Up the ranks: T-Systems' new vice president of human resources

T-Systems has promoted Brandon Lew to vice president of human resources, effective from 1 January 2016, moving up the ranks from his previous role as senior HR business partner/head of HR ops (Singapore).

In his new role, Lew is responsible for guiding the HR team in its daily operations as well as ensuring the business is aptly supported in its HR needs.

While Lew’s previous role as the head of ops was focused on guidance for the HR team, the new role will require him to steer the company effectively manner, using his experience to understand and prevent HR disasters, and emerge as a stronger business partner.

Lew was in his previous role for about a year and was gradually given the opportunity to lead and manage daily HR roles to prepare for his promotion.

Human Resources reached out to Lew to find out more about his promotion, and the HR strategies he has in the pipeline.

“I think a promotion does not happen suddenly, you have to work towards it and be ready to put in the extra efforts to be adequate in your future role.”

Having been in T-Systems for about four years, Lew feels that the best part is his colleagues.

“I have got a great team and lovely colleagues. Towering walls do not make a city, people make a city. Business challenges are the same everywhere but if you have great colleagues, your days would be radically different,” he added.

Lew is of the opinion that the HR function is a peace keeper between the business and the employees. He feels it needs to move beyond mundane tasks such as payroll and become a more strategic partner to the business.

“Very often, in HR, you are caught between a very hungry wolf (the business stream) and a very quarrelsome sheep (employees). An HR leader's role, I think, is to mediate and find a reasonable outcome for the two parties. HR is more than a match maker, the function is a peace keeper.

“I am currently trying to create a stronger outreach strategy for the HR team. This means that HR needs to move beyond operations and business partnering. HR needs to connect with the external market forces to create stronger branding for T-Systems.

“What this means in a nutshell is that HR must relook at how it can reach out to external marketing events, talks, speaking opportunities and partner collaborations to help build its recruitment pipeline and capture more mind share within the same local competitive space.

“This helps to elevate the perception of the organisation and creates ease of brand recognition for the sales teams. If you're not selling, you better be helping to sell.

“We are in a radically different world. The old rules of HR does not work effectively now. Payroll and other menial functions will eventually be outsourced to consolidate savings, HR must start its strategies to align better with the business and create a proper timeline to exit irrelevant roles.

“There are long-life jobs and life-long jobs within the HR scope. We need to move towards the evergreen jobs. These roles may include leadership consultation, quality gate assessments for recruitment, geo-expansion, negotiation expertise with unions and C-level counselling,” he concluded.