Dina Perreault

▶0:05IntroWelcome to the Built by People podcast, where we highlight the stories and insights of the world's top HR leaders. Now, let's Let's get started and welcome our next guest.

▶0:35HostOkay, well, I'm excited to welcome Dina to the Built by People podcast. Dina, thank you so much for joining us today. As a starting question, always love to ask if you can share more about your career journey.

▶0:47GuestSure, I would love to. I actually, I know I'm in HR now, but I didn't set out to be in HR. Many, many years ago when I went through college, I'm the first in my family to go to college and we couldn't afford it, so I actually accepted an Army ROTC scholarship and joined the military right out of college. And when it was time for me to leave the military, I started interviewing sort of all over the place for different jobs in logistics or in sales. I actually took a job working for some oil refineries doing project management and turnarounds. And the day I came to Philadelphia for a baseline physical, because it's like a big chemical plant, right? The HR manager reached out and said, hey, would you like to go to lunch with me? And I said, sure, as long as I'm— I was in DC at the time— as long as I'm back to DC on time. To pick up my children. And, uh, I would love to. What I didn't know was that that 1-hour lunch was really an interview. And what he told me was that he really liked to hire smart, hardworking people who didn't already have bad habits in the profession, and he'd be happy to train them and mentor them. So by the time lunch was done, I was offered a job as an HR manager for a refinery in Philadelphia.

▶2:01HostWow.

▶2:02GuestRight. And I kind of laughed and he's like, what do you know about HR? And I said, I can barely spell it. And he laughed because, you know, HR in the Army is very different, right? Congress oversees wage guides and benefits and all that kind of stuff. It's all congressionally mandated. So HR looks more like leadership development versus comp and benefits and all that kind of stuff. And he said, come work for me. I'll train you everything I know. And what I didn't know was he was planning to retire. The next year, but his name is Larry and he was true to his word. He brought me on, he sent me through some additional training, made sure that I got my HR certification, and then he rode off into the sunset. And that was 23 years ago. And here I remain.

▶2:44HostWow. That's an amazing, that's an amazing career path. That's pretty awesome.

▶2:48GuestYes. I was not many people get that. One day HR, the next day. I don't know how that happened, but.

▶2:53HostI love it. Well, you know, going, you know, going into that career journey, obviously you've got a lot of experience with, um, obviously building teams and working with teams and actually managing, right, those groups. Right now, what would you say is a top priority for you this quarter?

▶3:06GuestThis quarter, I mean, we're coming up on year-end, so all the typical year-end type of activities, but I'm working really hard with our executive team and our leadership on succession planning moving into next year. So we're doing bits of succession planning and also some talent pipeline planning, right? Like how many people do we actually need to bring in next year? Where are our skills gaps and how do we move forward with that?

▶3:29HostOkay, awesome. Yeah, I know a lot of people, especially around this time of the year, right? They get bogged down with all of that, plus the compensation, the benefits, and everything else that's going on.

▶3:38GuestSo I know everyone's in a very busy last part of the year, unfortunately, but— Yeah, and I am lucky that I have a very strong team that's handling all the administrative tasks, like our open enrollment and performance reviews and updating wage guides and all that kind of stuff. So I get to sort of oversee all of that and then do more of Part of my focus is now on more of the strategic level type activities, like succession planning and talent development.

▶4:03HostYeah. Well, I love that. It kind of leads pretty well into our, into my next question, which is what's the biggest challenge you're facing in HR?

▶4:11GuestI think the biggest challenge is trying to find technical talent in the trades because it's a shrinking pool and competition is pretty fierce out here. So the company I currently work for, we need mechanics, automotive mechanics, And there just aren't enough people going through tech or trade schools right now to fill all of the needs out in the field. And then especially as the equipment becomes much more technical, a lot of these new techs need to have that computer programming or, you know, the different kinds of computers that work on the vehicles now. And because, you know, most vehicles now have basically an iPad or, you know, a computer in them, it's just a different set of training, a different set of skills. So that's been our biggest concern right now.

▶4:52HostYeah. Which makes sense, right? A lot of people aren't going into that specific trade anymore. And so, yeah, I can imagine finding the right person is pretty difficult.

▶5:00GuestYeah.

