In this episode of the Future Proof HR podcast, Jim Kanichirayil sits down with Laura Muir, Chief Human Resource Officer at Polaris Transport, to talk about building HR infrastructure in a highly competitive transportation environment with a lean team, limited budget, and growing operational demands.

Laura shares how Polaris moved from a more informal, family-owned environment toward a more structured organization while still respecting the traditions, loyalty, and practical knowledge of long-tenured employees. She explains how transparency, leadership training, performance reviews, and employee trajectories helped the company create clearer growth paths without losing the culture that made the business work.

The conversation also gets practical about AI in HR. Laura explains how her team used tools like ChatGPT, Textio, and CodePro to build foundational job descriptions, support pay equity work, and give leaders a faster starting point for role clarity. She also shares the downside of AI in hiring, including candidates using AI-generated resumes that do not match their real experience, and how that changed Polaris's screening process.

For HR leaders working with small teams, tight budgets, and urgent business needs, this episode is a grounded look at using AI as a practical support layer, not a replacement for context, judgment, or leadership. Laura's experience shows why future-proofing HR often starts with building the basics, taking action, and improving the process as the organization grows.

Topics Discussed:

• How Polaris is moving from a mom-and-pop structure to a more scalable HR operating model
• Why tradition and long-tenured employees matter during organizational change
• How transparency helped employees understand new skills and career expectations
• Building employee trajectories through performance reviews and stretch roles
• Using leadership training to help managers communicate during uncertainty
• Why job descriptions became a priority for pay equity, compliance, and growth
• How ChatGPT, Textio, and CodePro supported job description work for a lean HR team
• Why AI-generated resumes forced Polaris to rethink candidate screening
• How skilled trades hiring changes the way HR evaluates applicant quality
• Building an employee skills repository to support workforce planning and retention
• Why AI still needs business context, leader input, and human judgment
• How execution helps HR teams learn faster than long planning cycles

If you are an HR leader trying to build better processes with limited resources, this episode offers a practical look at how AI can help a lean team move faster while still keeping people, context, and business needs at the center.

Additional Resources:

• Cleary's AI-powered HR Chatbot
• Future Proof HR Community
• Connect with Laura Muir on LinkedIn

I actually had incumbents in the interview say, ma'am, I

2

didn't really do that I had this

system build my resume out for me

3

and I think by having that DISCIPLINE

and that LEADERSHIP TRAINING leaders

4

were able to handle their teams and be

transparent and reassure them if anything,

5

that there is a MEANINGFUL CAREER HERE

6

And then having those conversations to

say, would you be interested in this?

7

It's really helped a lot

with our retention process.

8

Jim Kanichirayil: You're an HR leader.

9

You're at a company that's in a highly

competitive industry and sector.

10

The industry and sector relies

heavily on skilled trades.

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You have no budget, you need to grow, and

you're making an organizational transition

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from being a family-owned organization and

mom-and-pop type operation to something

13

that is setting the stage to scale.

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How do you pull that

off without any budget?

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How do you get started on doing anything

in terms of that scaling and growth

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journey, and how do you make it easier

with the limited staff that you have?

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Those are just a few of the questions

that Laura Muir had to tackle when she

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joined Polaris Transport as their CHRO.

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And in this conversation, we're gonna

tackle how Laura addressed all of those

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issues and started solving for elements

of it with AI in the loop, and that's

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the story that we're gonna tell today.

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She's a CHRO at Polaris Transportation

Group, and she's an award-winning

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leader in global human resources

practices and management strategies.

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She's a graduate of Oxford, and she

sits on the advisory board of HRO

25

Today and is the acting member for the

Women's Trucking Federation of Canada.

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Laura has lectured at a number

of events and enjoys speaking to

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students and other forums to help

provide guidance and inspiration.

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Her motto of "Be the unicorn,

develop powers that no one else

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has" Has inspired others to create

a unique and diverse background.

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Laura, welcome to the show.

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Laura Muir: Thank you, Jim.

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Jim Kanichirayil: So this is gonna

be a fun conversation because I get

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to relive my days, of being in, in

talent acquisition a little bit.

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so that's gonna be, a pretty

interesting conversation and hopefully

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for their listeners, I won't go

too far into the weeds on TA stuff.

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So we're gonna be looking at how AI can

be applied into a TA environment to create

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a more efficient workflow and process.

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So that's gonna be pretty

interesting to just dig into.

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But before we dive into that, I think

it's important for you to set the stage

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and give us a feel for your company and

kind of the spaces that you operate in.

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Because that's gonna be important

context for the TA conversation

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that we're gonna have today.

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Laura Muir: Thank you.

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So I'm the Chief Human Resource

Officer at Polaris Transport in Canada.

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we are a transportation company

considered midsize in North America.

