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Novo Nordisk Indonesia's Director of People & Organisation shares how spotting early signals, influencing business decisions, and embracing mentorship can help organisations thrive in a changing world.
HR leaders are often expected to respond to change, but Adhika Widya Sena believes their role starts much earlier. As Director of People & Organisation, Indonesia at Novo Nordisk, he sees HR as the function that reads the earliest signals of change, helping organisations prepare for shifts in business and the workforce before they become impossible to ignore.
Interestingly, Adhika's own journey into HR was far from conventional. An engineering graduate, he began his career in consulting before moving into HR, where one of his earliest roles covered physical security, employee and labour relations, and HR business partnering. The experience exposed him to the unpredictability of people and the breadth of the HR profession, shaping the leadership philosophy he carries today.
In this interview with HRO, ahead of his session at Transform Talent Indonesia 2026, Adhika shares why he believes managers must move beyond traditional ways of leading and instead focus on helping people grow, unlock their potential, and navigate change together.
Read the full interview below.
Q Please tell us a fun fact about yourself that people may not know.
I graduated from an engineering school and started my HR career in consulting before quickly pivoting as Associate HR Manager handling physical security, employee & labor relations, and Product Supply HRBP. The role as physical security leader for a 30-hectare site gave me an early exposure on the unpredictability of humans and the landscape we operated, as well as awareness of the very wide – often less visible – spectrum of HR discipline.
Q What is the core belief in HR leadership that drives your leadership journey?
HR leaders are fundamentally the earliest signal readers. They’re positioned at the leading edge of organisational change, reading how the business and people landscape will evolve, and already constructing the response before the rest of the organisation even recognises the need. More often than not, this means sitting down with business leaders and making the case that investing in the organisation isn't separate from investing in the business.
Q In fewer than 10 words, what is your #1 motto for leading teams more effectively?
HR Leads the business — ambitiously, purposefully, without limits.
Q A quick preview of your session at Transform Talent 2026: what do you hope attendees will take away from your presentation this year?
I’ll be sharing a crucial shift on “From micromanagement to mentorship: Developing new leadership styles for the modern workforce”. With us realising it or not, the rapid adoption of AI and continued flow of new-generational talents have tilted the workplace landscape where managers are not the source of truth or wisdom anymore. If leaders continue to cling onto the ideal & conservative way of achieving goals, we may not be able to unleash exponential growth for our team.
Instead, leaders must act as a mentor to help modern workforce grow and perform beyond the glass ceiling and continue to redefine the playing field.
I hope participants would benefit from this discourse and also share the phenomenon in their current organisations, so we learn to navigate this shift together.
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