President’s Forum- 4th May 2010

New Thinking for a Complex and Fast-Changing World
…The future is ‘now’ because many of us are already late!

Speaker – Professor Eddie Obeng

 10.00 for 10.30 to 12.30 (followed by buffet lunch)
at the National Liberal Club, One Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HE

Aren’t you a little bit ‘fed-up’?
Even before the ‘Crisis’ the HR agenda was growing far too long and unwieldy.  In any industry this is a sign that the fundamentals have changed and need a re-think.  But the ‘crisis’ meant you had immediate challenges.  You’ve now spent the past eighteen months focused on emergency and prudent management of costs.  You’ve succeeded but as the surveys show, many of your staff plan to seek pay rises or new jobs once the ‘crisis’ subsides.

Now what?
You know that you need to look more strategically to the future.  You need to identify what to prioritise but you have little time, the pressures of now are overbearing.  And it not obvious where the future is heading.

Why join this session?
Eddie spent a over decade focused on a strange quest.  He wanted to discover what managers and executives would need; to learn, to be able to do, and how they would need to think once the pace of change around them exceeded their ability to understand it.  He calls the current business environment the “World After Midnight”.
Uniquely Eddie has taken a view across the whole organisation looking at how what we do, has long-grown obsolete and contributes to our difficulties by absorbing our time and attention.  He has developed and successfully applied, with his client organisations, concepts and frameworks designed to help resolve some of today’s questions and challenges and prepare the ground for the future. 

What will I get of it?
As an individual in our ‘new world’ you need to develop a capability for dual roles, enabling change and ensuring that the current business priorities and objectives are achieved.  Eddie will describe how to build your capability and offer some concrete tools. 

How will this help my function?
The current conventional thinking assumes that the current priorities, out of a sea of choices, are Talent retention and development, employee engagement, compensation, controlling cost and managing the perception of HR.  This view does not go far enough to address the real challenges.  For example, it is not just about Talent retention but more about how to deploy the Talent so that they can lead and deliver the results anticipated.  For this we need to explore how to build an organisation which operationally and culturally resonates to the complexity, ambiguity and fast change we are experiencing.  Eddie will use his OrganoWeb concept to explain how to achieve this.  Maintaining and improving the perception of HR by the rest of the organisation though important is not enough. The function, which has become a strategic partner over the past decade, must now become an effective but ‘invisible’ leader.

What will the experience be like?
Intensely interactive and dynamic.  You will have fun whilst you learn.

What will I leave with?
You will:
• leave the session with a new view of the key priorities and how to begint o tackle them
• leave with some concrete tools and frameworks with which to think and act
• be able to explain the functional and personal change agenda to colleagues
• leave saying, “That was very interesting – I need some more time to digest it but it really helped.”
• enjoy the experience of being provoked and challenged by Professor Obeng

For further information on Professor Eddie Obeng : Click here

This event will take place at One Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HE. Coffee will be served from 10.00 for a 10.15 start and the day will end at 12.30pm.
The per-person fee is £190 plus VAT for members of the HR Society and £275 plus VAT for non-members. A 20% discount will apply to the second and subsequent participants from the same company attending the same event.

Fee is inclusive of materials for the session, refreshments and a buffet lunch.

If you have any queries about this event or others in the HR Society Calendar please contact:
Lara Roberts, Programme Administrator
Tel: 01264 774004 ~ Fax: 01264 774009 ~ Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it