Citation
Milner, K. (2014), "Practitioner Profile … Karen Milner (thebigword)", Strategic HR Review, Vol. 13 No. 4/5. https://doi.org/10.1108/SHR-04-2014-0031
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Practitioner Profile … Karen Milner (thebigword)
Article Type: Practitioner profile From: Strategic HR Review, Volume 13, Issue 4/5
HR executives share their experience in human resources
Karen Milner
Karen Milner has recently been promoted to Human Resources (HR) Director at thebigword following a 10-year journey from an entry-level operational role to Board Director for the Human Resources function. This appointment means that thebigword’s Board now has four men and four women, an achievement that few other leading businesses manage; a perfect balance.
thebigword is one of the world’s largest technology-enabled translation and interpreting companies. Karen’s route into thebigword is a significant factor in how her role through the business then progressed. Having studied German at Lancaster University, Karen is one of those linguists who continue to use her language skills on a day-to-day basis. As part of her undergraduate degree, she spent a year working as an English language Assistant at a grammar school in the former East Germany, midway between Leipzig and Chemnitz. This gave her an early career insight into working with other cultures and understanding cultural differences.
After graduating, Karen then spent the next four years teaching in the Czech Republic, Spain and New Zealand, before returning to the UK to pursue a Masters degree in Translation Studies at Salford University. It was during this year that Karen targeted thebigword as the organisation she wanted to work for.
In Karen’s view, the most successful HR people have spent some point of their career in a non-HR role, and preferably in customer-facing operations or sales roles. This provides critical exposure to the business and a much deeper understanding of what it is like to work “at the coal-face”. If you do not have this background, then you have to work harder to compensate for it as you start getting into the more senior roles within an HR function.
It was while Karen was in operations that she started to apply her teaching background to delivering training within the business. A critical turning point was delivering a “Negotiation skills” training course alongside thebigword’s Chief Financial Officer. Shortly after this, Karen was offered an amazing opportunity to move into an “HR and Training Manager” role. This was 2006, and at that point the business had 150 employees, £10 million turnover and had just started to spread its global wings, having opened its first office overseas in New York in 2004. Karen’s move into HR was the start of a dedicated HR function at thebigword. It was tough but exciting – the job was “sold” as mostly training and hardly any HR, but the reality was far different! Over the next eight years, the business grew to have 500 employees, a presence across 12 global locations and a turnover of £42 million. In HR terms, this meant a lot of recruitment and a great deal of time spent on having the right people in the right roles, and structures to support the growing business.
For Karen and thebigword, it was important that the person leading the HR function through this period of growth and change had the required grounding in HR, as well as the knowledge of the business. Karen therefore embarked on the company-funded CIPD Professional Development programme, studying via distance learning over a three-year period.
Karen’s HR career with thebigword has taken her to thebigword’s global offices, specifically Beijing, New York and Düsseldorf. Her early career background in working overseas, studying languages, and understanding different cultures, combine in a highly effective way for thebigword with her skills in talent identification, employee engagement, leadership development and her ability to define and deliver business-focussed strategies. Karen’s passion for people development has recently taken a more local focus. She has spearheaded thebigword’s hugely successful Apprenticeship programme, which has led to two awards and a commendation from the Deputy Prime Minister.
The owner and CEO of thebigword, Larry Gould, says that the secret to Karen’s success in the business is her ability to go on re-inventing herself, always stepping up to the next level of challenge and whatever issue the business throws at her.
Most recently Karen headed up the HR function as Head of Human Resources, reporting into Diane Cheesebrough, Chief Operating Officer. Diane then represented HR at the Board level. The past two years were about preparing Karen for the next step up to the Board and she received coaching from Diane, providing critical reflection time on the skill set required for working effectively as a Board Director.
Karen says: “It’s a tremendous privilege and responsibility to be appointed a Member of the Board of thebigword. I have benefited from the company’s drive to nurture its employees and promote from within and I want to extend that opportunity to all our staff.”
Karen Milner, is based at thebigword