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we run traffic between North South,

but we also have several entities like

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a warehouse facility and so forth.

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So I would say our employee

base is fairly dynamic.

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we do have a lot of technology, introduced

and part and parcel of our DNA at Polaris.

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when I came on board just about

five years ago, I started to explore

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AI and, how we can use it to build

sustainability in terms of our jobs.

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so one thing we're looking at is when I

started we were transitioning from a mom

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and pop shop, more structured environment.

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And we began to grow in

terms of our headcount.

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And now we're going back to basics in

terms of stretch roles and some of the

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things that were done in the infancy.

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so I'm looking to see how as we

introduced, technologies change

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management and how that's working

in terms of our talent acquisition

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and retention and efforts.

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Jim Kanichirayil: So I wanna dig

in a couple of different areas.

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So when you talk about being a

mid-size company in Canada, that's

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pretty straightforward in general

terms, in terms of what you can expect

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at that sort of an organization.

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And you're transitioning from, being

a mom and pop type organization to

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something that's more formally structured.

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I think people have a sense

for how that works as well.

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I think the gap between.

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What you're describing and what our

audience probably won't connect the

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dots easily, is the industry specific.

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When you look at being a mid-sized company

in Canada, that's moving from family

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owned to more of a scaled up organization.

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But within the industry, what's

unique about being in the industry

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and trying to pull this off

that people should be aware of?

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Laura Muir: I think.

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One is our adherence to

traditions, and change management.

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So many companies will

pull, trigger and introduce.

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A structural change, but because we're

still privately owned, there's the respect

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of the traditions and how things are done.

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tribalism isn't such a bad thing,

to be honest, and I've experienced

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this firsthand at Polaris, we

actually draw on the more tenured

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employees for their experiences.

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And we're also mindful when we

implement change management.

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We have employees who are

tenured up to 26 years.

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The company being 32 years old.

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Being mindful of what they've

experienced in terms of growth and

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introducing that sort of loyalty

into the new up and comers as well.

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I think it aligns with perfect

pairing and maybe some buddying

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up within the organization to help

spread the culture and focus on that.

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And I think we've been

successful thus far.

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Jim Kanichirayil: I get the value of

maintaining or being true to your roots.

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That

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makes sense.

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that's how I take what you just said.

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But there's a concept within the growth

cycle of every organization that you know,

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what got you here won't get you there.

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There's a direction that you want to go.

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And if you hold too tightly to quote

unquote traditions, you're not going

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to move or build enough momentum into

the direction that you want to head.

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So when, if you've experienced that, how

have you bridged the gap from merging?

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The tried and true ways into

what needs to change in order

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to get momentum to move forward.

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Laura Muir: I think being transparent

with the employee base as well

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of what our intentions is as we

introduce change management has

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been the secret of our success.

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also introducing things like

trajectories so people understand.

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Okay, you may be doing data entry today.

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That's not where your

job's gonna be tomorrow.

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We need to introduce skills

if you wanna continue to work

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here and to flourish here.

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sometimes people don't necessarily want

to go into leadership or become the

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SME, but there are other ways that we

can enhance their career experience by

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introducing technology in manageable

doses, is what I'm gonna call it.

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not everybody's on the

same learning curve.

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What I find is, it's not uncommon to say

the younger generation just eats it up.

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Whereas, some of the other people

who are more tenured may struggle

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with learning how to use ai.

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Things like Excel VLOOKUPs and things

that we may take for granted 'cause

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we're using it in the day-to-day.

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we provide a lot of

training opportunities.

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there's a lot of free training

that's out there that HR kind of

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tries to implement as part of their

growth and their goals for the year.

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And you learn very quickly where there's

going to be pushback on the employee side.

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And I think the modus operandi

is we take a step and ask them,

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are you willing to do this?

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And all too often they are, but in

the case where they're not willing

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to grow and put in the work as well.

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we need to make, key decisions

on how we handle those employees.

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Either repurposing them somewhere

else in the business, something that

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they're also more inclined to do.

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sometimes people have other, talents that

they don't really speak about, and we're

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learning that, since we've introduced

these employee trajectories as part of the

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performance reviews, we're finding a lot

of talent that's in the next layer, right?

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I think a perfect example is, we

introduced the Larry Cox Academy

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some years ago and, I had the

privilege of being the executive

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sponsor to one of the applicants.

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He was in the customer service

department and he actually had

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a very strong background in it.

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And over the course of the years, I

watched this individual grow into a

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supervisory role, but his other IT skills

were being used in the backgrounds because

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he became a project management bridge

between the operations of the business

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as well as the rest of the IT firm.

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And as we're growing talent, like

that's really hard to find because

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it's Polaris-ized, if you will.

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The Larry Cox Academy.

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We literally take somebody and move

them over a 15 month period of time

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into different functional areas.

