HR Capability Reimagined : How One Pharma Company Future-Proofed Its HR Teams

A deep dive into the transformation journey that equipped HR teams with cutting-edge skills and mindsets for the future of work.

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The challenge

CXOs & Business Leaders: Driving enterprise-wide digital transformation with sustainable, AI-poweredgrowth strategies.

‍HR, L&D & Talent Heads: Building AI-ready workforces through structured upskilling and workforcetransformation.

‍Functional Leaders: Embedding AI into everyday decisions across Sales, Finance, Marketing,Strategy, and Operations

‍Tech & Data Teams: Engineering intelligent systems that deliver business outcomes—not justtechnical outputs.

Despite being a market leader in pharmaceuticals, the organization’s HR function was underleveraging AI & tech capabilities. Operating with legacy capabilities that required team members to invest disproportionate time to diagnose and design people solutions.

‍“We knew our business was transforming, but HR needed to equipped on cutting edge capabilities to solve complex people problems. AI has lot to offer but we are not using the tools enough to get desired output.
— Director, Human Resources

Key challenges included:

Skill Gaps in core areas like digital fluency, analytics and agile plawhitenning & execution·
Underleveraging tech tools to solve complex people problems·
Spending considerable time on diagnosing & designing people solutions.

The stakes

Had these gaps persisted, the company risked:

Skill Gaps in core areas like digital fluency, analytics and agile plawhitenning & execution·
Underleveraging tech tools to solve complex people problems·
Spending considerable time on diagnosing & designing people solutions.

The approach

To future-proof the HR function, approach of capability development into the real work of HR was identified. The strategy focused not just on learning—but on changing mindsets, enabling tools, and building strategic confidence.

Step 1- Created capability themes
Step 2- Embed Learning in Real HR Process Workflows. Learning transfer through baking in principles of design thinking, hackathon and learning bootcamps.
Step 3: Enable with Toolkits & Nudges
Step 4- Creating collaboration Touchpoints

the impact

The structured, immersive capability intervention enabled HR to understand how to use AI tools in the workflow to be more productive, effective with outcomes and more strategic in solving HR problem statements Tangible shifts were seen across performance, perception, and proactivity of the HR teams.

-Capability Gains with Measurable Outcomes

3x increase in usage of workforce analytics dashboards in talent planning conversations
Over 70% adoption of new tools and frameworks introduced during the program
Increase in Cross-functional collaboration
Action learning projects solved real pain points, like streamlining onboarding or succession planning

Long term impact

The initiative has now become a part of the company’s Leadership Development Framework, ensuring new HR hires and leaders are automatically exposed to the same standards and tools.

HR Capability Reimagined : How One Pharma Company Future-Proofed Its HR Teams

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