The CEO-CHRO Partnership | Chief Executive Group

CHRO and CEO alignment on talent priorities is critical to organizational effectiveness. And to explore this alignment, a new survey by Chief Executive and Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) polled 243 CEOs and 406 CHROs on their views of the top 2021 human capital and talent priorities. The two biggest talent priorities for 2021 among surveyed CEOs are 1) talent retention and upskilling (58%) and 2) talent availability and recruiting (56%). While CHROs agreed on the former (60%), only 29% of CHROs said they’d like to see more time devoted to talent availability and recruiting. When CHROs were asked what they’d like to see their CEOs spend more time on, 62% (the highest percentage) said diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) strategy; this compares with 30% of CEOs when asked the same question about their CHROs. CEOs and CHROs shared similar views about the expanding role of HR as a strategic partner to the CEO, with a little more than three out of four CEOs saying they look to their HR chiefs for views on business strategy. Since the CEO and CHRO relationship is one of the most important in any organization, what practical tactics do you believe enable greater alignment between the two on talent priorities?