Inside Humankind Partnerships: Building organisational performance with Charlotte Brochoire
At Humankind, partnerships are at the heart of everything we do. This week, we had the opportunity to sit down with Charlotte, one of our Senior Client Partners, to discuss her approach to working with organisations, the unique value of long-term partnerships, and her insights into the evolving challenges in people and culture consulting.
Can you share a little about your role at Humankind and how you work with Partnerships clients?
My role as a Senior Client Partner is about driving organisational performance by helping leaders show up at their best and ensuring the employee experience is one where people feel engaged, motivated, and clear on what they need to achieve.
I operate in three main ways:
- Supporting existing People and Culture (P&C) teams as a mentor or strategic advisor, often working discreetly in the background.
- Leading the P&C function for organisations, fully embedded in their teams as a leader.
- Delivering projects, like organisational design or restructures, tailored to the specific needs of a business.
No matter the approach, my philosophy is to deeply understand the organisation's strategy, strengths, and challenges, creating authentic relationships that enable real solutions and impact.
What makes Partnerships different from project-based consulting?
Partnerships allow us to build deeper, long-term relationships with organisations. This enables us to fully understand their unique context, identify systemic challenges, and develop coordinated action plans.
For example, one partnership began with a comprehensive survey to understand the state of the organisation. From there, we created a 12-month action plan addressing strategy clarity, leadership development, and organisational design. This holistic approach has driven transformational change, with leaders embracing feedback, setting clearer goals, and working cohesively together. Twelve months down the track, all actions have been delivered, and the difference in performance and employee engagement is striking.
In contrast, while projects deliver impactful outcomes, they often lack the ongoing accountability and iterative improvement that long-term partnerships provide.
Can you share a specific example where a Partnership created lasting impact?
One organisation had a product development team structured by specialty—mechanical engineers, software engineers, etc. However, this structure didn’t align with their strategy of delivering faster, customer-driven solutions.
Through deep collaboration, we reorganised their team into two groups: a core technology team for long-term, deep technical work and a solutions team focused on rapid, customer-facing developments. By aligning the organisational design with their strategy, we unlocked faster innovation and better alignment with customer needs. This also allowed us to realign their talents to the right teams, creating better alignment with their preferred working style, areas of interest and strengths, resulting in higher engagement and performance.
What’s a key tool or strategy you often recommend to clients?
Always connect P&C initiatives to the organisation’s strategy. If an initiative doesn’t directly support strategic goals, it’s not worth the investment.
Additionally, fostering a strong culture of feedback is critical. Organisations that embrace feedback as a superpower consistently outperform others. It starts at the top, with leaders modelling how to ask for, receive, and act on feedback.
What trends are you seeing in people and culture, and how should organisations respond?
Continuous change is the new normal. The old model of "unfreeze, change, refreeze" your business no longer applies. Organisations must build resilience and embrace constant evolution.
This requires leaders to balance day-to-day management with long-term transformation, equipping their teams with tools and training to navigate change effectively. At Humankind, we focus on strengthening this "change muscle" in leaders and teams alike.
What role does innovation play in your work?
Innovation, particularly through AI, has been a game-changer. For example, I’ve used AI to explore how similar organisations structure themselves, quickly sourcing insights that would have taken hours of manual research. By combining these insights with our deep knowledge of a particular business, we co-create tailored solutions that drive real impact.
What’s one piece of advice for building strong consultant-client partnerships?
Be open about your pain points and fears. As consultants, we’re here to help, but we can only do so if we truly understand your challenges. And when we provide tough feedback, know that it comes from a place of care and commitment to your success.
Looking ahead, what’s one challenge organisations should prepare for?
Retaining top talent remains critical. Despite job market fluctuations, the best people always have options. Organisations need to invest in creating environments where employees feel engaged, valued, and motivated to stay.
At Humankind, our partnerships help organisations achieve this by building cultures where employees thrive and see a future for themselves.
Suggested Resources:
