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The HR Business Partner role is under unprecedented pressure. You are expected to be a strategic adviser, a change leader, a culture shaper, and a workforce planner while still carrying operational demands that leave little room for real partnership. You may feel the gap between what the business needs from you and what your current systems, structures, and capacity allow you to deliver. This conference speaks directly to that gap.

The KR HRBP Conference 2026 is designed for HRBPs who want to strengthen their strategic contribution and gain clarity on how to work differently in a world where expectations keep rising. Under the theme “Reinventing the HR Business Partner: Solving Today’s Challenges, Shaping Tomorrow’s Workforce”, the programme addresses the real constraints you face: fragmented processes, limited influence with leaders, competing operational demands, rapid digital change, and a workforce that requires more sophisticated approaches to engagement, capability, and well-being.

How This Conference Strengthens Your Role

You may not always have the structure, skills, or organisational conditions needed to act as a true strategic partner. You manage change fatigue, talent disruption, governance pressures, and shifting employee expectations while still being asked to deliver strategic insight and business impact. This conference addresses these realities directly, offering practical solutions for reducing low-value work, sharpening business acumen, navigating organisational politics, influencing leadership, and applying data, technology, and behavioural science to your everyday HRBP challenges.

You will leave with frameworks, tools, and confidence to operate with greater strategic clarity and personal influence. You will be better equipped to:

  • Work with executives as a credible adviser rather than an administrator

  • Use people analytics and business metrics to shape decisions

  • Guide leaders through culture, change, and employee experience challenges

  • Strengthen cross-functional collaboration and organisational agility

  • Design and implement HR operating models that reduce workload and increase impact

  • Drive long-term behavioural and capability shifts across your organisation

You will gain a clear picture of what “good” looks like in 2026 and how to reposition yourself as an indispensable partner in performance, transformation, and workforce strategy.

What Makes This Conference Different

This conference is tailored specifically to your lived reality as an HRBP. The programme is evidence-based, grounded in organisational case studies, and shaped by the practical skills you need to thrive. It goes beyond theory to address the behaviours, systems, and conditions that enable you to make a measurable difference.

You will learn from HR executives, practising HRBPs, organisational psychologists, and analytics specialists who understand the intersection of strategy, culture, and operational delivery. The design is intentionally practical, reflective, and anchored in the unique pressures of the South African environment.

Across two days of keynotes, masterclasses, panels, and case discussions, you gain a sharper strategic identity, a stronger voice with leaders, and a realistic roadmap for influencing organisational performance in 2026 and beyond.

You will gain a clear picture of what “good” looks like in 2026 and how to reposition yourself as an indispensable partner in performance, transformation, and workforce strategy.

Who Should Attend

Career Management and Internal Mobility Seminar
  • HR Directors and Heads of HR – Senior HR leaders responsible for aligning people strategy to business priorities.
  • HR Business Partners – Practising HRBPs who are expected to deliver strategic value while managing heavy operational demands.
  • HR Managers – HR Managers overseeing end-to-end HR delivery who want to strengthen their strategic contribution, improve operating models, and better integrate people processes with business needs.
  • HR Practitioners and Specialists – HR professionals involved in employee relations, learning and development, talent, or organisational development.
  • Talent Managers and Workforce Planning Professionals – Leaders responsible for attraction, retention, capability development, and succession in a tight and changing South African labour market.
  • HR Consultants and Independent Practitioners – Consultants supporting organisations across sectors.
  • Line Managers – Operational and functional leaders who work closely with HR Business Partners and want to build more effective partnerships.
Reinventing the HR Business Partner: Solving Today’s Challenges, Shaping Tomorrow’s Workforce

Summary of topics across the two day agenda

Day 1: 22 April 2026

  • Opening Keynote: Breaking the Trade-Off: Balancing Strategic Partnership and Operational Demands

  • Employee Engagement for a High-Performance Workplace

  • Mastering Business Acumen and Data Literacy for Real Influence

  • Rethinking Stakeholder Engagement: Gaining Influence Across the Organisation

  • Panel Discussion: The HRBP Reality Check – What Keeps HRBPs Up at Night?

  • Leading Change in Resistant Environments

  • Case Study: From Chaos to Clarity – How One HRBP Team Transformed Their Operating Model

  • Reskilling and Upskilling as Strategic Collaboration

Day 2: 23 April 2026

  • Keynote: AI-Enabled HRBP – Thriving in a Digitally Accelerated Workplace

  • Hybrid and Remote Session: Employee Experience Reinvented: Engaging a Distracted Workforce

  • The HRBP as Coach, Influencer, and Internal Consultant

  • Transforming Employee Wellbeing Programmes: HRBP as Wellness Advocate

  • Panel Discussion: Driving Business Value – How HRBPs Influence Performance, Culture, and Growth

  • Beyond Diversity: Creating True Inclusion and Belonging Through HRBP Leadership

  • The Collaboration Catalyst: How HRBPs Drive Cross-Functional Partnership and Agility

  • Strategic Workforce Planning in an Age of Disruption

Pre-conference Workshop: 21 April 2026

Using People Analytics to Influence Business Decisions

Workshop Purpose
To equip HR Business Partners with the capability to interpret, apply, and translate people data into strategic business insights that influence leadership decisions, improve workforce outcomes, and strengthen HR’s strategic value.

Learning Outcomes
By the end of the workshop, participants will be able to:

  • Identify high-impact HR metrics that align with business strategy
  • Convert HR data into business intelligence
  • Build executive-level people dashboards
  • Apply analytics to real organisational challenges
  • Present data in a way that influences leadership decisions

Martin Sutherland
Founding Partner, Peopletree Group

Martin Sutherland has spent his career tackling one question: why do so many companies fail to get real value from their biggest investment—their people? He believes the issue isn’t individual HR tools, but fragmented systems that don’t work together, leading to poor talent decisions and missed opportunities. As the architect of Peopletree Group’s Talent Management as a Service (TMaaS) model, Martin helps organisations build Sustainable People Ecosystems that turn HR into a strategic driver of growth. His work focuses on integrating processes, data, technology, and teams into a coherent system that multiplies value rather than diluting it. With a background in Psychology, Philosophy, and Training Management, he is known for translating complex people data into practical, business-focused insights. Martin is a regular conference speaker and published thought leader on talent strategy and organisational design.

Register by 15 February 2026 to save 15%

VENUE

Protea Hotel O.R. Tambo Airport

Experience the perfect blend of style, comfort, and convenience at Protea Hotel O.R. Tambo Airport. Our modern hotel near Johannesburg Airport, located in gorgeous Kempton Park, makes the ideal landing point for ambitious business travelers, as well as those seeking to explore the wonders of the city.

Download the Conference Brochure

Contains full programme and more information on our featured speakers!

Partner with us

Sponsorship & Exhibition Opportunities

For over a decade, KR has curated this premier event, attracting HR Business Partner leaders who are influential decision-makers. Elevate your brand and establish robust business relationships, lead generation and a thriving pipeline through our sponsorship opportunities.

Benefits:

  • Engage directly with current and potential business partners.
  • Forge significant connections, generate leads, and close sales.
  • Showcase your most recent product and service innovations.
  • Feature your executives through speaking opportunities that solidify your market position.
  • Access an elite networking platform with top HR decision-makers.
  • Demonstrate your products’ and solutions’ practical applications within our inventive conference agenda.
  • Select from a variety of sponsorship packages to fit any budget.

Don’t miss out on presenting your brand at this event, by partnering with us for the HR Business Partner Annual Conference 2026.

NOTE: There are limited sponsorship and exhibition opportunities available.

Contact Virginia Motsepe – virginia@knowres.co.za to find out more.

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