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Intel this week announced that Sandra Rivera is its new Chief People Officer. Rivera, a 19-year Intel veteran, most recently led Intel's Network Platforms Group, a fast-growing, 3,000-person organization. I immediately thought I wanted to talk to her for this newsletter. Like Microsoft's Kathleen Hogan, who joined us at our April @Work event in New York, Rivera comes from an operating role outside of traditional human resources.
Rivera takes responsibility for Intel's workforce at a challenging moment. CEO Bob Swan has taken the reins after his predecessor was forced to resign for violating corporate policy. The company recently offered guidance that disappointed Wall Street, amid global trade volatility. At the same time, the company is broadening its horizons. Rather than simply rule the market for PC and server chips, it is expanding into markets driven by the data revolution. I got some time with Rivera in her first interview since taking over Intel's human resources organization. Here's some of what she shared, lightly edited for clarity:
On why she switched from an operating role to Chief People Officer:
"We are driving business transformation to a data-centric world, where data impacts everything we do – how we live, how we work, how we play. In that transformation, our opportunity at Intel increases to the largest total addressable market in our history, a $300 billion TAM. So that means for us that we go from being a relatively large market share player in the markets we have served in the past, to being a much smaller player in a larger opportunity for growth. That, tied with business transformation, Jon, we believe requires a cultural evolution that will allow us and propel us and accelerate our ambitions. And in all the discussions I had with [CEO] Bob [Swan], it became clear that you really can't have one without the other. So Bob asked me to partner with him and our leadership team to really engage with and connect and inspire and unleash all the innovation of our more than 100,000 employees. And as that vision crystallized, for me, it just became the thing that I was compelled to do. Which is a very, very far pivot from what I'd been doing before. I'd been building, growing and running the network business for Intel for a number of years."
On the trend of business leaders taking HR roles:
"When I think about it, I think about the intersection of our people with our strategy and our culture becoming this sustainable competitive advantage. And I think that's what you're seeing with leaders coming to the chief HR officer role from different disciplines, and many of them from the business side. The HR agenda is the business agenda."
On how her engineering and operational background will influence her HR leadership:
"For sure I understand the business. I understand how things get done and what slows us down. I speak the language of the business to our business partners and our functional organization in a company that is so technical, and that is overwhelmingly made up of engineers. It does allow me to fit in their shoes and really understand what inspires them, what enables them, what unlocks all of that innovation and capability. So I think that I bring a very different skill set from someone that has been an HR professional throughout their career. I will say that I will never know as much about HR as our HR professionals. And our HR professionals are world-class and they're just excellent at everything that they do, and we need them to continue to do that work as well as they do today. But we also need them to have a seat at that table and understand how the business gets done – and that gets back to my earlier comment that the HR agenda is the business agenda. We're sort of in this period of value exchange where I'm learning a lot, but of course I also want to contribute a lot to this HR capability."
On how she will infuse technology into people management:
"It's early days – I think today is day 12 of me being on the job – but one of the things that is so obvious to me, certainly coming from the business side, is asking how do we use modern tools, how do we use data analytics, how do we use A.I. capability for us to be able to understand the effectiveness and efficiency of our systems and processes and ultimately our people? And how do we utilize those tools and turn all that data into valuable insights?"
On her approach to diversity and inclusion at Intel:
"As you know, I'm Latina, and I have an electrical engineering degree. In many ways, the journey that I've walked is one that we want to make more available to more of our employees and more people. The way that I approached my operational roles in running and growing a business has been to tap into diverse and inclusive environments where you have different perspectives and experiences and expertise and leadership styles. I've tried to harness the value of that raw set of diverse perspectives to make better business decisions. My organization was two-thirds diverse – either females or underrepresented minorities – and we drove a very successful business for Intel in a startup mode, in something that grew into multi-billions of dollars and very profitable. I have embraced it because I've lived it, and I've demonstrated that diversity and inclusion has driven better business results. So I don't need to be convinced. Intel has been a leader in diversity and inclusion, and we have made that a core part of our business agenda – certainly our culture agenda. Certainly in a company that is primarily engineers, we know that we need to win hearts and minds, and data allows us to do that – the data that shows a more diverse organization delivers better business results."
My thanks to Sandra for talking with me about her new role.
New speaker alert: We have IBM's Martin Schroter, former NFL player/Harvard grad and venture capital firm founder Isaiah Kacyvenski, Gen.G Esports CEO Chris Park and more diving into the business of sports in the morning program at @Work Human Capital + Finance. Space is limited, so apply now!
Until next week, |
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