▶5:02HostYou know, you mentioned something that was, it kind of hit me and actually leads really well into the other question I was going to ask, which is if I were to shadow you for a week, where would I see you spending the most time on things that don't feel strategic?

▶5:14GuestHonestly, I think it's answering repetitive employee questions about benefits and payroll and time off. They're all really important questions that everybody needs to know. One of the things I learned in the Army was don't mess with people's pay or their time off or their food, right? So I kind of always understood that. So it's really, really important to take all of those questions seriously. But when you're answering the same question for the 10th time, right, about the same kind of thing, or, hey, maybe they didn't read the email that was sent, that's kind of demoralizing, right? And then you spend a lot of time doing that repetitive administrative kind of work. Rather than focusing on strategy. What's the next best thing that we can do to move our company forward next year, within 3 years, 5 years?

▶5:56HostYeah. Yeah. I mean, you're not alone. I, we, you know, I get in a lot of these conversations and it seems like there's a pretty, a pretty common thread of that, right? Where it's like, yeah, I feel like unfortunately I'm, I'm answering repetitive questions. And so one of the things I usually have kind of followed up with on that is, what are you guys doing to combat that from maybe a communication standpoint? Because it seems like that's what I hear often is, that we're drafting that email, we're putting it into all the places that we normally send information and make sure they can access it. But still, I get these people coming back and asking the questions. Is there anything you guys are doing right now that you're trying to maybe improve or create that engagement where there maybe doesn't eliminate but reduces some of those inbound questions?

▶6:43GuestSure. So this year we actually created a page of FAQs So when the employees log in to, you know, clock in and clock out through our HRIS system, right on that site, there is a list of frequently asked questions that they can easily click to. So that was sort of step 1. What we realized is we don't have a really high utilization rate for that yet. But then on a quarterly basis, my HR director and HR manager and one of our generalists are holding quarterly management trainings where they go over things like performance reviews, or how do we hire folks? What are all the steps in the process in getting them onboarded? So what we realize is when we try to do it too often, nobody attends. But once a quarter seems to be a nice tempo for us to hold— yeah, to hold those Zoom calls so that the HR people in each of their locations can meet with those managers, answer their ongoing questions, and then kind of highlight, hey, this is the question we're getting most often. So maybe we should reach back out and remind folks. So it's kind of like continuing to drip information on those managers.

▶7:45HostYeah. Awesome. I love that. So I'm curious, I'm going to skip a couple of questions and come back to them, but you know, which tools or partners are you finding most critical for you today with what we just spoke about?

▶7:57GuestSo I don't specifically have any tools. I would love something that I could, you know, would just take over all the, the administrative work that we're constantly doing, the pulling the reports and all that kind of stuff would be really, really great. And we do have those kinds of reports already set up and built, but I think the most critical partners that have are the operational leaders at the executive level, right? So we have just installed some area vice presidents in the past couple of years for each of our hubs. And making sure that HR is well aligned with those 3 executives has been a huge benefit because they can sort of carry the water for us, right? They can ask all the questions or say, hey, I'm also being inundated with these questions. You know, how do I help? Get the word out, and then use sort of the same language so we're all speaking from the same playbook. I think that has been really, really helpful. In fact, one of the, the newer area vice presidents joked with me one day and said, I feel like I'm an honorary member of the HR team. And I said, welcome, you're a people person now, right? You're one of us. But yeah, because he's now helping carry those messages forward.

▶9:04HostYeah, no, I think that's a big part, right? It's still, we still have to utilize people. It's funny, a lot of the conversations I get into, there's always this concern of AI. That it's going to overtake, you know, a lot of the jobs that are there. I think one of the things that you can't overtake is the human interaction, right? And be able to actually communicate well with that person and sit across the desk from them, right? And you can read that individual and actually understand what is resonating with you, what are you understanding, maybe what aren't you understanding, right? And so I love that you guys have put area managers in there to actually help combat some of that communication to help deliver it downward. Right.

▶9:40GuestAnd since you mentioned the AI piece, you know, we do use some AI to help train some of our folks. Where they can get some scenarios that they can work through, and they can speak to the computer, and it'll kind of reach back out to them so they can tell sort of levels of EI or executive presence, that kind of thing. So they're good to practice on, but they're not the whole truth, right? So it's good if you're trying to figure out your elevator pitch, right, or your opening, or that kind of thing. If you're trying to practice, I think that's really helpful. But as you stated, sitting in front of someone and watching their bodily reactions, looking at their facial expressions. Now you know if you're really connecting or not, or if there's some confusion, right? Whereas talking to a computer model, you just don't get that.