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What was difficult managing him

through this program was he'd

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already been there because of the

tenure he'd had with the company.

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It was, how do we.

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Expose him to newer areas such as

finance, where he's never worked before,

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and how his skillset can align today.

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He works in our IT department, I'm

so happy to say, and he's doing

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quite well as a project manager.

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I'm very excited to see where his future

lies, but he's also become an inspiration

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to other applicants of the program.

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Jim Kanichirayil: Got it.

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So when I hear that, part of what you

did from a change management perspective

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is build in learning paths, and what

sounds like a rotational as a way to

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get, get people, exposed to different

areas of the company and give them

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multiple pathways to, to navigate.

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I wanna go back to something

that you mentioned earlier.

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when it came to.

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Bridging the gap between the traditional

approaches and what's necessary to scale.

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And you mentioned two things.

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You mentioned being transparent

and you mentioned also talking

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about a vision for the future.

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And when I think about both of

those things, that's all nested

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under an overall communication plan.

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And when I think about change management,

a lot of the success or failure of

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change management is gonna rely on what

your communication plan looks like.

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So can you share with us a

little bit more about the.

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Blocking and tackling involved

in the communication plan and how

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that was structured in a way that

meets everyone where they're at so

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that you can move forward together.

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Laura Muir: Yeah.

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when I started, we didn't really have

a formal performance review process,

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and we're also operating on what

I'd like to call a shoestring budget

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compared to many of my peers in hr.

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So you have to get really creative on

how you tackle some of these challenges.

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As we started to develop the

performance review process and build

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a cadence of how often these things

were happening, I started to urge our

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leaders to take courses on leadership

so that they also could cope.

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In the past, I noticed that we promoted

a lot of high performers, but we

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didn't necessarily hone in on how to

develop them to effective leaders.

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So we also created a program called

the Players Leadership Program.

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So they spent time learning things

like diffusing conflict, mindfulness,

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mental health as a leader.

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Polaris also introduced, third party

contractors to come in and speak to

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those leaders on mental health as well.

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So I've just been very blessed to

work for company that, I hatch a

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couple of weird ideas, but they're

like, you know what, if it works.

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again, trying to stay in budget.

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What the benefits and the ROI has been,

these are now high potentials who are

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trained up to be effective leaders

and they go back to these frameworks.

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What we're noticing, we introduced

two individuals last year into the

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Six Sigma program and, we brought on

board some other staff members who've

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had their black belt or experienced

doing Kaizen, lean Six Sigma.

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And, it really revolutionized us last

year, especially when our organization

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had to pivot, amongst the tariffs.

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I will not go into that.

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but that being said.

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In my industry of transportation,

it was a time of flux and unknown.

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And I think by having that discipline

and that leadership training leaders

204

were able to handle their teams and be

transparent and reassure them if anything,

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that there is a meaningful career here.

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I also saw in the performance

reviews as they started to

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build out employee trajectories.

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As they did these biannual reviews,

there were a lot of goals that were

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tied back to the performance of

the company, which after we did the

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employee engagement survey, we noticed

that many employees, the response was

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embedded in the results of that survey.

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Employees felt.

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More appreciated.

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They felt that, okay, I'm not just

being voluntold to do something.

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they actually felt as if they

had meaning in what they did.

216

we saw a number of individuals sign

up independently for classes and

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question, okay, what comes next?

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Which is really, avant-garde.

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and there was a sense

of belonging, I believe.

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So this year we're leveling up and

we're, we've, retained the services of a

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third party individual to come in house

actually this week and start with Lean

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Six Sigma on the next layer of leaders.

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Jim Kanichirayil: Got it.

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So that sets the stage up pretty nicely

for where we want to go with, with

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the main part of the conversation.

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So you as an organization.

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Are going through this transition and

you're, heading into this growth phase,

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and you've been here for, a handful

of years and you've been laying the

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groundwork in, in bringing that forward.

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Now, when you think about where you

need to head to next part of growth

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has to do, it has to involve hiring.

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It can involve upskilling the

existing staff, but you always need

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to bring new people in as well.

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So as you're preparing for growth.

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What were the issues that you noticed

from an operations perspective,

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specifically in HR and TA that stood

out to you as, hey, these are barriers

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to, barriers to entry, or barriers to

acceleration for where we want to go?

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Laura Muir: Unlike the US and Canada,

we have a lot of very stringent labor

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laws and requirements and reporting.

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And some years ago we started

to work on pay equity.

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Part of that was transparency of

roles and responsibilities, and it

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came back to doing job descriptions.

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And I have a very.

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Tiny HR team of literally six individuals.

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although we're overseeing a company

of multiple entities and just under

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300 employees, it's important that

my team is operating and servicing

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the shared services for all.

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and we're very much high performing,

department, There was a challenge.

