In every organisation, there’s someone who seems to cut through the noise. They don’t chase trends for the sake of it, and they’re not seduced by complexity disguised as strategy. These Talent leaders operate differently, they see systems clearly for what they enable, and for what they obstruct when it comes to progress.
Why Friction Matters Now
Talent Acquisition today is operating in high-stakes conditions: shrinking budgets, rising expectations, and a workforce that’s fundamentally rethinking its relationship with work. Against this backdrop, one quiet threat undermines progress – organisational dysfunction.
It’s the invisible strain on every hiring decision. The root cause behind delayed offers, poor candidate experiences, inconsistent interviews, and stalled DEI initiatives. And it often goes unnoticed because it hides in plain sight: overengineered processes, ineffective technology, legacy approval workflows, conflicting KPIs and incorrect, incomplete or contextless insights.
Friction-Fixer TA Leaders see this dysfunction for what it is: not just inefficiency, but erosion of trust, momentum, and credibility.
Beyond the Individual
Friction-Fixer TA Leaders build things that last, ensuring they are designed with purpose and built to evolve. Every step in the process serves a clear function and can operate without constant oversight. In short, the system doesn’t just work because they’re there.
It’s not a “set and forget” mindset. These leaders are always questioning, always learning, and always looking for ways to evolve. They ensure the process stays current with the market and ahead of the curve; refining what works, removing what doesn’t, and never settling for “good enough.”
- Sustainability
They’re not the hero holding it all together. They build systems that outlast them and processes that can adapt and hold up even when they’re not in the room. Standards and infrastructure are highly baked into the DNA of how the Talent Team operates.
- Resilience
Processes aren’t dependent on personality, memory, or constant escalation. Friction-Fixers embed clarity at every level so teams can operate with confidence, even under pressure or during change.
- Scalability
If your TA function only works because this one person is across everything, it’s not scalable. Friction-Fixers lay down ways of working that others can pick up, improve on, and carry forward.
- Capability-Building
They shift knowledge from the centre (the TA leader) to the edge (hiring managers, recruiters, interviewers). Decentralising knowledge moves the function from dependency to empowerment, while securing executive sponsorship and fostering cross-functional collaboration to overcome obstacles effectively.
Good Friction vs. Organisational Drag
Friction-Fixers also understand that not all friction is bad.
There is friction that protects quality, like the turnaround time on background checks. But there’s also friction that drags on progress: hiring practices built for another era, outdated tech workflows, and stakeholder approval chains with no clear owner.
What distinguishes the Friction-Fixer is their ability to discern the difference. They apply good friction with discipline and remove the rest with care. Because unnecessary complexity doesn’t just delay outcomes, it also disengages people and undermines belief in the system. It frustrates hiring managers, demotivates recruiters, and disorients candidates.
Addressing the Deeper Issues
Friction-Fixer TA Leaders are often quietly confronting far more than surface inefficiencies. They’re navigating:
- Cultural resistance to change
- Power dynamics in hiring decisions
- Misaligned incentives between speed and quality
- Technological overload that adds tasks, not value
They don’t just implement fixes. They build the relational capital to lead change. They translate hiring challenges into language that senior leadership can understand like cost, risk, and time to value. Ultimately how this impacts a business’s strategy and ability to achieve it.
Traits of a Friction-Fixer Leader
These leaders tend to share a few key traits:
- Operational fluency: They understand the entire hiring process, end-to-end, and can pinpoint where it breaks down.
- Empathy at scale: They design systems that respect people’s time – candidates, recruiters, hiring managers alike.
- Strategic clarity: They know what matters to the business, and they anchor hiring decisions to those outcomes.
- Bias for simplification: Not in pursuit of speed, but in pursuit of clarity and value.
They’re not trying to “move fast and break things.” They’re here to move deliberately, rebuild trust, and position hiring as a true business capability.
Friction-Fixer Mindset
Derek Del Simone, Chief Talent Officer of Abano Healthcare has repeatedly been a friction fixer in his career.
Derek says “Over time I’ve learned that to be a transformative Talent leader, you need a loud voice and radical candor. You must challenge complexity that adds no value and ensure people’s decisions are driven by those who truly understand talent.
Never accept ‘That’s how we’ve always done it’, it’s the biggest barrier to progress in Talent. Complexity isn’t just inefficiency; it’s a sign of unchallenged decisions holding us back. Real transformation starts when we have the courage to say: this isn’t good enough for our team, our business, or our candidates.
Talent has been too quiet for too long. Real change demands a louder voice and a true seat at the table, helping shape strategy, not reacting to it. Hiring can’t be solved from the sidelines. When talent is sidelined, it’s more than a hiring delay; businesses risk achieving growth and delivering on their strategic plan.”
Friction slows more than hiring, it drags down productivity, trust, and morale. Remove it, and you unlock not just faster outcomes, but healthier teams and smarter decisions.
