A Conversation with Joan McGrail, CHRO of New Balance
Joan McGrail is the CHRO at New Balance and has been with the organization for 15 years. She heads up HR globally for the organization. New Balance has approximately 8,000 employees worldwide and her HR team is 100 strong.
We asked Joan how COVID has impacted her business and she shared, it has had a significant impact… our work happens across offices, manufacturing and retail stores where the needs and challenges vary greatly. In addition to setting in place different communications, protocols, and expectations, we have also needed to make some tough decisions including furloughing some associates globally and implementing pay reductions. Underpinning all of this change has been a need to more closely monitor and support associates well-being.
When asked what she anticipates changing in the future, she explained, “a lot of that is to continue to be determined as it brings up many questions around how we think about how we work – to how we strengthen culture – to how we serve our customers and more… there is much speculation surrounding consumer sentiment and shopping….levels of comfort with brick & mortar shopping…consumer comfort in general…which large retailers will survive the pandemic? The good news is that we have seen our online business increasing and makes you think, will people be more accustomed to shopping online?”
What about HR? We then talked about the changes within HR at New Balance and Joan shared, “we are learning a lot about the need to be change leaders for the business – leveraging new approaches to increase productivity levels and learning how our new way of working can enhance our effectiveness going forward…we will be leading the business to revisit where and when the work gets done…how we can sustain some of this learning…looking at how we will have a greater reliance on technology and video connection…and of course, digging into spending on corporate real estate and travel as well.”
We wrapped up by asking Joan to share some advice for her fellow HR colleagues navigating through these uncertain times. She shared some very insightful and helpful words of wisdom. Joan explained, “We recognize, as HR professionals, that the people agenda and people strategy should be our top priority…organizations will differentiate themselves by focusing on the health and safety of their employees while also being mindful of what their employees need from their corporations…we have a tremendous opportunity to amplify empathy, connection, clarity….we have an amazing culture at New Balance and it is because we prioritize our associates.”
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