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How do we do something like create, job

descriptions, if you will, and how do

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we do it in a timely fashion to meet pay

equity, regulations, and how do we make it

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relative to what they're actually doing?

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Some of the challenges were, we

didn't have the basics set up.

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What did a forklift operator do?

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What does, a customs clerk.

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Manage what are their

roles and responsibilities?

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So that clarity, coupled with our

senior leadership team, we were

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able to achieve the bones of that.

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But we started to explore ChatGPT

to work on the external framework.

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As soon as we had some of those details

and bullet points, we also looked at

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CodePro and we're still evaluating that.

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At the time I was evaluating

Textio because that was something

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I had to do internally myself.

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We just didn't have the bandwidth on

the team to explore something like this.

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And Textio went into a

different direction altogether.

265

So you live and learn,

Through this process.

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We're, it's still a work in progress.

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we're also, able to

leverage a lot of freeware.

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'cause a lot of companies are building

out their own programs and they love

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people like me to say, Hey, we'll

give you a free trial for 30 days.

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I'm using that free trial as most as I

can to kind of, get my Gantt chart sorted.

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but honestly I would say.

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There has been a real value because I

have not had to, had my team involved

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in mundane tasks and we're now able

to look at these, what I would call

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foundational job descriptions and start

to evaluate stretch roles and how we can

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create a Franken employee of like order

entry plus customer service and what the

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actual role and responsibilities are.

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when using ChatGPT, it's great

because it's fast, it's quick,

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it gives you a foundation.

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That you can start from, but you

still have to tweak to your business.

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But when I was evaluating and I'm

still evaluating Code Pro, it keeps

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a lot of the legacy information

and it's almost like a customized

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repository that you're building.

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So I'm in a rock and a hard place.

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Both are fairly affordable,

but I'm looking at.

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How I can optimize my

time as a practitioner.

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The business has to pivot

relatively quickly and.

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I need to respond to that.

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Sometimes I literally have a matter

of hours before I have to come up

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with some sort of foundation that I

present to senior management to say,

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is this what you're looking for?

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They don't have the bandwidth to do that.

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So I think all in all, as we're

utilizing ai, it's helped me

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to maintain my head count.

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Kept in line with budget, which is

great, but it's also helped me to

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explore what are other companies

doing and how are they attacking

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some of these things here in Canada.

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And we do have a handful of employees

in the US so I'm also being mindful

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of their roles and responsibilities

as well, and how it all comes

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together as an overall organization.

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Jim Kanichirayil: When I hear

that, here's how I understand it.

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You're going from zero to

one and we'll take the job

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description piece as an example.

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You're in an environment where even

roles and responsibilities weren't

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well defined, and you're building

that on the fly with the assistance of

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ai and this is platform independent.

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But when I look at that and you don't

have foundational level context, you enter

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into a garbage and garbage out scenario.

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So how did you manage or navigate

that particular gap or hole in

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how these AI platforms are set up?

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Because it's only as good as the

information that you feed it.

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And if you're thin on frontline

information, it's just gonna give you

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generalized AI slop that isn't useful.

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So How did you deal with that particular

gap or challenge with these AI platforms?

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Laura Muir: Like I said, because of the

size, our organization, we really had

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to rely heavily on the senior leadership

team and their input on their expectations

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of what this particular role does.

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I don't know, the interworkings

and the systems that they use,

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so down to that granular level.

319

But what I was also able to do is to

look at some of our direct competitors.

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What are some of the job postings that

they put out, and what are some of

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the expectations that they are putting

on those individual roles as well?

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we do have an HRIS system.

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we're using ADP's workforce now.

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but unfortunately there

isn't a tool like that.

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With that's industry specific.

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So this was a ad hoc way.

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I was able to craft something just

based off of whatever information

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I could find that's out there.

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I also luckily do belong to a number of

organizations and I have a lot of good

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friends in our industry who are in hr.

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We get together and talk about any

sort of word nuances that we may see.

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During COVID we were experiencing a war

on talent is what they would call it.

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So I would, meet with these individuals

and ask how are you guys keeping

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your forklift operators happy when

they can get up and leave for an

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extra 50 cent raise more or so forth?

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I think having that and aligning

with whatever we can find out

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through technology and what's

out there in the industry.

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It's, it gets the job done for now.

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Again, we do not have the luxury

of getting a company like PayScale

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to come in and do all of this.

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I've known of other companies that

are brought in third party firms that

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have got this information, but because

things are moving so quickly in our

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Canadian environment I question how

accurate is some of that data as well.

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Jim Kanichirayil: So the other thing

that I think about this growth journey.

345

You have to standardize

your job descriptions.

346

And the bulk of the talent that

you're looking for probably sits

347

in the skilled trades, side of it.

