Ebonee Ifeobu
Chief People Officer
Heritage Medical Associates
Episode 187
Beyond HR transformation: Why cultural renovation drives real impact.
Current chapter: Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built By PeopleMay 16, 2025 · 12:03
Thesis
“Effective HR leadership prioritizes understanding and building upon an organization's existing culture to achieve 'renovation' rather than imposing top-down 'transformation'. Measurable impact is achieved by deeply analyzing HR metrics within context and fostering a culture of continuous learning.”
Show notes
Leadership and Cultural Renovation in HR with Ebonee Ifeobu on the Built by People Podcast
In this episode of the Built by People Podcast, host Dave welcomes Ebonee, a seasoned HR leader with extensive experience across various industries including healthcare, CPG technology, and automotive.
Ebonee shares insights from her career journey, highlighting her role in culturally sensitive HR leadership, especially in regions like Latin America. She emphasizes the importance of cultural renovation rather than transformation, aligning KPIs to measurable impacts, and innovative approaches to compensation.
Ebonee underscores the value of listening, learning, and humility in leadership. She concludes with advice on the significance of constant learning for leaders at all levels.
00:00 Introduction and Welcome
00:41 Ebonee's Career Journey
01:49 Cultural Renovation vs. Transformation
05:57 Building a People Strategy with KPIs
08:33 Innovative Compensation Structures
10:59 Parting Advice for Leaders
11:56 Conclusion and Farewell
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What you'll take away
- 1Focus on cultural renovation by adapting and strengthening existing cultural elements rather than attempting a complete transformation, especially in diverse global contexts.
- 2Shift beyond raw turnover numbers to actionable KPIs like 'quality of hire' to understand the root causes of attrition and implement targeted retention strategies.
- 3In flat organizational structures, utilize 'in-grade promotions' and regular job evaluations to reward high-performing individuals and enhance retention without creating unnecessary elevated titles.
- 4Cultivate a leadership style centered on continuous learning, humility, and seeking to understand, which fosters authenticity and encourages team contribution.
- 5When implementing changes, consider the unique cultural nuances of different regions (e.g., relationship-based cultures in Latin America) to ensure new processes resonate and attract talent.
What most organizations get wrong
- •Pushes back against the common executive tendency to implement top-down 'cultural transformations' that force new structures and people to fit a leader's style, advocating instead for a 'renovation' approach that builds on existing strengths.
- •Challenges the perception of turnover as an inherently good or bad metric, asserting that it is neutral and only becomes actionable when understood within its specific context (e.g., first-year turnover, reasons for departure).
- •Suggests that for flat organizations, an 'in-grade promotion' strategy (adjusting pay within salary bands based on performance and actual job duties) is often more effective for retaining talent than creating potentially meaningless elevated titles.
In Ebonee's words
“in my mind, when the leader changes the structure and the people and the rewards to fit them, that's the transformation versus when you look at what's already there, you adapt, you strengthen, you build, that's the renovation.”
This quote defines Ebonee's core philosophy on cultural change, distinguishing between top-down transformation and adaptive renovation.
“But turnover is not inherently good or bad. It's the context behind it.”
This highlights a nuanced view on a common HR metric, emphasizing the importance of qualitative understanding over raw numbers.
“what I realized is that about 50% of our overall turnover was happening with people within the first year. Some of it, it was the training or lack thereof. Some of it was just a bad hire or a bad fit.”
This identifies specific, actionable drivers of high first-year attrition, moving beyond surface-level data.
“for a flat structure, I don't want to necessarily create elevated titles that are meaningless to people. I don't want to overinflate titles or overpay for salary. But what I can do is look at the people periodically that have been here that are high performers and see if the job that they're doing is actually the job that we hired them for.”
This quote outlines a creative and practical compensation strategy for retaining talent in flat organizations.
“I think our job as leaders is to learn, right? I think we should seek to learn versus seek to lead, because when we seek to learn, you're showing that you believe that other people can contribute to your ecosystem.”
This offers a humble and authentic leadership philosophy, emphasizing growth and valuing contributions from others.
The problems this episode addresses
- •Leaders struggling with cultural change initiatives that are met with resistance because they are perceived as top-down transformations rather than adaptations.
- •Organizations experiencing high first-year employee turnover (e.g., 50%) due to issues like inadequate training, poor hiring matches, or lack of cultural fit.
- •HR departments needing to move beyond basic turnover metrics to understand the specific contextual drivers behind attrition for more effective intervention.
- •Companies with flat organizational structures facing challenges in retaining high-performing talent without overinflating job titles or salary bands.
- •Global organizations struggling to integrate standardized HR processes (e.g., hiring practices) across diverse cultural contexts without alienating local candidates or employees.
In this episode
Built by People podcast features insights from world's top HR leaders
Built by People
Dave Johnson is currently leading HR for a healthcare company
An Interview with HR Executive Dave Jones
Ebony says she successfully implemented a cultural renovation rather than a transformation
Cultural Revitalization: The Right Approach
Ebony created a people strategy that linked KPIs to measurable impact
Ebony, can you walk us through the
Ebony had to think creatively about compensation to attract and retain talent
Exploring the Compensation Framework
Ebony says leaders should seek to learn rather than lead
Ebony On Leading With Integrity
Topics covered
Organizations and entities mentioned
Full transcript
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