Jessica Baker

Charged with providing oversight to all aspects of HR, driving performance for a best-in-class workforce to execute the mission and vision of the organization. Reported to the CEO and COO and managed compliance, HR operations, employee engagement, and various continuous improvement initiatives.

• Developed and executed a recruiting and retention strategy to attract A players with a focus on diversity.
• Cultivated strong relationships with business leaders to align human resources initiatives to support their business goals.
• Strategized with executive leadership to establish KPIs for HR and talent management metrics focused on establishing and maintaining a highly engaged workforce.
• Managed strong vendor relationships with benefits providers to create and sustain robust total rewards offerings.
• Maintained company compliance with local, state, and federal laws, in addition to established organizational standards.

Highlighted Achievements:

• Increased employee engagement by 25%, a significant milestone, especially for a 100% remote workforce.
• Decreased annual costs significantly with the implementation and conversion of the professional employer organization (PEO), employer of record (EOR) for global employees and 401K vendor.
• Conceptualized, launched, and led an employee-based Culture Committee focused on building and maintaining an employee-centric workplace.
• Leveraged AI across multiple HR platforms to drive efficiency and productivity, including implementing an AI-enabled applicant tracking system to streamline hiring processes.

Promoted into a more strategic role as a manager charged with leading the human resources function. Accountable to a multi-faceted role, providing human resources consultative services to leaders as a human resources business partner, leading a team of nine HR employees, and managing all aspects of HR, including recruitment, retention, training, compensation, benefits, employee relations, performance management, and oversight of the human resources information systems (HRIS).

• Collaborated as a strategic partner to senior and executive leaders within the health system, supporting all aspects of recruiting, employee relations, and performance management.
• Partnered with department heads across the organization to work in tandem to support overall organizational goals focused on clinical excellence and operational effectiveness.
• Spearheaded and executed multiple compensation studies across the organization, with a thorough review of pay practices, equity adjustments, and company-wide salary adjustments.
• Implemented programs focused on increasing employee retention, specifically for employees with less than two years of service, which generally had a higher level of turnover.
• Aligned systems, processes, and team members in recruiting to improve overall metrics, with faster application processing times from 4 days to 48 hours to process, yielding the ability to hire more quickly.
• Developed and executed the strategy for a partnership with a local community college to fund the education and hire upon completion for Certified Nursing Assistants (CNA), based on a talent shortage.

Achieved a promotional opportunity after successfully implementing the performance management system and charged in a new role to lead the implementation and maintenance of a new HRIS and timekeeping system. Additionally, maintained the duties previously held as the Employee Services Specialist, served as a resident subject matter expert for the HRIS (Lawson/McKesson), and managed the work for one direct report.

• Orchestrated the selection process and implementation of the new HRIS and timekeeping system.
• Gathered functional business requirements, configured the system, conducted testing, and trained new users.
• Liaised with technical programmers to translate business and functional needs in the systems, understanding system options and limitations to recommend the most effective approach for all parties.
• Resolved user issues by analyzing incoming tickets, troubleshooting, and providing solutions to overcome system challenges.

Hired into the health system to strengthen the human resources function by implementing and maintaining a new online performance appraisal system. The role expanded to include compensation management and benefits administration for medical and dental plans.

• Consulted with leaders on pay practices and procedures for the compensation programs.
• Performed job analysis and evaluations to recommend pay ranges for new positions and addressed internal equity.
• Informed managers of best practices on performance management, progressive discipline, terminations, and other employee relations matters, compliant with all employment laws, including, but not limited to, EEO, FLSA, FMLA, ADEA, and ADA.
• Administered the Performance Manager system, the source of information that all employees used to provide routine performance feedback as part of the performance appraisal program.
• Reviewed and guided all HR employee change requests, including employee promotions, transfers, demotions, and pay changes, to ensure employees were adequately compensated in alignment with the established pay structure and policies.

Hired to join the organization to support end-to-end human resources in areas including but not limited to talent acquisition, staffing, employment, processing, compensation, health and welfare benefits, training and development, records management, safety and health, employee relations and retention, AA/EEO compliance and labor relations.

• Implemented new HR programs and services for a small HR organization, leveraging expertise to identify opportunities to enhance the department and recommend and implement HR best practices.
• Managed various special projects within the department, leading the initiatives to set project schedules, timelines, objectives, research, and executing action items to achieve the overall goals.
• Analyzed and synthesized sensitive HR data and prepared reports and summaries to share with leaders to make critical decisions related to the workforce.