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So when I think about that, and I

come from the professional staffing

349

world, where I was always recruiting

for it talent, it's a different ball

350

game when it comes to distribution

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and finding candidates.

352

When you're talking about skilled trades,

finding distribution for the roles.

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Having those roles stand out in a way

where you can drive applicant flow, what

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did you notice in terms of the challenges

associated with those things and how

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did you solve for those challenges with

potentially an AI solve in there as well?

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Laura Muir: I would say, one of the, one

of the things I learned was I was looking

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at, Textio, they had a free, webinar.

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They were talking about how to create

effective job postings and there were

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things that, it's interesting to know

how quickly to somebody's span of

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attention, will just pass on your job.

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So what are things that you can do

to make your posting attractive?

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I also had to look at comp ratio

data as well to make sure that

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we were compliant, but also.

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We were not overpaying underpaying.

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There was like a fine balance.

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And I had to think, on a future kind of

basis, should things normalize post COVID,

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are these rates still gonna be relative?

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Are we gonna be in a situation

where a workforce is being overpaid

369

or underpaid coming out of COVID?

370

So a lot of kind of

considerations had to be.

371

Put in effect, again I draw from

a lot of our partners or staffing

372

agencies that we align with, giving

us feedback and a little bit of intel

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of these are some challenges that

they're seeing when they're helping

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us staff and fill some of these roles.

375

And, either moving or

adapting the role itself.

376

we've had to make comp changes.

377

Either draw down or draw up, maybe

introduce, non cash in kind, benefits.

378

we introduced things like

379

attracted a different level of talent.

380

Now your, to answer your question,

what are some of the challenges?

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I'm not.

382

Saying AI is, guilty of this, but we

found that many incumbents were using

383

AI to create their resumes and they

would make it to the interview stage.

384

And when it came down to asking them

the guts and bones of, can you do this?

385

Give us examples.

386

A couple of times I actually had

incumbents in the interview say,

387

ma'am, I didn't really do that.

388

I had.

389

This system build my resume out for me.

390

So having egg on their face helped my

team to realign how we did preliminary

391

interviews and what we were screening.

392

We had to completely change

our screening process.

393

our partners also realized this as well.

394

And this is something that's

becoming more and more prevalent.

395

Having to look at their social media

or, some of the questions that were

396

tailored specific roles to find out have

they, do they have the capability to do

397

these things as additional standardized

testing that we put in place as well.

398

Thomas Kunjappu: This has been

a fantastic conversation so far.

399

If you haven't already done so,

make sure to join our community.

400

We are building a network of the

most forward-thinking, HR and

401

people, operational professionals

who are defining the future.

402

I will personally be sharing

news and ideas around how we

403

can all thrive in the age of AI.

404

You can find it at go cleary.com/cleary

405

community.

406

Now back to the show.

407

Jim Kanichirayil: So there's a lot of

moving pieces that you just described,

408

but you just identified one of the

key problems that many organizations

409

are dealing with, in the age of ai.

410

And actually getting in front of real

candidates versus puffed up pieces of

411

paper that end up making it through

the, through the interview process.

412

So when you think about.

413

Augmented resumes, people that are

feeding their resumes, tying it to

414

their job description, and having

AI create a resume that aligns with

415

what the job description looks like.

416

If that's happening even

in the skilled trade space.

417

What are the things that you're doing

earlier in the candidate lifecycle

418

to fist those out before it gets

to, a mid funnel or late funnel

419

stage of the selection process.

420

Laura Muir: Honestly.

421

so like I said, we're a tiny team.

422

So we have our HR manager and an

HR generalist who more or less

423

spearhead recruitment on my team.

424

they're having to customize questions.

425

They're looking for real life examples.

426

When they do the screening, but even

before it gets to them, we're noticing

427

that there are some commonalities

in the makeup of the resume, the

428

content of the resume, even from a

candidate's comprehension skills.

429

So something as simple as how they

complete, job application form.

430

Are their English

comprehension skills up to par?

431

how they communicate in the prescreening.

432

are they understanding when we're

asking them questions, do they

433

understand and do they take the

initiative to research our company?

434

there's a lot of, research that's

also done by the partners to find out,

435

okay, do their, does their LinkedIn

align with what's on their resume?

436

And all too often we do find

that there are some gaps there.

437

So I think it's a fair game at this

stage, in technology that we can inquire.

438

While it says you're still

employed here, but on your LinkedIn

439

profile, it shows that you were

actually, you parted a year ago.

440

What have you been doing since then?

441

Everybody has a unique story to tell,

especially when they're applying for jobs.

442

It's just we're a little bit

more selective and we could

443

tailor the experience of the

interview to these individuals.

444

Jim Kanichirayil: So staying in the

interview front, when you're dealing

445

with potentially high candidate

flow, you have questions of whether a

446

percentage of those candidates are legit.

