Heather Oxley, CHRO at Perficient, joins Jeet Mukherjee on The WorkOps Podcast to explain how a 7,000 person IT services company is rebuilding its People function around AI without pretending everything can move at the same pace. She opens with the work study she ran on arrival, which found that 60% of HR's workload was inquiry, and shows how that single number set her first priority.

From there the conversation moves through Perficient's two speed operating model, the AI academy whose capstone requires a real client or internal outcome, and the decision to break 40 semi autonomous units into global practices so hiring draws from the largest pool instead of the smallest. Heather is direct about what does not work, including concentrating AI accountability in one person and treating course completion as proof of skill. HR leaders, People Ops practitioners and anyone building an AI operating plan for the function will find a practical sequence here: measure, separate fast from slow, prove the skill, fix the structure, then buy for speed.

Chapters
00:00 Cold open
00:54 Welcome Heather Oxley of Perficient
01:12 From IT consulting to the CHRO seat at Perficient
03:18 Why the CHRO job keeps expanding
05:11 Where HR ends and IT begins
07:06 Spreading AI accountability across the HR leadership team
09:41 The academy, the capstone, and applied AI skill
12:16 Go fast on the obvious, slow on the complex
13:02 60% of HR workload was inquiry
15:26 Build versus buy on hiring and skills
19:29 Global practices and matching supply to demand
23:01 HR in three years, agent supported and proactive
26:20 Pilots, passengers, and leaning into the hard

Takeaways
- A work study at Perficient found that 60% of HR's workload was inquiry, questions already answered somewhere in the policy library, which made an inquiry agent the obvious first place to move fast.
- Perficient runs at two speeds by design: fast where the ROI is clear and the blocker is data hygiene, slower where cross silo handoffs offer a real chance to redesign the employee experience.
- Course completion does not count as capability at Perficient, because the AI academy only certifies people once they finish a capstone applied to a real client or internal situation and assessed on the outcome.
- Rather than appointing an AI transformation lead, Heather gives every function head accountability for AI in their area, on the logic that concentrating ownership in one person slows the whole organization down.
- Consolidating roughly 40 autonomous units into global practices widened the hiring funnel from the smallest pod to the largest, and a bought skills platform, kept current by feeds from learning and daily work, powers the supply to demand match.

Connect with the Guest
Heather Oxley LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heatheroxley/
Company Website: https://www.perficient.com

Sponsor
This episode is brought to you by Kinfolk, the AI service desk built for HR.

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