A radical HR evolution is underway, and now it’s up to the HR leaders of the future to evolve in order to ensure we have a new skill set to support changing business environments. So how do HR leaders begin thinking about the future of human resources, and what will the next three to five years look like? This is where the experts come in to help. A super-panel of some of the Bay Area’s brightest executives will put the power of their thoughts together in a candid, thought-provoking discussion covering topics from how to think about current capabilities to what it really means to enter HR 3.0. Join leaders from Juniper Networks, Adobe Systems, Applied Materials and Polycom in this provocative session that’s sure to inspire.

Business challenges are unique to each organization, and HR leaders deliver the highest value when they take proactive steps toward finding creative ways to support the business. Sometimes change takes courage, and it’s not always an easy path to travel. At URS, the recruitment and retention of professional staff is an important business challenge. In this session two HR leaders will take you along their journey of finding a creative solution. It’s a case of using HR metrics to better the business and change behaviors, resulting in a positive impact on the bottom line. Here Darryl Robinson and Julie Hines detail the system they developed to understand why people were leaving their global organization, and what they could do to reverse the trend. The key takeaway here — an easy, inexpensive method to focus on several retention factors, bringing real results back to the business.

If corporate social responsibility isn’t on your priority list as an HR leader, it will be soon enough. As pressure increases to produce bottom-line results, competition grows and business becomes more global, it’s now more important than ever to recruit and retain the best and the brightest talent. That’s where corporate social responsibility can help. At Flextronics, it’s about even more than the talent — it’s about an underlying belief that a sustainable approach to business is essential. In this discussion with author John Izzo, Ph.D., two of Flextronics’ HR leaders share the “Flextronics Pledge” and its four cornerstones — people, environment, ethics and governance, and community partnership. Get an inside look at a thriving corporate social responsibility initiative including how it works and why it’s improving corporate citizenship and workplace performance.

If the global economic recession was an earthquake, the resulting business landscape it produced is certainly still feeling the aftershocks. So as your organization rebuilds from the rubble, the time is now for HR leaders to proactively respond to a new set of global challenges left behind in the aftermath. Ian Ziskin, former CHRO at Northrop Grumman, has his pulse on the future of HR, and in this session he shares how you can both reactively and proactively pull the HR levers under your control as you respond to the ever-changing needs of your business. Come ready for tips and tricks that will ensure you’re prepared for the next big one as HR redefines its role in worldwide organizational strategy.

In recent years, a few women have broken through the glass ceiling to hold senior and C-suite roles in organizations; however, it remains a very challenging barrier for most women leaders to cross. At higher levels of organizations, the number of women decreases steadily, from 28 percent at mid-level leader to just 17 percent at the senior executive level. Join this interactive discussion to explore the factors that help or inhibit women who want to advance to higher leadership levels within the organization.
Discussion topics include:
• What are the skill differences that inhibit and advance women?
• Are women less likely to accept opportunities and more likely to interrupt their careers?
• What can both women and the organization to do address these issues?

In today’s fiercely competitive markets, employee engagement can have a direct impact on your organization’s bottom line. Once you recruit key talent, how do you keep employees engaged, elevate performance and drive business success? What exactly is engagement? What does it look like? How can you assess it in your organization? How can you improve and sustain it? Join this executive boardroom discussion led by Carrie Beckstrom, vice president of training at ADP, for a high-level talk about what you and your peers are doing to achieve positive results through employee engagement.

How does an HR leader go about embedding real change in an organization? It’s about getting creative and developing a global infrastructure that can manage performance, talent, rewards and culture — all in a single HR framework. Take that challenge up a level, and ask that same leader to do more … with less. Andy Montrose of Fujitsu Limited was tasked with a massive overhaul of how HR supports the business, and his results are amazing — $80M cut from the budget in four years. Now he’s sharing his methodology of benefits realization and not only his approach to gain buy-in from senior management, but also how he embedded action down through the organization.

If there was such a thing as a proverbial HR box, the team at Netflix is most definitely not in it. No vacation requests? Check. Performance reviews? Out the door. The focus here is on driving organizational strategy and the customer service of employees — creating opportunities and leaving barriers behind. In this unorthodox HR conversation, hear from both HR and the business perspective about how things are different at Netflix and why their methods are working so well. HR shares its four key roles — talent scout, leadership coach, culture ambassador and business coordinator, while IT follows suit, giving real examples of how HR brings true value to the business. This team shares how they challenge each other and will likely challenge the way you think about HR.

