Connector of Talent and Success 💼 | Empowering Businesses to Thrive through People | Culture Growth Strategist | Coach | Writer | HR leader | #1 LinkedIn Belgium | Top #150 LinkedIn 🌍

Who I help: Ambitious introverts and people-first companies

Problems: Visibility without burnout, quiet leadership, culture that enables deep work

Outcomes: Promotions, role transitions, retention, high-trust cultures

STRATEGIC HR LEADER AND COACH WITH HANDS-ON APPROACH AIMING FOR THE BEST EMPLOYEE/BUSINESS EXPERIENCE - INTROVERT ADVOCATE

International HR Executive passionate about the link between employee experience and business dynamics. Combining a strong focus on strategic thinking and planning with a structured and factual hands-on approach. A positive well connected team coach with a natural sense of empowering team members in a spirit of challenge, learning and mutual recognition. Sound decision making capabilities based on critical reflections within companies focusing on innovation, change, digital transformation and learning.

A. Group HR Director Alter Pharma (200 FTE - BE/IRL/US) – private equity backed firm defining & implementing HR strategy (from strategy to operations) including definition of mission/vision/strategy & values.
B. Global HR Business Partner BU Kerley international/Tessenderlo Group (+/-300 employees - 11 countries) developing/transforming key HR processes (talent resource planning, talent acquisition, performance management, competency management, learning, reward,..) - HR project lead new factory Rouen, France. 
C. Global HR Executive SWIFT (+/- 3.000 employees in +25 countries) transforming/coaching business and HR into new ways of (digital) working/thinking to improve the employee and business experience 
D. Global Head of Reward Tessenderlo Group (+/- 5.000 employees in +25 countries) - strategic development/transformation reward strategy
E. Development new holistic performance management framework for Tessenderlo Group, including full implementation recognition stream.
F. HR Project Manager : move of the Chiquita EME Headquarters from Belgium to Switzerland (social plan negotiations, c&b setup, recruitment, mobility, new policy/process design,...)

Professional coaching certification Better Minds at Work               2018 - 2019
Centre for Creative Leadership - senior leadership program           Q1-2 2018
Management Development Programme Vlerick (17 days)		  2010 - 2011
Strategic Compensation & Benefits Management, Vlerick 		  2007      
Master degree in Law&Taxation, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven    1997 - 1998

Steven Claes

This visual stopped me mid-scroll.

Not because it was poetic.
Because it was accurate.

For 20 years as CHRO, I sat across from introverts who apologized for being exactly this.

For needing silence after back-to-back meetings.
For choosing one real conversation over five surface-level ones.
For slipping out before the small talk started.

Last year, a senior director asked me permission to skip the team dinner.

He thought I'd mark him as "not a team player."

I told him I'd been doing the same thing for two decades.

What most people get wrong about us:

They confuse selectivity with coldness.
Solitude with sadness.
Quiet with empty.

All three are dead wrong.

What work actually taught me:

→ Selectivity is a self-management skill
Choosing fewer interactions protects your best thinking. Not coldness.

→ Solitude is a recharge, not a retreat
The best boardroom decisions? Made by someone who sat alone with the problem first.

→ Quiet is not empty. It is focused.
That depth is a career advantage most never develop because they're too busy performing.

The quiet life is not a consolation prize.
It is a chosen one.

And if you are in an introvert's inner circle, know this.
You were not a convenience.
You were a deliberate choice.

That is quiet confidence in action.

Which line on the visual hit you the hardest?

♻️ Repost to help a fellow introvert feel seen

Introversion isn't a bug. It's an operating system. I spent years apologizing for who I am.

Too quiet. Too reserved. Too much "in my head."

I tried to fix myself.
Fake energy. Forced small talk. Endless networking events that drained me by Tuesday.

Then something shifted.

I stopped treating introversion as a bug to fix.
And started seeing it as my operating system.

My quiet? It's deep listening.
My reserved? It's strategic thinking.
My "in my head"? It's where the best ideas live.

20+ years as a CHRO taught me this:
The leaders who know how they're wired outperform those who fight it.

Every time.

So I wrote this on my whiteboard.
As a reminder.
As a declaration.

I'm done apologizing.

And if you've ever felt like you needed to become someone else to succeed, I see you.

♻️ Repost for the introvert in your network who needs to hear this.

📩 These are the daily techniques that helped me stop fighting my wiring:
https://lnkd.in/eSdKpkMs

Executive & Team Coaching & Consulting - we help to drive business growth through the development of high-performing teams in everchanging environments.

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Steven Claes

Daria Rudnik Coaching & Consulting

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The Battle

Steven Claes

Daria Rudnik Coaching & Consulting

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Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Steven Claes's LinkedIn Performance

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