Olivier Deslandes - Chief Human Resources Officer and Organizational Architect

Olivier Deslandes

Chief Human Resources Officer  ·  Organizational Architect

"No HR religion. Just a preference for design over declaration."

30+
Years
6
Countries Lived
30+
Countries Led
4
Industries
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About

The problem I have spent
thirty years solving

Organizations rarely fail because they run out of good ideas. They fail because they cannot make their ideas real. The distance between what an organization declares and what it actually produces is the most consequential unsolved problem in leadership today.

I have built HR architecture at scale across MedTech, private banking, and international retail banking - in France, the United States, Japan, Singapore, and Switzerland. In 2011, four of my countries were simultaneously at war or in political meltdown during the Arab Spring. I have navigated 4 mergers and acquisitions, 2 joint ventures, and led HR through the governance complexity of one of Europe's oldest private banking institutions.

What those experiences produced is the CHRO Operating System - a five-layer framework for closing the gap between organizational strategy and the behavior that should make it real.

The culture of any organization is defined by the worst behavior its leader tolerates. Not by its most noble aspirations. By its worst tolerated behavior.
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Career

30 years of
organizational architecture

Terumo Neuro (Microvention)
Head of HR, EMEA
Medical Devices / Neurovascular · Greater Paris Region
Full EMEA HR accountability spanning talent strategy, organizational design, and behavioral infrastructure for a federated European geography within the Terumo Group.
ReLyfe Group
Board Member & VP Organizational Development
Digital Health / MedTech · Franco-American
Board-level governance and organizational architecture for a patient data sovereignty startup operating across French and US regulatory environments.
Independent HR Advisory
Co-Founder - Swiss HR Patrol / Adexis Solutions
Executive HR Consulting & Search · Geneva, Switzerland
Interim CHRO mandates, C-level executive search across Europe, and strategic advisor to the Chairman of the R20 Foundation on leadership and talent.
Bank Lombard Odier
Chief Human Resources Officer - Executive Vice President
Private Banking · Geneva · 250B USD AUM · 23 countries · 2,500 people
CHRO for one of Europe's oldest private banking institutions. CHF 2.9M in savings. 40% HR productivity gains. EDGE gender equality certification. Trusted advisor to the multi-partner management committee.
BNP Paribas
Global Head of HR - International Retail Banking
Retail Banking / Emerging Markets · Paris · 30,000 employees · 30 countries
HR leadership through the Arab Spring crisis across Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Cote d'Ivoire simultaneously. M&A integration of 15,000 employees through 2 acquisitions. Global High Potential program for 250 senior leaders.
Boston Scientific
HR Director International
Medical Devices · Boston / Singapore / Tokyo / Paris · 10 years / 3 continents
Progressed from HRIS management to HR Director International covering 5,000 employees with team members in 7 countries. Led HR Tech through the Guidant acquisition in Europe.
Expertise

Where I create
organizational value

HR Strategy & Transformation

Building HR functions that operate as genuine organizational architects - not process administrators serving a support role.

Organizational Design

The operating model, not the org chart. Who decides what, how resources flow, and where accountability actually lives.

Cultural & Behavioral Design

Culture is what you tolerate, not what you declare. Designing the architecture that produces the behavior you actually want.

M&A HR Integration

4 mergers and acquisitions and 2 joint ventures. Building coherence across newly combined organizations at speed.

Cross-Cultural Leadership

6 countries lived and worked in. 30+ countries of operational accountability. HR without cultural context is not HR.

Executive Coaching & Advisory

Board-level advisory on leadership, governance, and organizational maturity for institutions at inflection points.

Intellectual Framework

The CHRO
Operating System

A five-layer framework for closing the gap between organizational strategy and sustained behavioral performance. Built from 30 years of observing why brilliantly designed strategies quietly disappear before they become behavior.

01
Strategy Core
Is the strategy actually achievable with the talent and culture we currently have?
02
Org Architecture
The org chart is not the operating model. Structure rarely changes how work actually gets done.
03
Behavioral Design
Culture is the breathing of an organization when unsupervised. It is defined by what is tolerated.
04
Execution Systems
How long between identifying a performance problem and a clear, consequential response?
05
Adaptive Feedback
Name three decisions this year materially shaped by HR data. If the answer is near zero - the loop is broken.
Read Part I on LinkedIn   ·   Read Part II on LinkedIn
Part III in development — the five layers under pressure from collapsing certainties
Publications & Speaking

Writing on what
organizations actually do

LinkedIn

The CHRO Operating System - Part I

Your culture is not what you declare. It is what you tolerate.

Read on LinkedIn
LinkedIn

The CHRO Operating System - Part II

Four questions the five layers have to answer. And why most organizations cannot.

Read on LinkedIn
HR Today

Le nouveau visage des RH (2019)

The future of the HR function and the capabilities it requires - written in 2019.

Read on HR Today
HR Today

Hypnotises par la disruption (2019)

Organizations rushing into automation with their ethical faculties on standby.

Read on HR Today
HR Today

La nouvelle normalite (2020)

Organizational resilience and the future of work - written at the height of COVID-19.

Read on HR Today

Speaking

Available for keynotes and executive panels on organizational architecture, the future of the CHRO role, and cultural transformation.

CHRO Operating System Keynote Organizational Resilience Culture & Behavioral Design Impact through Intercultural Performance
Contact

Let's have a
real conversation

If the question of why good strategies fail to become behavior is one you wrestle with - or if you are looking for a CHRO who thinks like an architect, not an administrator.

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