Shows
The Career Change Maker Podcast I Career Change, Career Advancement & Leadership Development#283: Intentional Career Management with Olya Yakzhina🎙️ Episode OverviewHR is evolving — and with it, the roles of managers, employees, and People leaders.In this episode, I sit down with Olya Yakzhina, People Director at Switchee, who shares her unique journey from psychology to leadership in HR.Olya dives deep into how internal mobility, feedback, and community-building are shaping the future of work. We explore how personal growth, even through discomfort, can lead to transformation — and why supporting managers is a non-negotiable for a thriving workplace culture.What You’ll Learn in This Episod...2025-05-0849 min
PX Espresso☕with Luke O'Mahoney006 - Olya Yakzhina - How To Get Employee Engagement RightSend us a textIf you like the podcast, you may want to sign up to the PX Espresso Newsletter ☕ the weekly newsletter which brings you actionable tips and valuable resource flags on building thriving culture through intentional PX design - 📧 Newsletter sign upBoom! 💥Another awesome conversation to bring you today with one of the brightest minds in People & Culture today... The one and only, Olya Yakzhina 🤘🏻 Head of People @ remote-first tech startup, Switchee. Olya is also Co-Founder of the People Stories slack community 🙌🏻The main practical takeaway in this episode, Olya walks...2023-07-191h 01
The Modern Employer #wildcardsCulture EngineeringCulture as a Product
In this episode, we are chatting with the Founder of Sapien, Luke O'Mahoney.
Who is this for: People-people who wish to approach employee experience as a product and learn product engineering ways so they can adopt it. How do you even talk about agile ways of working without sounding like you are out of your depths?
2023-01-1229 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsCancer At WorkCancer at Work...
A difficult topic.
How do People teams support employees when they approach them after a diagnosis?
Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD has been brave and compassionate to share her personal story with cancer.
This episode comes almost 8 months after our last and I am sure you can deduce the reason for that from the title of this episode.
The episode will be useful for:
- Employees who are dealing with cancer
- People professionals who need to support employees with cancer
Karthika is offering your insights and personal experience from both perspectives...and I (Olya Yakzhina) am j...2022-09-0536 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsHow to Scale with People at Heart?One of our favourite topics discussed with an awesome and knowledgeable guest Jack Villiers, the Founder & CEO of KULA!
This episode will bring the most value to People-people and organisations who are going through a period of growth in their companies or planning for scale and scope.
We will discuss how to stay driven as an organisation in a world of building processes and structure. How to create an inspiring workplace and ensure we have the right people on board with us as we grow.
As always this podcast is hosted by Olya Yakzhina & Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD, the Peopl...2022-08-0638 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsSalary Benchmarking Made EasyThe Modern Employer is back from a much-needed rest! We missed you so much and decided that the first podcast should focus on something incredibly current, practical and necessary - Salary Benchmarking!
In our newest episode "Salary Benchmarking Made Easy" we will talk about:
- Why salary benchmarking is important and at what stage it becomes more relevant?
- What to watch out for when conducting salary benchmarking?
- Practical tips and advice that you can implement tomorrow.
Cozy and friendly chat with Olya Yakzhina & Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD
2022-08-0636 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsMaking Processes People will Actually FollowMOBILISING TEAMS & EFFECTIVE PROCESSES?
Gee, those are some big words right there. Let's unpack them with our wonderful guest Ghilaine Chan as we jump into the world of young startups that scale!
If you are a leader who is trying to make processes that people will actually follow while maintaining your values and beliefs - jump on this podcast and get some valuable and actionable advice for where to start and what to consider!
As always this podcast is hosted by Olya Yakzhina & Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD, the People - people :)
*Find The Modern Employer #wildcards podcast is now on...2022-08-0645 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsScaling with People at HeartCULTURE when SCALING?
Podcast alert: How to Scale with People at Heart?
https://lnkd.in/dHnv6Nk
One of our favourite topics discussed with an awesome and knowledgeable guest Jack Villiers, the Founder & CEO of KULA!
This episode will bring the most value to People-people and organisations who are going through a period of growth in their companies or planning for scale and scope.
We will discuss how to stay driven as an organisation in a world of building processes and structure. How to create an inspiring workplace and ensure we have the right people on board with us as...2022-08-0641 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsLong Term People StrategyPODCAST ALERT: Wanna get some tips from an ex-Googler?
In this episode, we are inviting Stephan Thoma to talk us through ways of setting up a Long Term People strategy and making work for your business.
https://lnkd.in/dATwSye
The value of this week's episode is predominantly aimed at People leaders who own their people strategy and function.
It would be especially interesting if you are looking at building a long term strategy for your people function or if you’re wondering if your people strategy is even ready for a long term strategy?
