KPMG chief people and inclusion officer Evan Bateup on why talking to fellow leaders beats going it alone through uncertainty
For people leaders navigating the pressures of the role, one of the most valuable tools isn't a new framework or piece of technology – it's a phone call to someone doing the same job somewhere else.
That's the view of Evan Bateup, chief people and inclusion officer at KPMG New Zealand, who says connecting directly with peers outside your own organisation has become one of the most useful – and least talked about – habits a people leader can build, particularly as workforce uncertainty and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) reshape the job.
"It's an awesome job, it really is," Bateup said of the chief people officer (CPO) role, which he holds with a deliberately expanded title. "The addition of inclusion [to the title] just makes sure all the different people in KPMG know that that inclusionary voice is an active one within our exec team as part of what we do."
The hidden cost of leading people
Bateup pointed to something structural about people-leadership roles that makes external relationships more valuable than in most other executive functions: the isolation that comes from sitting both inside and outside the leadership team at once.
"Even internally, your role might mean you've got to performance manage the exec sitting next to you," he said. "You're part of the team, but you're always a little bit apart in different scenarios."
That isolation carries a real cost, he said, starting with wellbeing. "At a real personal level, is actually mental well-being," Bateup said. "The cognitive load of our roles are significant, and you're trying to solve really important decisions, often with imperfect information. That takes a toll. Just having a safe space with a peer who's doing the same thing actually just gives me the energy I need to keep on persevering."
His comments echo wider warnings within the sector about isolation tipping into burnout among senior leaders when left unaddressed – a risk that applies just as much to the people leaders themselves as to the staff they support.
Unlike commercially sensitive functions, Bateup said, people leadership tends to reward openness rather than guardedness between organisations. "One of the advantages in a CPO role versus a sales role is the nature of competition," he said. "It's a greater good, it's a lifting tide approach to what we do in the people space."
Peer conversations can shortcut decision-making
Beyond wellbeing, Bateup said conversations with peers act as a practical shortcut when weighing up options. "I'm weighing up trying two or three different ways of approaching a situation," he said. "They might either go, I've tried this and it's kind of working in this regard, or I tried this and it didn't work, so I can take one of the three options off the table."
He also pointed to the limits of any one person's information. Talking to someone with a similar vantage point but different experience, he said, means each side benefits from insight the other hasn't seen.
That's a different kind of value, he added, than the generic advice available from unconnected sources such as podcasts or online commentary that "may or may not really apply" to a leader's specific context.
Vulnerability, not ego, unlocks the value
Bateup's clearest message was about honesty. He said the value of a peer conversation depends on leaders being upfront about their own uncertainty rather than performing confidence – a mindset that echoes wider coverage of how HR leaders are learning to navigate constant change rather than eliminate it.
"The best part is often just getting together with peers locally, globally, and just understanding that no one actually has a good answer," he said. "Your exec team, your CEO, your board are looking to you going, so what are we going to do? And you're like, I don't know."
That uncertainty, he said, doesn't mean people leaders have nothing to offer – it means the value now lies in setting direction rather than promising certainty. "I think we're going to head in this direction and we are going to aim to step into these core problems first," Bateup said. "I'm not going to sit here and say exactly how we're going to get there ... but I know the first part of the road looks like this."
He said that willingness to say "I don't know" only works with the right audience. "If you go into those conversations just trying to out-ego your equivalent, you can probably feel good about yourself, but you're not going to get a lot out of it," Bateup said. "That's where you get the magic of it all."
