Manufacturing
Technology, Information and Media
Active

Emma W

Experienced Chief Human Resources Officer

About Me

Emma J. Woodthorpe is a seasoned human resources executive and fractional CHRO who helps CEOs and leadership teams drive business performance through people strategy, leadership alignment, and organizational capability. With more than 25 years of hands-on experience partnering with CEOs, Boards, and private equity sponsors, Emma brings a pragmatic, outcome-focused approach to HR leadership. She has shaped HR functions, scaled talent systems, led M&A integrations, strengthened leadership pipelines, and aligned people priorities to business objectives across technology, manufacturing, defense, and global operations. Clients rely on Emma for strategic workforce planning, culture and engagement acceleration, performance and talent systems that scale, and organizational design that enables growth and change. She steps in where leadership needs trusted human capital counsel and rapid, measurable impact—without the overhead of a full-time executive. Based in Massachusetts, Emma works with high-growth companies and established enterprises to build resilient, purpose-driven teams.

Jurisdiction

United States

Notable Employer

  • Chief People Officer at Brooks Automation
  • SVP & Chief Human Resources Officer at Mercury Systems

Experience

Seniority LevelExecutive
Years of Experience20+ years
Current StatusActive
Chief People Officer NotableBrooks Automation
2022 - 2026

Lead the strategic transformation of culture, values, inclusion, and people processes to align organizational growth with business priorities. Accountable for building scalable leadership, strengthening performance and accountability, and positioning Brooks as an employer of choice. Partnered with the CEO and PE Owner to lead company-wide transformation, aligning structure, talent, and culture to support long-term growth and performance across a global workforce. • Advised the CEO on executive team composition, strengthening team effectiveness and upgrading 25% of the team. • Established Board governance for talent and compensation, providing quarterly updates on executive compensation, succession, and leadership development. • Created and implemented a multi-year people plan with programs that enhanced engagement >5 point increases in engagement scores in key countries, capability, and scalability as the company grew toward multi-billion potential. • Defined a new purpose, values, and core behavior model to strengthen accountability and alignment. • Introduced the Leader Success Model and Executive Leadership Development Program to build leadership capability and succession depth for critical roles that resulted in 25% of leaders being promoted into expanded roles. • Redesigned performance management and OKR processes to reinforce clarity, ownership, and measurable outcomes that aligned 100% of OKRs to the enterprise objectives. • Implemented a streamlined HR model that outsourced transactional work and applied automation to improve efficiency and decision quality that resulted in a $2M cost saving in the HR Budget. • Co-led development of the company’s AI strategy to enhance productivity, talent development, and risk management.

SVP & Chief Human Resources OfficerNotableMercury Systems
2016 - 2022

Led the people strategy in a high-growth, acquisition-driven environment. Partnered with the CEO and Executive leaders to shape the company’s leadership, culture, and organizational capability to support rapid growth and operational excellence. Partnered with the CEO to define human capital strategy, providing quarterly updates to the Compensation Committee on succession, executive compensation, and leadership development. (MERCURY CHRO, continued) • Defined new purpose, values, and core competencies to set clear expectations for the company and acquisitions. • Developed a five-year people plan to strengthen leadership, culture, engagement, and the overall employee experience that led to achieving a 4.6 rating on Glass door and a increase of 10% to a 78% engagement score and Mercury being award the #12 spot on the Boston Globe Top places to Work in Massachusetts in 2020 • Led the integration of 14 acquisitions, aligning culture, systems, and people processes to enable scale and consistency. that supported the CAGR of 28% over a 5-year period and led to <5% voluntary attrition in any acquired company and placed Mercury on Fortune Magazine’s top 100 fastest growing companies in 2020. • Redesigned company structure, reducing fixed costs by $30M and positioning the organization for growth to $2B+. • Introduced a leader success framework and leadership development program that built internal bench strength, increased promotion rates for Directors and above by 30%, and expanded leadership diversity. • Modernized HR infrastructure and systems to create a scalable, data-driven function including full implementation of ADP Vantage HRIS and Job architecture that reduced the number of job titles in the company from 1,000 to 200. • Exceeded DE&I goals: increased led women in leadership by 350%, technical roles by 344%, and doubled veteran hires. • Led the company’s COVID-19 response and engagement plan, maintaining 100% uninterrupted operations across all facilities; drove CEO approval to 95% on Glassdoor and Glassdoor’s CEO.

Vice President, Human ResourcesXYLEM INC
2013 - 2016

Supported the Analytics and Treatment divisions across 25 sites in 20 countries. Responsible for the full integration of 10 Analytics acquisitions, partnering with the Treatment GM to design a turnaround plan for the division, driving organizational design, strategic workforce planning, change management, and strategic talent management. • Completed organizational redesign of both divisions in an 18-month period with particular focus on Asia and China. • Drove the full integration of 10 acquisitions and implementation of new compensation and benefits plans in the US, UK, and Australia to drive harmonization. • In partnership with the business leaders developed a process to streamline and optimize critical work streams within the Treatment business that were leading to a loss of revenue • Led the development of an M&A playbook and resource planning model for Xylem. • Partnered with the Talent Management COE, to develop and implement leadership reviews and talent development.

Skills

Core skills0
Languages2

Languages

English
English (British)