In a recent Quick Bites webinar, Gabrielle Cutfield, founder of Emerging Engines, shared her insights on how to build high-performance leadership teams and the role of strategic people planning in driving business growth. Gabrielle’s approach challenges the conventional view of People & Culture (P&C) functions, focusing on aligning people strategies with business objectives and using data-driven decision-making to maximize productivity.
Gabrielle’s work with Emerging Engines revolves around the idea that P&C is not just about creating a great employee experience—it’s about driving productivity that fuels business growth. “We enable growth through productivity via people,” Gabrielle explained. She emphasizes that while employee engagement is important, a productive and well-functioning business is the foundation upon which a positive employee experience can be built.
For Gabrielle, the key to this approach is aligning the business’s goals with its people strategy. Emerging Engines works closely with companies to understand their objectives—whether it’s scaling, managing turnover, or increasing productivity—and develops tailored strategies to help achieve those goals.
A core aspect of Gabrielle’s approach is using data to inform people strategies. She believes that many companies collect data through engagement surveys and performance processes but fail to use it effectively. “P&C can be dismissed as just handling engagement surveys, but when we use data effectively, we can drive significant business outcomes,” Gabrielle noted.
One example she shared involved a client who had invested heavily in HR technology and engagement processes, but the volume of processes was overwhelming, and they weren’t extracting value from the data. Gabrielle helped the company reduce the number of processes, extract key data points, and present them to the executive team. This shift allowed the company to focus its investment where it would have the most impact.
On the other hand, Gabrielle described working with a company that had high engagement scores but low performance. Through what she called “weeding the garden,” her team used data to identify and address performance issues, ultimately driving the company to hit its sales targets. “It’s really about how transformational it can be when you lean into the data in P&C,” she said.
Gabrielle also addressed a common misconception about the P&C function: that it’s focused solely on soft issues like engagement and employee well-being. “Like marketing can be dismissed as the ‘coloring-in department,’ P&C is often seen as the ‘tea and tissues’ department,” Gabrielle said. She argued that P&C needs to be seen as a strategic business function, one that uses data and holds teams accountable for performance.
One of the biggest challenges, according to Gabrielle, is changing the perception of P&C within organizations. She emphasized that P&C leaders need to front up with metrics and take an active role in strategic discussions. “You need a P&C leader who comes to the table with data and holds their team accountable. Unfortunately, I don’t see this approach very often,” she added.
As companies grow, the role of leadership becomes even more critical. Gabrielle observed that in many startups and scale-ups, founders are focused on growth but may avoid tough conversations with their teams. In these cases, Gabrielle often acts as an emotional intelligence (EQ) coach, helping leaders navigate difficult conversations and hold their teams accountable.
“When you’re not comfortable with tough conversations, you avoid them, and things reach a boiling point,” she said. Gabrielle works with leadership teams to address issues early, fostering a culture of accountability and performance.
When it comes to measuring the success of P&C strategies, Gabrielle focuses on key metrics like turnover, productivity, and leadership effectiveness. She believes that P&C metrics should be seen as leading indicators of performance, and they need to be integrated with other business metrics like churn and revenue growth.
One powerful example Gabrielle shared was when her team conducted an analysis for a client and discovered that high employee turnover was costing the company over $670,000 in just one quarter. This data provided a compelling case for leadership to address performance issues and implement changes to reduce churn. “It’s not just about gut feel or what’s trendy; it’s about looking at the numbers and seeing what’s working and what’s not,” she said.
Gabrielle’s key piece of advice for companies looking to build high-performance teams is simple: invest in your people early. She emphasized that setting up strong foundations in people management, performance reviews, and leadership development from the beginning will save businesses from bigger challenges down the line.
“Don’t wait until you’re 100 people and things are falling apart to start thinking about your people strategy,” Gabrielle advised. “If you set up strong foundations early on—things like performance management, clear expectations, feedback loops, and leadership development—you’ll save yourself a lot of pain later.”
Conclusion: A Data-Driven Approach to High-Performance Teams
Gabrielle Cutfield’s approach to building high-performance teams is rooted in aligning people strategies with business goals and using data to drive decision-making. By focusing on productivity, holding leadership accountable, and investing in people early, companies can create a culture that fosters growth and high performance.
As Gabrielle said, “It’s not just about engagement scores or employee happiness. It’s about driving productivity through people, using data to inform decisions, and holding leaders accountable for results.” This is the future of People & Culture, and it’s a powerful tool for companies looking to scale and thrive in today’s competitive market.
Watch the full webinar here.
