SLT Spotlight: Sarah Bright, People Director

Meet our People Director Sarah Bright. With nearly 25 years of HR expertise across diverse industries, Sarah brings a wealth of knowledge and passion to Axiologik. Her impressive career includes 13 years at Hallmark, where she honed her skills in organisational and leadership development and championed a coaching culture that fostered growth and collaboration.

Sarah's unique blend of generalist and specialised HR experience makes her a powerhouse in building high-performing teams. She thrives in the fast-paced tech industry, drawn to its passionate, forward-thinking culture and the exciting opportunities for rapid change and innovation.

At Axiologik, Sarah's mission is clear: to empower employees and drive meaningful, practical changes that make a lasting impact on the organization. Whether she's shaping the people agenda or creating a positive work environment, Sarah is dedicated to making Axiologik a place where everyone can thrive.

Why did you join Axiologik, and what attracted you to the role?

Joining Axiologik was an exhilarating opportunity because it was a scale-up organisation, allowing me to shape and own the people's agenda from the ground up. The company's size and ambition was a major draw, being small enough to deeply understand what people wanted and yet fast-paced, agile and willing to test and learn. The investment in my role demonstrated Axiologik’scommitment to its people; their needs and motivations, values and personal growth and development and being empowered to be creative, drive change and innovate matched my approach values.

As People Director, how do you make decisions, communicate, and keep your team's spirit high?

My decision-making process is often data-driven, but I rely on gut feeling and emotional intelligence to guide what feels right. This balance between the analytical and the human side is crucial in my role and shifts from being empowered to make decisions independently and recognising when to gather stakeholder input. Communication is also vital in my role, especially in internal communications. I focus on ensuring the team knows what we're working on and why, particularly when it comes to improving the employee experience. The people offer is constantly evolving, so there's always a drumbeat of new initiatives.

I also like to bring a sense of fun and informality to foster inclusivity and openness.

What unique perspective do you bring to the Senior Leadership Team (SLT) at Axiologik?

On the SLT, I bring aunwavering focus on people's insight, empathy, and communication. I am able to surface challenge and I bring a strength in joining up the dots across theorganisation, ensuring coherence in our efforts. I ensure focus on regular honest and transparent communication and messaging to be inclusive and resonate with our people. I am often the voice of people, bringing emotional intelligence and reflecting the mood and needs.

I also bring a sense of creativity and innovation, pushing the SLT to think differently and challenge the norms.

My role in the SLT also extends beyond people insight as I encourage high performing team behaviours of trust and collaboration, acting as a leadership coach and sounding board for my peers.

How would you describe your leadership style?

My personal leadership brand centres around trust, collaboration, inclusion and inspiration. I see my purpose as ensuring a positive employee experience for everyone at Axiologik and being approachable and trustedare core to this along with promoting autonomy and coaching othersto be successful and recognising achievement.

I’m visionary and lead with a fun, solution-focused yet pragmatic style, always looking for progressive ways to make a positive impact.

What has been your greatest accomplishment at Axiologik so far?

Earning the Best Companies Star was a brilliant achievement and recognition of the whole teams work over the past year.

Some of my individual key contributions include promoting learning and development, and personal growth initiatives, championing employee voice, enhancing our workplace culture through a sense of inclusion and belonging and uniting the leadership team to work more cohesively.