Project – CHREATE

From 2013 to 2017, CHREATE was a consortium of HR leaders looking to advance the future of HR. During that time, over 50 CHROs and HR leaders contributed to the project.

These HR leaders put hundreds of volunteer hours into an effort to map how HR must evolve and meet the challenges of the next ten years, to identify pivotal initiatives to accelerate that evolution, and to design the actions needed to make the future a reality.

CHREATE was built on five beliefs.

Open Source
There are no proprietary interests or claims that limit the use of what we uncover or create. We make our findings, tools and insights available to anyone, in support of those who share our mission to accelerate HR forward faster. “Open Source” engages more voices, harvests more insights and wisdom, and creates a more broadly shared commitment to our mission.

Voluntary
The vast majority of effort is by volunteer leaders who participate for a unique opportunity to collectively give back to the profession from which they have so richly benefited. CHREATE gathers funds that support the necessary program office and other expenses to coordinate and support the volunteer effort.

Inclusive
Of course our participants work for competitive organizations, are individual thought leaders in their own right, and compete to provide products and services to a common constituency. Their participation in CHREATE enhances their efforts, but CHREATE is a place where we agree to put competitive relationships aside, in order to amplify our efforts through collectivity and collaboration. We focus where we can accomplish more, faster and with fewer resources through collaboration, understanding that we may also compete in other arenas.

Messy
There will be “messiness” in a volunteer-driven and inclusive undertaking, and that can be frustrating and uncomfortable at times. This messiness is inherent in our approach. It is essential to build the new ecosystem that accelerates the HR profession and organizational capabilities. It is also increasingly essential to how our organizations must operate, so CHREATE is our opportunity to learn, model and develop those capabilities in ourselves, and to apply them to own organizations and the broader profession. We acknowledge the challenges and discomfort transition evokes. We will practice our skills in change management upon ourselves.

Agile

Our findings and tools emerge through agile evolution, including design thinking, adaptive planning, evolutionary development, early delivery, continuous improvement, and rapid and flexible change. We understand and embrace that everything is imperfect, and that our results and products are always a starting point for innovation and improvement. Progress is iterative and incremental, with collective input. We strive for practicality and tangibility, balanced with the necessary abstractions needed for innovation and forward thinking.

The following table shows the three phases of work that occured over several years for the CHREATE team.

Executive Summaries by Phase