This podcast episode will help...2022-08-0640 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsEffective People MetricsWe are back with Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD & Olya Yakzhina discussing the Effective Metrics to take in 2021!
https://lnkd.in/dSBs5Wa
To help us have a fruitful discussion we have invited a metric guru Pavel Golenistsev, who helped us unpack the following questions:
1. What metrics do we want to be taking?
2. How do we develop questions that will measure those metrics?
3. What practical tools and actionable ways of working with metrics and analysis are available?
We are excited about this episode as it will show that metrics do not have to be boring, they can be empowering, life-changing and t...2022-08-0638 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsShort Term People Strategy 2021PODCAST ALERT:
Are you an HR leader in need of inspiration with your strategy next year? Look no further...
https://lnkd.in/di7Jm-D
Olya Yakzhina and Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD discuss the 2021 People strategy.
On this episode, we look at the HR fundamentals and where to start with your People and Talent roadmaps.
Areas to start with:
1) Org design and being prepared.
2) How to be proactive in 2021 vs reactive.
Let's start 2021 strong as a People function! Thank you to all of you for listening to us in 2020! See you all in the New Year. The Modern Employer is sig...2022-08-0648 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsCreating Better Experience with Remote RedundanciesBoom! Shake the room with a topic no one wants to talk about - Creating Better Experience with Remote Redundancies.
- What? How? When? And then?
https://lnkd.in/dZm5dQZ
In summary, that's the drift of this podcast. With some great wisdom from Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD, Olya Yakzhina and a surprise guest April Georgia Williams (MCIPD) we are unpacking the meaning of "redundancies" as a process for our mental health, for what it means and how it impacts us and for how to build successful processes now to be able to give your best self later (if need...2022-08-0633 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsRemote Onboarding Employee ExperienceIt's happened! Your voices have been heard and we recorded a podcast on the subject you've requested - Remote Onboarding Experience with Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD & Olya Yakzhina!
https://lnkd.in/dWHNYhr
This podcast covers our experience of setting up some incredible, creative, practical and scalable remote onboarding solutions for our companies.
If this is something you are interested in or just passing by and want to compare how we do it vs how your onboarding has been so far, stop by and tune in!
*Find The Modern Employer #wildcards podcast on: Apple podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Castro and Soundcloud. Downl...2022-08-0653 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsReturning BACK TO THE OFFICE!- How do we make it Human?
- How do we support our Culture?
- How do we generate Excitement?
- How do we consider Psychological Safety?
This podcast is a collection of tips and tricks for returning back to the office in the most human way possible, created by People people (aka Olya Yakzhina & Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD) & our GUEST speaker Georgia Barrett! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom! #shamelesspromotion
*Find The Modern Employer #wildcards podcast on: Apple podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Castro and Soundcloud. Download and listen later.*
2022-08-0639 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsTalent Acquisition vs RecruitmentBy Olya Yakzhina & Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD
This is the second podcast in our series of podcasts from the Modern Employer - #wildcards :
1) Learn how to set up a talent function and the remit of Talent acquisition.
2) Innovative ways of looking through CV's and making sure candidate experience is met.
3) What does the future of our TA look like? What other creative ways could we source the right talent? What is culture add?
4) Fundamental differences between Talent Acquisition and recruiters.
5) Why do we not use agency recruiters?
6) When would we use recruiters?
2022-08-0644 minThe Modern Employer #wildcardsFlexible Working - Considering All AnglesHow to tackle the visibility of leadership?
How to approach L&D?
How to support commercial teams who are used to selling F2F?
Podcast by Olya Yakzhina and Karthika Biju MSc, MCIPD answering the burning questions you guys have asked us! :)
2022-08-0640 min
Leading Between the LinesCulture Before AnythingIn this week's episode of Leading Between the Lines, we hear from Olya Yakzhina, the Head of People at Switchee as she speaks to our head coach Peter about aspects of culture, recruitment and the employee experience.
Founded in 2015 by Adam Fudakowski, Ian Napier, Ed Warrick and Russ MacMillan, Switchee is an enterprise insight solution combining a smart thermostat with an analytical platform to provide safer and better housing for some of the largest landlords in the UK.
As the Head of People at Switchee, Olya knows the importance of a strong culture. She says t...2021-07-2941 min
People, Culture & TechRewriting the Benefits PackageAfter the year we have all just had, the benefits package as we know it, is broken!The workforce wants different things which means companies will need to be creative with their benefits to entice new talent and to hold onto their existing superstarsWith my guests, we will tear up the existing benefits package and rewrite it so it s more in line with the expectations of the workforce.Our guests will be:Olya Yakzhina, People Manager, SwitcheeOlya is a People Manager at Switchee, she is a...2021-03-2552 min