447

How does the idea of AI enabled

interviewing fit into that calculation?

448

I've heard about

organizations that are doing.

449

Early in the candidate selection

process, before even recruiter

450

will actually talk to a candidate.

451

There's prerecorded three questions that

they're asked, and the candidate has to

452

record their answers via video before

they're moved further along in the funnel.

453

So if you're dealing with a candidate

quality and you're dealing with

454

where a candidate can't speak

to the specific experience once

455

it gets later in the funnel.

456

How are you thinking through the

process of adding an interview

457

layer that's automated on the front

end of the candidate lifecycle?

458

Laura Muir: I know we had explored

Indeed, for example, does have that

459

capability and we had explored it.

460

But one thing I said to the HR manager,

we both mulled around we should

461

probably bring this back in-house.

462

I just find that sometimes they can

pre-coach themselves and rerecord

463

their responses, whereas it's a very

different experience and more authentic.

464

If you're asking those questions, on

a conference call or over the phone

465

it's not necessarily as prompted.

466

But you do get a sense also

reading and writing comprehension.

467

When you look at that candidate's

application form are they tech savvy?

468

Are they typing it out or are they

handwriting it and scanning it?

469

What does this look like?

470

I think it's, there's, it's still a

work in progress because again, our size

471

of organization, but also managing, is

this person going to be a culture fit?

472

So we are essentially back

to basics and we're trying to

473

actually mitigate some costs by

bringing some of these recruitment

474

In-house.

475

So we're also looking at, our recruitment

softwares that we're using, and platforms.

476

So like Indeed, we have

another one here in Canada.

477

We've got Monster.

478

I'm not sure if these translate,

globally or what have you, but we

479

are looking at other, platforms

and what their AI offerings are.

480

But I just think it's more

authentic to have those.

481

Virtual pre screenings so you

can see their actions reactions.

482

are they processing

what you're asking them?

483

Are they able to pivot when you ask

something a little more specialized?

484

but we also have a number of

entry level individuals as well.

485

So again, those are the ones that are

you willing to come on site five days

486

a week in an environment where the

perception is this is a hybrid role.

487

Maybe, 60% of the job is a work from home.

488

So just to get their transparency

I think important as well.

489

Jim Kanichirayil: So far we.

490

Looked at the TA process and the

employee lifecycle from the early stage.

491

AI assisted job description builds.

492

there may be a distribution component

that comes into it, and then you've put

493

in mechanisms to, increase the quality

of the screening so that you're getting

494

higher quality candidates in-house.

495

when you think about that process,

now you're at the stage of hiring and

496

making an offer and bringing them in.

497

What else have you done?

498

from an internal process perspective

to facilitate a more streamlined growth

499

trajectory, when you have a lean HR team.

500

Laura Muir: One thing we've started

to do is we're exploring, building

501

a repository of the employees.

502

So information like do you

have another language skill?

503

What was your graduate discipline in?

504

Did you graduate in something that

maybe you have a better interest in?

505

So going back to my example of

my incumbent that went through

506

Larry Cox Academy, when we were

able to identify that he had an IT

507

background and graduated from college.

508

In that discipline, it begged

the question what comes next?

509

So we're looking at software

now and AI to, okay, how's this

510

data and evaluate this data.

511

So should we have another offering?

512

Is there an internal candidate that we

could either build a trajectory for?

513

'cause some of these roles are

what I would call evergreen.

514

We're always looking for

what's up and coming.

515

And I think that nobody's gonna

know everybody's background.

516

Like the drop of a pin.

517

As you grow, it's difficult to

remember all of the, educational

518

backgrounds of all your staff.

519

But at least having a repository that

has that search agent or, intelligence

520

to kind of depict okay, who would be a

reasonable candidate to further develop.

521

And then having those conversations to

say, would you be interested in this?

522

It's really helped a lot

with our retention process.

523

Jim Kanichirayil: So when I hear

that, I hear workforce planning and

524

succession planning of that employee

lifecycle, I would imagine from a

525

skills inventory perspective that would

exist within your HRIS or ATS, already.

526

What are the gaps that you've

seen in current platforms that are

527

keeping you inventorying that in the

current systems of record, and having

528

to do this in a more manual way.

529

Laura Muir: I would say, the time it takes

for my team to transpose that information

530

into the repository is a big, gap.

531

also budget.

532

Am I willing to, invest in something

that would just click out an answer?

533

I think.

534

There's a lot of freeware that

I'm able to utilize rather than

535

spending that in our HRIS right now.

536

I think that, there's a lot of

opportunities that maybe we could

537

develop something and house ourselves.

538

I don't know yet what that looks like,

but, we're still in the infancy of

539

looking at what are the options, and

I'm trying to tell the story, of how.

540

This one time budget spend could

potentially benefit us in the long run.

