Kraft Heinz has appointed Joanne Chin as the company’s Chief People Officer in Australia. Chin joins the company’s executive leadership team as the business continues to accelerate its innovation and expansion journey globally and locally.
In the past year, Kraft Heinz Australia has experienced growth including increasing its staff headcount and bringing a number of new products to the market.
Kraft Heinz in Australia employs more than 900 people throughout the country and is renowned for offering strong growth opportunities for its people. In Chin’s new role, she will be responsible for helping to build a sustainable Australian business through a comprehensive people strategy, including building a thriving culture, developing strong leaders and managing current talent, as well as attracting new talent.
Boasting nearly 15 years of people and performance management, Joanne has built her expertise in the human resources (HR) sector working for some of the world’s most innovative companies. She first began her HR career at Sydney-based law firm, Allens, after five years working as a lawyer at the company. Most recently, Joanne was Head of People at Waymo (Google’s self-driving car company project) for over two years in San Francisco, and prior to this held HR leadership roles at Google for more than four years in both London and San Francisco.
In these positions, Joanne honed her skills in transformational HR, designing and building new business divisions and teams. She developed employee training and development programs, as well as implemented best-practise strategies for driving outstanding workplace cultures.
Chin said: “I am thrilled to join the team at Kraft Heinz Australia. My passion for business transformation, people, culture and innovative workplaces has led me to this exciting opportunity, and I hope to impart the knowledge I have working in various sectors and geographies.
“While one of the largest food and beverage companies in the world, the business here in Australia is very agile and operates with a large amount of local autonomy. Kraft Heinz is known for taking great pride in hand picking outstanding talent and bringing them into the business, as well as nurturing its people with exciting opportunities.
“One of my core focus areas will be helping to develop a future generation of FMCG leaders. Regardless of tenure, everyone is given the opportunity to own and manage major products, enabling them to thrive and grow rapidly. A key element of my role will be building upon the robust personal development programs and opportunities currently in place.”
Kraft Heinz in Australia has been recognised as one of the country’s leading employers, recently named in The AFR’s Top 100 Graduate Employers 2018 List. The business works closely with Australian universities to on-board and train high achieving graduates annually. Many of these graduates have progressed into permanent positions and soon after achieved promotions into more senior roles.