With the complexity of a more global workforce, today’s leaders must sustain business performance in a vastly different environment than generations before. Forward-thinking HR leaders recognize the need to shift key strategies and leverage new technologies. Oracle built a strategic HR function over the last 13 years, moving away from an administrative back office position and moving toward driving workforce decisions within each of Oracle’s business units, all during a time of swift growth. In this session, Anje Dodson, VP of human resources, will illuminate critical shifts in Oracle’s approach to talent management, organization effectiveness and HR analytics. Come prepared to learn what her team is doing to stay ahead, and how you can implement the strategies that work and avoid those that don’t in your own organization.

Whether you’re working on elevating your global talent management strategy or preparing for a worldwide expansion, as the CHRO you must ensure there is consistency in your strategy throughout the organization. Orchestrating such a complex talent management structure takes not only technology, but also a specific skill set. The ability to break down silos so each division knows what the others are doing and keep metrics and analytics visible on a global scale doesn’t just come naturally. That’s where Cornerstone OnDemand comes in to help focus the full employee life cycle in a cohesive, global approach. In this executive boardroom discussion come prepared to ask questions and share challenges and successes in your own approach to global talent management, and get ready to walk away with a better understanding of what you will need to take your strategy to the next level.

Each year, members of Generation Y comprise a higher percentage of our workforce, obtain greater purchasing power, and continue to influence social movements. Numbering more than 80 million in the U.S., their distinct attitudes and behaviors reflect the social forces that have shaped their lives, and have shifted how they aspire to achieve, and ultimately define success. Companies and institutions that seek to manage them as employees and engage them as customers must work toward a better understanding of their aspirations. Jamie Gutfreund will provide context around this generation’s most critical developments, providing examples of new ways to align your organization’s thinking with these emerging trends and social developments.

What specific skills do you need in order to achieve the most effective relationship with your board of directors? And what are the expectations board members have of you as an HR leader? These questions are important for executives across the C-suite, and this session will provide the answers straight from the source. Jing Liao, vice president of worldwide human resources at Atmel Corporation, teams up with Jack Saltich, one of Atmel’s board members and chairman of their compensation committee, for a candid conversation. This team has gone through major transformation to build a strong company with a winning culture. They credit their effective partnership with being professional, proactive, transparent and trusting each other. This is a session not to be missed by any HR leader looking to strengthen their relationship with the board.

Succession planning is top of mind for most senior HR leaders, and whether you’re feeling behind the curve, ahead of the game, or somewhere in the middle, you’ve likely got questions and curiosity about who’s doing it well. For J.C. Herrera of McAfee succession planning is a recipe he’s developed over the years — one-part building trust and being honest, one-part setting goals and working through the process systematically. In this session, he highlights his personal mantra for succession planning — how to gain executive support and look at the bigger picture of the business to ensure everyone’s on board with the plan. He then takes it a step further to focus on how McAfee set a goal for career development throughout the organization and leveraged it as a starting point to develop a highly-creative, measured plan.

As organizations grow and become more complex, so too does the need for an agile communication strategy to grow. Social media tools are out there to facilitate more effective corporate communications, but using them effectively and in a way that’s custom for your growing organization can be a daunting task — especially when you consider the cultural variation that exists in businesses evolving on a global scale. CHROs must be able to leverage social media and technology to communicate a universal message that encourages engagement and drives collaboration. This eye-opening session will focus on not only using social media to better communicate throughout the organization, but also addressing the entire HR life cycle — from recruitment to engagement — to attract and retain top-notch candidates.

As the role of the CHRO evolves into that of a more strategic business partner, the time is now to boost your influence by understanding what’s possible with today’s cloud, mobile and social technologies. That requires lock-step alignment between your business strategy, HR strategy, and enabling technology to ensure your HR function is agile enough to support the ever-changing world of business. Join us for a candid conversation on the many forces reshaping HR technology today and into the future.
Session discovery topics:
• Delivering talent management intelligence
• Creating a modern service-delivery model
• Understanding an evolving workforce with new expectations

A cultural renaissance is underway at Yahoo!. People are critical to the success of any organization, especially one that’s on a path toward greatness. Working closely with CEO Marissa Mayer, the human resources group is working to not only make Yahoo! a great place to work, but also an incredible place to be. From the changing workplace environment to smart perks and a culture built on transparency, accountability and innovation this candid session will reveal what’s in store for thousands of people at Yahoo!. Come ready to learn how HR is impacting talent management in creative new ways.