▶10:22HostAbsolutely. And that is one of the big things we're finding is where, where does a company thrive versus suffer? And one of the common things we've heard is communication, right? How we're communicating to the employees and getting them to align with what the goals and the culture of that company is or planning to be, right? And so being able to better communicate that to the employees, and like you mentioned, seeing that person react in person is a big piece of that.

▶10:52GuestAnd in real time, right? And I think about, you know, I've worked for 3 different companies since I've left the military, you know, all in human resources. And in every single company, we've conducted those employee engagement surveys, you know, at multiple points throughout my tenure at each. And of course, and so this isn't just in my current company, but it's sort of universal that the number one issue that employees state they have is a lack of or insufficient communication with the leadership team. So they really don't necessarily know where the company is going. And I just don't think that that's something that AI will be able to— it won't be able to fill that gap, right? You really need humans to have that conversation. And then when I also think about some of the scenario testing, I think it's great for entry-level folks just to get their kind of arms around it and get some practice saying the words out loud. But once you have some level of experience behind you, you can start thinking back and connecting the dots for all the things that you've learned in your entire career to give really good advice and to help people out.

▶11:52HostAbsolutely. And the thing you said that is really interesting and what I keep hearing is obviously the almost the sense of overcommunication is better than undercommunication. And I know there's a lot of times HR leaders get very concerned, like, oh, I don't want to bombard my employees with too much information. I don't want them to always be like, oh, there's another email. But to exact your point on that, better engagement from employees means that they're going to be there longer, right? This is your better employee because they understand what's happening in the organization versus those that are kind of lost and confused over here on the other side where it's like, I haven't heard from any executive leaders in months. I don't know what's happening, right?

▶12:36GuestAnd then if you're in person, and I'm saying in person, not necessarily shaking their hand directly, but at least, you know, on a screen or somewhere where you're interacting with them and you can see the other people, you start building this higher level of trust as well, right? That I just feel like, and maybe, maybe this will be the Jetsons in the future, right? That we'll be more comfortable talking to machines, but that's just not yet, right? Not today.

▶12:58HostYep, exactly. Exactly. No, that's amazing. Well, here's a couple of questions in closing. If I came back in 12 months, what would you hope has changed in your HR org?

▶13:09GuestSure. I would love to see tighter alignment with the field. And I think these area vice presidents are a huge help for that. So tighter alignment, less repetition of the basics, you know, what we just keep saying over and over again. I think that being fully aligned with them would really help us from that perspective. And then I'm going to say stability in our pay structures. The market is a little bit wild right now. So trying to bring on good talent is more expensive than it has been in the past. And we're trying to really avoid compression of our current employees as well. So I think that, so, you know, I'm just kind of thinking less tinkering with all these little things and focus on execution, really good execution of our operations, our business plans, and how HR aligns with that.

▶13:52HostI love that. Well, As parting advice, what would you like to share with our community?

▶13:56GuestSure. I would say, and I'm probably beating the same drum of many other HR professionals, but really be a business partner first. You need to learn the business well. You need to be able to speak the business language fluently. When you're hired as an HR person, the leadership team assumes you know HR, right? So don't lead with that all the time. Lead with the business piece and how you can impact the business with all of the tools and insights and experience that you are bringing.

▶14:22HostI will say that was one of the better pieces of advice we've heard.

▶14:25GuestOh, thank you.

▶14:26HostYes. A lot of people kind of go with, yeah, showcase a similar experience and what you've done in the past, but I don't hear often people saying, hey, bring in the business side of this and how you can actually help enhance that. Because like you said, they know you as the HR side. They expect you to understand that and to be able to immediately tackle that. But if you can bring in that other piece of it, that's a really key component to actually being successful. So I love that.

▶14:52GuestYeah.

▶14:53HostThanks. So, well, Dina, thank you so much for joining us today on the Built by People podcast. It has been a pleasure to have you involved with us.

▶15:00GuestThank you so much. It was nice to meet you.