How Pinterest’s chief people officer is renovating company culture after turmoil

Last week, I was scheduled to attend an HR conference in sunny Phoenix to interview Christine Deputy, Pinterest’s chief people officer. Unfortunately, the reality that we’re still in a pandemic sank in, and I came down with COVID a day before I was supposed to fly West. Kevin Oakes, CEO of human capital research firm i4CP, graciously stepped in to conduct the interview. The ensuing conversation was full of gems about how Pinterest is overhauling its culture after multiple reports of discrimination, how it benefited from working with ombuds, and how it’s promoting a flexible workplace.

In recent years, the company has revamped its performance review system and developed a new career framework using insights from employee surveys and HR business partners, Deputy says.

Here are three soundbites on her approach to people operations following a wave of cultural turmoil. 

Comments have been edited and condensed for clarity.

Renovating the company’s culture required alignment with the organization’s business strategy.

“We started with the strategy of the business and really understanding where we see ourselves in three to five years. What are going to be the critical things we want to accomplish?…We did a lot of iterative work and relaunched a set of values that were a North Star for us around what matters here.”

Pinterest tapped an independent party to field employee concerns and build trust with leadership. 

“We hired an ombud onto our team. She joined in December last year. She follows the International Ombuds Association guidelines, so everything she does is confidential. She reports to our CEO, so she doesn’t report to HR—she’s not part of our budget…She is an active resource for any employee to understand: How do I navigate Pinterest? Who should I call? Is this a normal policy? [If] they don’t want to have an investigation, they don’t want to raise a concern with their manager, or they just feel uncomfortable about something, they can speak to her.” 

Pinterest plans to maintain flexible work arrangements.

“We’ve told [employees], ‘We owe you clarity around the rules; you choose what’s right for you and your life. If you want to live away from where you might have to come in the office, we’ll fly you in when we need you to, and then you can go back.’ We’ve also said, ‘If you’re living near a physical office and want to go in every day, you can go in every day.’”

Amber Burton
amber.burton@fortune.com
@amberbburton

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HR business partners play an essential role in achieving business objectives, Allison Rutledge-Parisi, senior vice president of people at HR technology platform Justworks, told me last week. Yet their work often goes unmentioned.

“It’s really important to remember that your people business partners do everything from strategic thinking with business unit leaders down to making sure that folks know where to put their ticket to get a new laptop. It's a really comprehensive set of tasks. But the most important task is to be a partner to the business leaders and have them think about their business objectives through the lens of human beings.”

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- The Federal Trade Commission’s efforts to ban noncompete clauses would significantly affect the local television news industry. New York Times

- The average Wall Street bonus fell 26%, the largest since 2008. Quartz

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