Highlights
- TR's Global Head of HR explains why shifting from trusted information provider to technology company is a people story first.
- Transformation is lived through individual roles, habits and identities, so TR puts people at the center of the change.
- HR enables change by supporting wellbeing, investing in skills over roles, and redesigning how TR hires, grows and rewards talent.
For most of its history, Thomson Reuters has been known as a trusted provider of information: the news, the legal research, the tax and accounting content that professionals rely on to do their jobs. That reputation took generations to build, and it’s not going anywhere.
But the work our customers need us to do has changed. Customers no longer want only information. They want answers, workflows, and AI-powered tools that help them act on that information faster and with greater confidence. TR’s deliberate shift to operating as a technology company isn’t a rebrand. It’s a fundamental shift in how we build Fiduciary-Grade AI™, how we work, and who we need to be.
As Global Head of HR, I get asked a lot about the technology side of this journey. The platforms, the AI, the product roadmap. Those matter enormously. But I’m convinced the most important part of our transformation is the human one.
Technology doesn’t transform companies. People do.
When you think of a transformation strategy for a technology company, what might not come through loudest is how it will feel for the person who spent fifteen years mastering a craft that is now evolving beneath them. Or the editor who is learning to work alongside AI. Or the sales leader who used to sell content and now sells platforms.
Transformation is lived at the level of individual roles, habits, and identities. If we get that part right, the technology follows. If we get it wrong, the best roadmap in the world stalls.
This is why we’ve chosen to put people at the center of the change rather than treat them as something to be managed around it.
What it means to be a tech company in practice
Moving from a content-led business to a technology-led one changes things that are easy to overlook:
How we work. Tech companies iterate. They ship, learn, and improve, and they do this quickly. That asks us to get comfortable with experimentation, with being useful before being perfect, and with the idea that a failed pilot that teaches us something is a success.
What we value. Deep domain expertise has always been our foundation, and it becomes more valuable, not less, when paired with technical fluency. Our advantage is that we understand the professions we serve better than almost anyone. Pairing that expertise with engineering, data science, and product skills is where the magic happens.
How we learn. The half-life of skills is shrinking. Continuous learning can’t be a perk. It must be part of how we operate.
The role of changemakers
Every transformation I’ve seen succeed has had changemakers at its heart. These are people at every level and in every function who see what’s possible, are willing to go first, and bring others along with them.
They aren’t always the most senior people in the room. Often they’re the engineer who starts an internal community of practice, the lawyer-turned-product-manager who translates between customers and builders, or the team lead who quietly reshapes how their group works and then shares what they learned.
Our job is to find these people, support them, and amplify them. That means giving them air cover to experiment, connecting them across silos, and making sure their stories are heard. Culture shifts when people see colleagues who look like them making the change and thriving.
How HR enables a people-first transformation
HR’s role in a moment like this is to build the conditions for change. I think about it in three parts:
- Look after the human experience. People can better handle difficult change when there’s a clear pathway and explanation on where we’re going, why, and what it means. Leaders need the tools to guide their teams through ambiguity with empathy, while employees need space to learn, ask questions, and sometimes stumble. We believe wellbeing and psychological safety aren’t separate from transformation—they’re what makes it sustainable.
- Invest in skills, not just roles. Job titles will keep changing. Skills travel. We focus on helping people build capabilities in areas like AI literacy, data fluency, and product thinking, and on creating visible pathways for them to apply those skills in new ways at TR.
- Redesign how we hire, grow, and reward. If we want a tech-forward culture, our talent practices must reflect that: rethinking how we attract technical talent, how we recognize collaboration and learning, and how we define leadership in a world where teams are more cross-functional than ever.
Transformation can sound abstract until you remember it’s just people, thousands of them, choosing every day to learn something new, try a different way of working, and trust one another through uncertainty.
I’m proud to work alongside colleagues who are doing exactly that. The future of Thomson Reuters is being shaped by technology, but it’s being defined by the people who build it and the culture they create together.
If you’re on a similar journey in your own organization, I’d love to hear what’s working for you. And if you’re curious about joining ours, we’re always looking for people who want to help shape what comes next.
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