implications for emerging challenges and impending disruptions you need to get ahead of.

A falling score may feel like a red alert, but how do you explain what’s driving the decline? Is it burnout, a breakdown in trust, or career stagnation? Numbers don’t tell you where to focus, which leaves HR leaders reacting to symptoms instead of addressing root causes. Without context, a dip could create panic instead of progress.

The Real Benchmark: Action, Not Numbers

IIf you miss the signals hiding in your survey results or fail to close the loop with employees you asked for input, you risk losing your top talent and having to explain “what went wrong” to your board or CEO.

What separates thriving workplaces from those that stall? It’s the honest conversation about “what now” after the survey is done. However, understanding and anticipating what’s needed to keep talent disruptions from derailing business success is easier said than done. When you dig deeper into survey results, you often find that the barrier isn’t a lack of data, but a lack of direction.

That’s why the most effective people leaders focus on closing the gap between how things look from your engagement score and what employees experience at every level. Instead of asking, “Did we score high enough?” savvy HR leaders ask:

• Where are we seeing turnover despite a good score?
• Which teams or employee groups are consistently less engaged?
• What stories are employees telling us in open comments, exit surveys, or focus groups?
• Are we closing the loop and following up on feedback?

This is the hard, unglamorous part: translating ambiguous, sometimes messy feedback into concrete steps that move your organization forward. It takes intentional effort, time, and support. That’s why Seramount’s approach isn’t just about collecting data. We help HR leaders make sense of it, prioritize what matters, and build a strategy that sticks.

Make Surveys the Starting Line, Not the Finish Line

Engagement survey should be the starting line, not the finish line. Real impact is determined by what you do after Real impact is determined by what you do after results are ready, not the number on your dashboard. So, if you’re about to review your results, don’t just ask “How did we do?” Challenge your team to dig deeper:

• “What does this number miss?”
• “Where is our risk building?”
• “How are we communicating next steps?”

Seramount’s employee voice platform is built for the “what now.” Assess360 helps you answer these challenging questions by contextualizing survey results, digging deeper via anonymous voice sessions, and providing change management support to work on solutions with you.

Key elements of our approach:

• We do the heavy lift. We take work off your team’s plate by analyzing and prioritizing the findings and helping you close the loop with your stakeholders, saving you time, money, and resources.
• Unlimited expert support. You don’t have to become a data scientist or change management expert overnight. Our team partners with yours for every phase to translate insights into strategy.
• One holistic approach. Instead of hiring multiple employee engagement vendors, you get an all-in-one solution. So, you never lose time chasing disconnected data.

With our support, you can move from “what’s the score?” to “what’s our strategy?” Our partnership gets to the heart of the issue, reduces talent risk, and maintains momentum while ensuring employees see and feel the change. Surveys alone can’t shield you from turnover or disengagement. What you do next determines whether those signals fuel strategy and give your leaders a clear path forward.

Ready to connect the dots and turn your signals into strategy with Assess360? Schedule a call with one of our experts to move beyond your score to implement the listening strategy your organization needs to stay ahead of disruption.

The post The Real Benchmark of Employee Engagement Isn’t the Survey Score appeared first on Seramount.