Influential Woman · Human Resources Consulting

Agatha Agbanobi

Fractional Human Resources Leader and Inclusion, Belonging and Accessibility Advisor, ResonantHR

Houston, TX

6Awards received

Certifications · Degrees · Memberships

Degree Master's in Education Leadership Degree Spring 2018 Degree Bachelor's in English with double minor in French and International Business Degree 2010 Cert SHRM Senior Professional Certification in Human Resources Cert Certified in Talent Management through HRCI Cert Certified in Change Management Cert Certified in Diversity and Inclusion Member Troop HR Member SHRM (Society of Human Resources Management) Member Fractional People People

Her Story

About Agatha

I've been in the human resources consulting field for a little over 6 years, going on 7 years this December. I started off in consulting and moved into the fractional space about a year and a half ago, where we're now more embedded in the companies of our clients. I build HR from the ground up for companies with usually less than 50 employees. We help them set up payroll and benefits if they don't already have that, then move into developing sustainable systems for recruiting and performance management. We lead and support employee relations cases, conducting investigations into employee complaints. We provide trainings as well, including manager training and executive leadership training as needed for our client companies. We really do the whole bulk of it, but our flagship is definitely providing those audits and then providing clients with a strategic roadmap for what's to come, helping them build a sustainable and agile HR infrastructure from the ground up. One of my most notable achievements is that with all of our conflict management and conflict resolution cases over the past 6 years, we've been able to help every single one of our clients successfully resolve those cases. What inspired me to enter this field was witnessing inequities and a lack of fairness in how different employees were being treated in the workplace. I saw a lot of lack of follow-through from human resources, pay inequity, and different issues that impacted employees' engagement and productivity overall. I wanted to work closely with leaders who were committed to core values of fairness, human-centered work, productivity, and bravery, but there seemed to be a disconnect between what they were touting and what employees were actually experiencing. I wanted to work with leaders who are seriously committed to closing that gap.

Her Interview

Ten minutes with Agatha

01What do you attribute your success to?

I would say community. Being connected to people who are really invested in my growth and my success as a business owner and as an HR professional has been probably the core, one of the main keys to my success.

02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?

The best career advice I ever received was knowing when to say no. Being very clear on who you are, what you stand for, and sticking to it, no matter what. That means knowing when to say no, even when it feels like saying yes would be the easier path or would open up more doors. There's a thing about saying yes to the wrong door and creating a cycle of walking through the wrong doors and then feeling frustrated about where we end up in life. There's often this thing about saying yes to these opportunities, and not enough people are talking about when and how to say no to an open door that is just not the right door for you to walk through.

03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?

I think just being very clear about what you're trying to accomplish in the field before you get in, and being open and flexible to that changing as you learn more about the field. It is a very thankless job, and it's very hard.

04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?

I think one of the biggest challenges is the misperception or wrong perception of HR. And also the very real fact that HR often gets stuck putting out a lot of fires that aren't high-impact work, doing a lot of low-impact work, putting out little fires here and there. Things that help with compliance and keep things steady, but we get stuck with that often and are rarely able to get into the really good, meaty work of improving overall team culture, really helping employees grow in meaningful ways, developing leaders, making the HR ops and systems a lot more efficient and fluid. We never really get to these things, so it feels like we're not people-centered when we should be. A lot of HR professionals in the field that I've come across do really care and want to be people-centered, but we're constantly sidelined by a lot of different little fires that we have to put out that aren't as impactful, but are still meaningful for the organization. And so it comes across as though we are primarily about the organization, instead of being primarily about the people in the organization.

05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?

I would say honesty and transparency where possible.

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