This Week's Top Five HR Stories

Salesforce Resets Operating Model for an AI-first Workforce

Salesforce is reshaping its top team as it deepens its push into AI and reconfigures parts of its workforce.

The company has hired or promoted six senior leaders to replace five-high profile departures, according to Business Insider, aligning oversight of core platforms and security while streamlining operations across go-to-market and product areas.

This leadership reset sits alongside job reductions reported in marketing, product management, data analytics and Agentforce.

Inside Accenture’s AI-Powered Model for Cultural Reinvention

According to CEO Julie Sweet, Accenture is adopting a culture of reinvention to maintain its growth in the AI era. 

In conversation with Great Place to Work, after the company was named one of the organisations’ top workplaces, she said: “Being a reinventor is believing that every part of the enterprise and their product has to be reinvented using tech, data, AI – new ways of working, new ways of engaging.”

To achieve this, the company has developed new ways of recruiting younger talent and prioritising AI-powered learning opportunities as it looks to upskill its employee base of more than 700,000 people. 

Reinvention, says Julie, is only truly possible when employees are given the ability to fail. She shares: “We have a culture of progress over perfection. When you have that culture, you provide the safety to move quickly, to be able to make mistakes, and that is a deep part of our DNA.”

Why Grant Thornton UK Hired its First Chief People Officer

Abigail Fisher has been appointed as Grant Thornton UK’s first Chief People Officer, joining the firm in late February. 

According to the company, this newly created role will involve shaping a people strategy that can support a high-performance, future-focused culture to help employees grow and thrive. 

Malcolm Gomersall, Chief Executive Officer of Grant Thornton UK, says of the appointment: “Abigail’s appointment marks an important step in our journey to strengthen our culture and further enhance our people experience.

“Her experience and passion for people will help us build on what makes Grant Thornton a great place to work while modernising our operations to meet our clients’ evolving needs.”

Why Heineken is Cutting 7% of its Workforce

Heineken has announced it is cutting 6,000 jobs – or around 7% of its workforce – across 2026 and 2027, after lowering its forecasts for profit growth. 

In its full year results, the company revealed total sales fell 1.2% in 2025, and it has put plans in place to “unlock significant savings” of approximately US$500m by reducing its headcount. 

These cuts are likely to come from both brewery closures and reductions in white-collar roles due to AI increasing company productivity. 

Discussing this strategy in the company’s latest earnings report, published 11 February, CEO Dolf van den Brink says: “Our first priority is to accelerate growth, funded by stepped up productivity and operating model changes that will involve a significant cost intervention over the next two years. This will unlock stronger people productivity and enable greater speed and efficiency.”

Why Cisco’s CEO Hates Interviewing Internal Talent

Chuck Robbins, CEO of Cisco, has revealed that he thinks there is no point to interviewing internal talent. 

In an interview with TBPN, he said: “I think when we have two or three internal candidates for a promotion, the whole interview process is stupid. 

“What are we going to learn about them when we sit down in a room for 30 minutes and ask them questions when we can watch them work?”

Instead of interviews, Chuck believes that observing employees in their day-to-day roles is a more accurate predictor of how they will perform, saying “every day you’re working is an interview for your next job.”

This means seeing success in a role both alone and as part of a team, according to Chuck, who says: “If your peer group would look at your promotion announcement and go, 'that makes perfect sense,' then you've done your job, right?

“And if you can't look in the mirror and say, 'OK, those people, would they be happy, would they believe it's the right decision?' And if they wouldn't, you're probably not quite where you ought to be.”