Skillsoft Chief People Officer Ciara Harrington

Ciara shares her journey from dreaming of being a CPO as a kid (briefcase in hand!) to leading global people strategies, the challenges of stepping into an internal leadership role, and the power of data-driven decision-making in HR. She breaks down Skillsoft’s strategy cascade, a system that ensures every employee’s work drives company success, and reveals how generative AI is changing the game for HR analytics. 

 

Key Points From This Episode:

 

• From County Cork to the C-suite: Ciara’s path to becoming a CPO.

• The power of listening and widening your perspective when stepping into a leadership role.

• Fixing a disconnected remote team and the small changes that made a big impact.

• Why Ciara always wanted to lead HR and how her analytical brain helps her do it.

• Insight into the AI revolution in HR: turning scattered data into real business insights.

• How every role is a tech role and why HR pros must upskill in AI and analytics.

• Benefits of a company AI co-pilot (and why you probably shouldn’t use ChatGPT).

• Skillsoft’s strategy cascade and the secret to aligning people with company goals.

• Streamlining organizational structure for speed, clarity, and real business impact.

• The art of subtraction and why HR needs to stop doing outdated tasks and focus on impact.

• Tips for executives to inspire organizational engagement in strategic goals.

• Lean in, step up, and follow your passion: Ciara’s advice for aspiring HR leaders!

 

Quotes:

 

“To have influence in a boardroom or at the C-suite [level], it's important you're able to demonstrate that the activities your functions provide to the organization actually drive tangible business outcomes.” — Ciara Harrington [0:10:33]

 

“It doesn't matter if you're in IT, HR, finance, [or] product, every role is a technical role [these days]. As a result, every single employee or team member at every company needs to be up-skilling themselves in data, generative AI, and data and analytics.” — Ciara Harrington [0:15:04]

 

“That's how we want people to think about things: every time you're making a decision on how to spend your time, it should be on one of these five things. Our logic is, if every single person at our company does that, we will meet our business outcomes.” — Ciara Harrington [0:29:25]

 

“Do not follow the money. Follow the job. The money will follow you.” — Ciara Harrington [0:35:25]

 

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

 

Skillsoft

Ciara Harrington

Ciara Harrington on LinkedIn

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