HR leaders are shifting from compliance and admin toward driving direct business results through people decisions
Global research is converging on the same conclusion: human resources is no longer just a support function – it is becoming one of the most decisive levers for business performance.
McKinsey's HR Monitor 2025, which surveyed nearly 2,000 companies and 4,000 employees across Europe and the United States, found that organisations excelling at both people and performance can achieve up to 30 per cent higher revenue growth than those focused on only one.
Meanwhile, Deloitte's 2025 Global Human Capital Trends report, based on responses from close to 10,000 business and HR leaders across 93 countries, reached a similar view: businesses least able to withstand disruption are often the ones still treating HR as an administrative afterthought.
Nowhere is that shift more visible than at Hunter Douglas, the Netherlands-founded window coverings manufacturer, where the Asia-Pacific (APAC) HR team led by Syntia Leite, APAC Human Resources Head, has rebuilt the function around commercial outcomes rather than headcount administration.
From compliance function to commercial partner
For decades, Hunter Douglas grew through more than 100 independently run entities acquired with little central coordination. Since 3G Capital took a controlling interest in the company in December 2022 – with the founding Sonnenberg family retaining a 25 per cent stake – unifying that fragmented structure has become the defining task for HR.
Leite's team resisted the instinct to centralise everything. "We decided very early on that we're going to work in a matrix organisation, which means we're going to have regional teams – we call it Regional APAC – and then there are global teams as well, the centres of excellence," she said.
Country HR leads still run local teams day to day, while compensation, rewards and talent sit as global centres of excellence – a structure that reflects a recent analysis of how HR leaders prove strategic value, which points to the same tension between local relevance and enterprise-wide consistency as central to earning genuine influence.
Why HR is being handed a seat at the results table
Leite makes the case for HR's strategic weight in blunt commercial terms. "I do think HR is the most strategic function," she said.
"It's the one that touches people, and people will deliver results, deliver finance, deliver compliance, deliver sales. If we get things wrong on hiring – wrong person, wrong place, wrong timing – the business will not flourish. It's as simple as that."
That thinking shapes daily practice. "We don't see HR as a function that recruits, trains and outplaces people," Leite said. "We say: how can we help you drive better results? What can we do to have a management model with routines in place and KPIs cascaded, so we can get there together?"
In practice, that means her country HR leads attend the same meetings as finance and sales. "I do a lot of business trips, so I'll go to the monthly reviews when they talk about EBITDA, net sales, business results. I'm there, I'm listening. And my HR leads in each country also go to the sales meeting, the finance meeting. They understand what's going on with the results of the business," she said.
That pattern lines up with new research on why CEOs expect CHRO influence to grow: an IBM study of 2,000 executives across 33 countries found 59 per cent expect the CHRO's influence to grow, driven partly by the recognition that workforce adoption – not technology itself – is the biggest barrier to returns on AI investment.
Proof over persuasion
Rather than arguing for influence, Leite's team has tried to demonstrate it directly. Talent density mapping sessions using a nine-box grid became one of the clearest proof points.
"The biggest takeaway for them was when they came together in the calibration and listened to their peers talk about their teams," Leite said. "They said, 'I didn't know you could add that much value talking about my employee.'"
That evidence-first approach mirrors the broader shift toward frequent, feedback-driven performance management, where HR leaders are replacing static annual reviews with continuous feedback models precisely because they generate the kind of data that makes HR's commercial case for itself.
What it takes to make the shift stick
Leite is candid that translating this philosophy across 1,500 employees and more than ten factories spanning Australia, New Zealand, China, India and Vietnam hasn't been straightforward.
"We made some mistakes underestimating the complexity in some countries in APAC region," she said. "You need to ask three times, listen carefully, and sometimes find a local translator to support your understanding."
An early offsite in Vietnam, held within two months of the APAC senior team forming, set the tone. "We shared weaknesses and strengths, and we drew on a page what our dream was and how we were going to work together to get there," she said. "It was super simple, but I think the leadership team set the tone from there, and it cascaded out."
Her advice to HR leaders chasing the same influence is direct. "Be humble to learn, but be bold as well," she said. "Sometimes you need to make bold decisions and learn from them."
For Leite, the underlying philosophy is simpler still: "Human back in human resources. Resources is one thing, but human – just talk. I think that's it."