541

But again, we're seeing the

growth pick up post COVID and

542

the tariffs have swayed things.

543

It's one minute it's good, you

don't know what's happening.

544

It's been a lot of

movement, in our industry.

545

I am challenging my HR operations

team with, attending seminars, getting

546

out there, networking, finding out

what other companies are doing to

547

hone in on talent and how are they

building trajectories, how are they

548

determining milestones for the employees?

549

How are they regrouping

with the employees on the.

550

Accomplishments of those milestones

because again, being mindful and having

551

taught in post-secondary, everybody's

learning curve isn't exactly the same.

552

It's not cookie cutter.

553

I'm finding some of the freeware,

it's taking the same approach.

554

It's then taking that template

and making it a little bit more

555

malleable to the employee experience.

556

That really lies between the

bridge of HR and leadership.

557

Jim Kanichirayil: So when

you think about your overall

558

retention strategy for talent.

559

You're in a space where, skilled

trades is not an easy set of talent to

560

find and then keeping them in-house.

561

When they can easily make transactional

decisions and go to another organization

562

for 50 cents more, or a dollar

more or whatever, that can occur.

563

the gap that exists within

your organization is taking

564

the skills inventory that

exists on a candidate profile.

565

And having that be actionable

once they're hired.

566

So when you think about how you could

apply AI to that existing skills

567

inventory and embedding that into.

568

What exists on your HRIS

platform or your ATS platform?

569

What are the different things that

come to mind in terms of initiatives

570

that you might take to leverage ai

to flesh out those skills inventories

571

and then have those candidates

be surfaced as new roles pop up?

572

So this is a very future,

like what if type.

573

Thought problem.

574

You're not, I don't think

575

you're already doing that, but this is,

how could AI be used to solve that issue?

576

Laura Muir: I think being mindful

that, our company does, adhere to

577

sustainability requirements and we do try

to build meaningful roles for everybody.

578

it's also helping leaders understand

what somebody else's capabilities

579

are and having those open discussions

so we could maybe consider moving

580

people into those other roles.

581

but again, going back to the question of

the data repository and how we use this.

582

I think right now to invest, our limited

budget into that may not be the time

583

for us right now because we're having to

deal with an influx of, I would say, new

584

talent as our business continues to grow.

585

But, simultaneously what we're

looking to do is figure out.

586

Maybe we don't use our HRIS.

587

Is there something that we can maybe

embed in A GPT or some other form of AI

588

or freeware, which is a thing, to kind of

house that data for us and then do some

589

sort of reporting on these are some up

and comers, these are the high potentials

590

we have, these are their skill sets.

591

Because one thing I don't like to

do, and I'm not an advocate for

592

is setting someone up to fail.

593

Someone may have a skillset and may

not, with their current attendance

594

or performance, really align

with next steps of their career.

595

So we need to go back to

basics and rein that in.

596

But in terms of identifying high

potentials and using AI to say these

597

are their skill sets, it would give us

a leg up to go to leadership and say.

598

What do you think you would

like to do with this individual?

599

Because this is their end game.

600

One thing I don't wanna do is to

bring good talent in, to have them

601

get up and leave and go to some

other company to go and do what

602

they're truly passionate about.

603

I can't stop that.

604

If people wanna leave, they wanna

leave, but it's always about the

605

experience we give them here at Polaris.

606

But one thing I would say is how

are we educating our leaders to

607

be open to the suggestions of what

capabilities people have and their

608

willingness to do stretch roles.

609

we've introduced some interim

promotions to individuals.

610

I've actually seen where someone has

entered a new role and then done a

611

walk back because, she just didn't

feel comfortable taking that next step.

612

That's not something that.

613

Becomes a full stop at the end

of the day at our organization.

614

There's always opportunity to grow, and

that's something that will probably, go

615

back to her, at each performance review.

616

What does this look like for you?

617

it's interesting because I could foresee

that person eventually becoming a

618

leader, but at the time we were trying

to introduce the person to that, they

619

decided it was not really for them.

620

Jim Kanichirayil: So I like the, I

like the emphasis that you have on,

621

Driving growth number of different ways.

622

'cause I think generally speaking, when

you look at reasons for why somebody

623

leaves an organization, if you're looking

in the top five, two of the top three

624

will be related to manager issues.

625

And then one of the top three

issues is gonna be lack of growth.

626

So the fact that you're focused on,

expanding growth opportunities within.

627

the organization that's, that's

a pretty good initiative.

628

The thing that I worry about when

I hear what you're describing

629

is one of the challenges is

having a single system of truth.

630

when you have data that's spread across

multiple systems, you create automatic

631

blind spots and choke points, for not

only HR members, but also the leadership

632

team because if the system of record,

if there's four systems of record

633

and all of them have different data

points, it's hard to get a global view.

