Coworking with Anitra St. Hilaire

On Wednesdays, we schedule our weekly 1:1 with HR Brew’s readers. Want to be featured in an upcoming edition? Click here to introduce yourself.

Anitra St. Hilaire is VP of people at ThreeFlow, a benefits placement software company. Like many in the HR industry, her career hasn’t been linear: After earning an MBA, she worked in consulting and then for Teach For America and Upworthy. St. Hilaire recently spoke to HR Brew about how HR can use corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts to engage employees.

How would you describe your specific job to someone who doesn’t work in HR? I’m a people leader focused on attracting, engaging, developing, and retaining organizational talent. Or, if I’m talking to my kids, I’d say I work with people to help create a place where great people can come do their best work with other great people.

What’s the best change you’ve made at a place you’ve worked? One change I was excited to enable was a corporate giving program. Because the company was financially stable and privately held, we had a lot of discretion in building a program that fit the company’s values. We wanted something that was meaningful to the recipient of any funds, and we also wanted to support our employees’ philanthropic giving. So, we set up a matching program where we matched donations of employee money and time (volunteer hours and board service). And then, we developed a monthly program where employees could nominate an organization based on the theme of the month. Employees would vote on the organizations they liked the best, and the top two organizations would receive a sizable donation from the company.

Why do you think it’s important for HR leaders to have their hands in a company’s CSR efforts? Depending on the company, if part of what you’re doing from a CSR perspective is meant to be either an employer branding piece, something that you want your employees to feel proud about, to feel good about, to feel connected to—having your HR leader team involved in providing that voice of the employee [and] providing that additional thought partner in the ways that [the] company can support something and also bring our employees into it. It creates a greater sense of belonging and engagement between employees and employer.

What’s the biggest misconception people might have about your job? One misconception I hear often is that my role is about protecting management. I view my role as being an organizational steward—I’m thinking about the good of the company, which includes all of the people within its walls and the people the company serves.

What’s the most fulfilling aspect of your job? I like being helpful in my role; I’m able to impact a very meaningful part of our employees’ lives—their finances—but I also help support other aspects as well. For example, people teams implement benefits (family, health, and wellness), help build skills (personal growth), and develop activities that encourage social connection (relationships). It’s a privilege to be involved in so many facets of someone’s life, and I take that responsibility very seriously.

What trend in HR are you most optimistic about? Why? Remote work. As someone who’s been working remotely for over 10 years, it’s weird to say that it’s an HR trend. But it’s obviously gained a lot of traction over the past two years, and I’m a fan. It’s not for every person, and it’s not for every company. But, when a company can truly embrace remote work, it opens the recruiting pool and allows you to offer more flexibility in the workplace.

What trend in HR are you least optimistic about? Why? Artificial intelligence. I do think we’ll see some great benefits in the future, but I’m concerned about the challenges that we’re already seeing. It can be easy to get sucked into the idea that AI is “better” (e.g., faster, less biased) because it’s running on a set of built-in rules in a consistent way. But those rules can often have bias baked into them. And sometimes, we need some level of judgment and flexibility to get to equitable outcomes.

Tell us one new or old HR tech product or platform that’s made your life easier, and why. I’ve started using a tool called Clockwise. It’s not HR tech per se, but it’s made managing my calendar easier. I spend a good deal of my time in meetings, so having the system proactively shift some of my standard meetings around to make space for focus time has been so impactful! It also has the ability to link with my personal calendar and can block time out as “busy” on my work calendar automatically (including expected travel time).

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