What’s keeping CPOs up at night?
What are the biggest challenges faced by HR leaders in the next 12 to 24 months?
In 2022 LACE Partners asked 30 CPOs from a wide variety of industries and company sizes, to provide the answer to a simple question on “what their ‘one big thing’ is for the next 12 to 24 months”.
This exercise was conducted through a variety of methods, including face-to-face
interviews, online interviews as well as through a focus group held in July 2022.
Download our latest whitepaper
Why ask this question?
The amount of change at work, in the economy and society, is making the working lives of Chief People Officers and their HR teams more complex. The conflict in the Ukraine in 2022 continues to be an issue and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Covid remains a daily part of our lives. A recession is starting to take hold; energy prices are skyrocketing, and the cost-of-living crisis is becoming a reality across the UK and other parts of the globe.
The pandemic and the economic situation across the globe has forced a radical rethink on the employee/employer dynamic and nature of work itself. At LACE Partners we seek to understand and help our clients deal with the biggest business and people issues they are facing. To gain insight into these issues, we have conducted this research and will continue to deep dive into the core themes which have emerged.
What this report covers
In this initial launch piece we explore the top three ‘one big thing’s that are on CPO/CHROs agenda and as we move in to 2023 the team at LACE will be focusing on how HR teams can tackle these pressing challenges through a variety of different content themes and channels (videos, webinars, blogs, podcasts and networking events – all designed to help bring HR teams from a variety of sectors together to learn how to tackle those ‘one big thing’ issues. Download the report today to find out about the top three themes and get in touch with our team today to talk to us about what your ‘one big thing’ is that is your focus right now.
Meet our authors:

Chris Horton
Director

Cathy Acratopulo
Co-founder and MD

Emma Leonis-Hughes
Client Executive Director, HR Transformation
Emma is an experienced, highly skilled HR transformation director, specialising in HR strategy and operating model design and implementation. She has led complex, global change programmes to effectively optimise how organisations deliver HR services and redefine the employee experience for both a ‘connected’ and ‘unconnected’ workforce, with clients across a multitude of industries within the Private Sector and Financial Services. Emma spent over 10 years at Deloitte before joining LACE Partners in early 2018 as Executive Director of HR Transformation. She brings a pragmatic approach to transformation, working with clients to develop change plans which are simple, effective and always tied back to clear business outcomes.
Read our other whitepapers below:
The Cost Of Living Crisis: How can businesses help?
As part of a collaboration for financial wellbeing week Chris and Adam Morris from LACE speak to Therese Procter, global advisor at Wagestream about their The Cost of Living Report 2022; which you can download here. What can businesses do to help their employees...
The quiet quitting phenomenon and how to tackle it
As we ended 2021 the big talking point was the impact of the post pandemic ‘Great Resignation’, where the economy opened back up and employees began reconsidering their own career prospects. In 2022 the focus has been on ‘quiet quitting’, so we caught up with Cathy...
What can businesses do to become more inclusive?
Ahead of national inclusion week, Chris is joined by two LACErs Rebecca Addison and Eve Edmonds to discuss inclusivity in the workplace and why it's important. How can larger businesses create a more inclusive work environment?...