634

So I'd be curious to see how

that problem gets tackled over.

635

over time, as we continue the growth

journey, want you to zoom out and

636

I want you to think about yeah,

where you started from, a talent

637

perspective and the infrastructure

that you put in and where you are now.

638

and that can include like

everything that you've encountered.

639

So when you look at that journey from

not even having, baseline roles and

640

responsibilities mapped To where you

are now, what are key lessons that

641

you've learned, especially when it

comes to applying AI for specific

642

problems that you dealt with in, in the

candidate lifecycle stage, process, as

643

well as the employee lifecycle stage.

644

Laura Muir: I would say, really

taking your time to do regular

645

evaluations on workforce planning.

646

many companies, regardless of size, I

think that's always an ongoing struggle.

647

and one of the challenges that we've also

faced is the market climate, the economy,

648

tariffs, which is specific to my industry.

649

When I started, like I

said, it was grassroots.

650

There were no job descriptions,

no role clarity, and then I

651

joined at a time of COVID.

652

So there was the war for talent.

653

I think making sure that our

workforce planning is sustainable

654

and by that introducing technology.

655

At the right time and making sure

staff are aware of how this is gonna

656

impact them and their roles, things

that they need to do and, gear up for.

657

Keeping the energy, I

think is also important.

658

I think by.

659

Also getting their feedback of

how this change management is

660

operating from the ground up, helps

leaders to evaluate, okay, are we

661

moving too aggressively on this?

662

Do we need to pull back

and kind of recalibrate?

663

Because from the end user standpoint,

this is working, this isn't working.

664

Specifically in my own department, we've

learned very quickly that just bolting

665

people on, in particular departments where

there's high attrition is not the answer.

666

Because when we saw decline

in volumes, it resulted in the

667

inevitable reduction in force.

668

We started to get creative with

things like I said, stretch roles.

669

So as we were also exploring things like

Flex Staff, so leaning on our partner

670

agencies to bring in staff, as we required

them and as, and dialed down on those

671

individuals, met oftentimes, if it was

a high performing, Flex opportunity,

672

that person was converted in-house.

673

It gave them an additional

layer of trying this out.

674

Does this work for them?

675

some of those individuals were actually

hired and then brought on board in other

676

areas because having that background

of what their area of expertise are

677

and where they were really passionate

of staying in the business, which I

678

thought was also very interesting.

679

Jim Kanichirayil: Great stuff.

680

If people want to continue the.

681

Conversation.

682

What's the best way for them

to get in touch with you?

683

Laura Muir: I'd say,

hit me up on LinkedIn.

684

I'm always interested to make a

connection and, discuss what's happening

685

in HR and in our world in general.

686

Jim Kanichirayil: Awesome stuff.

687

So thanks for hanging out with us, Laura.

688

I appreciate you sharing your experience

and when I think about this conversation,

689

it aligns really well with a lot

of the stuff that I do in general.

690

I operate in the zero to one space.

691

In what you described in terms of your

journey at Polaris is a zero to one

692

story when it comes to applying AI

and also applying overall process to

693

an HR organization in a TA process.

694

One of the things that stands out

to me is that the emphasis was just

695

getting frameworks in place and then

696

executing.

697

That's usually the toughest thing

for a lot of organizations to

698

do because they spend more time

in strategy versus execution.

699

And when you're looking at a growth.

700

Plan.

701

You're not gonna grow in the boardroom.

702

You're gonna grow through execution.

703

And especially when you're

looking at multiple tiers of

704

initiatives that you wanna roll out.

705

You wanna roll out an AI initiative,

you wanna revamp your TA initiative, you

706

wanna update your job descriptions, you

wanna update your succession planning.

707

Those are all things that people

can turn into month long strategy

708

sessions and never make progress

because they've never set into motion.

709

So for those who are listening to this

conversation and are thinking about

710

what they want to do, it's important to

think about those things, but it's more

711

important to put those into action even

if they're not fully formed, because that

712

bias for action is what's gonna actually

teach you what you need to know to

713

iterate and innovate as you move forward.

714

So as you're listening to

this conversation, for those

715

people who have hung out.

716

And listen to this.

717

That's the key takeaway that I, draw

from it, is that you have to put

718

these things into motion, even if

they're half baked, because the only

719

way that they actually become fully

formed is when they meet the market.

720

And if you'd never meet the market,

it still stays on the drawing board.

721

And you haven't made any progress

other than just burning time.

722

So I appreciate you sharing that with us.

723

For those of you who've been

listening to this conversation,

724

we appreciate you hanging out.

725

If you like the discussion, make sure

you leave us a five star review on your

726

favorite podcast player, and then tune

in next time where we'll have another

727

leader hanging out with us and sharing

with us the strategies and initiatives

728

that they're utilizing and implementing

in their environments to future-proof HR