Nadia Uberoi’s career is the story of a psychologist turned strategic architect. As Head of People at Garner Health, she leads a next-generation People function—one that has evolved beyond traditional HR to become the engine for a distinctive, high-performance culture. She is known for her ability to partner with executives to translate bold visions into thoughtfully crafted, scalable programs and systems. Her secret weapon? A nuanced understanding of human and organizational behavior.
The Accidental Path to HR
Uberoi’s journey began at the University of Pennsylvania, where she studied psychology with a deep interest in human behavior. While searching for a marketing role after graduation, she had a fateful interview with an HR Director at Chewy. He had a strong instinct that she belonged in HR and was so determined to bring her on that he made an exception to the campus recruiting program so she could work in Boston.
The irony? He left Chewy before she ever started.
“I’m fairly certain I would’ve found my way into HR eventually,” she says, “but those first four years of growing my career at Chewy gave me a solid head start.”
From Hypergrowth to Strategic Leadership
That solid start at Chewy quickly turned into a masterclass in building for scale. Uberoi helped establish and grow the company’s talent management and HR Business Partner capabilities during its hypergrowth phase. She then went on to lead People Operations at a Series C tech startup before bringing her expertise to Garner Health. Today, she uses her unique background to build the infrastructure for a culture where human behavior is not just managed but understood.
In our latest Faces, meet Nadia Uberoi.
What’s your favorite part about working in the HR industry? What’s your least favorite part, and how would you change it?
What I love most is the variety and the intellectual complexity. HR sits at the intersection of philosophy, strategy, operations, and EQ. One day I might be focused on developing an enterprise talent strategy, the next I’m designing workflows into an integrated system, and the next I’m navigating a challenging leadership issue. The scope of work exercises every part of my brain, and there’s constant opportunity to make a tangible impact.
As for the most challenging part, I’d say it’s stakeholder relations. HR leaders engage with every type of stakeholder across the organization, often in highly nuanced situations. We’re frequently trying to influence people who don’t understand what we do, don’t see the value in what we’re asking them to do, or think they know how to do our job better. The way I deal with this is by shifting my mindset from “perception management” to focusing on the content and impact of the work itself.
It sounds like through your experience, you really care about people, which is important in the industry. Please elaborate here.
I do genuinely and deeply care about people. I also genuinely and deeply care about our mission to fix healthcare, and I know the value that a strong People strategy can have on the business. That’s what makes this job both incredibly meaningful and uniquely challenging. I make difficult decisions and have tough conversations nearly every day. The key, for me, is doing that with empathy, care, and deep respect for each individual—while not losing sight of the broader mission.
How can HR most effectively demonstrate its value to the leadership team?
I’ve been fortunate – or intentional – in choosing organizations where the People function already has a seat at the table. But the organizations where that isn’t the case are often the ones that need a strategic HR function the most. To those navigating that challenge, I’d recommend a combination of two tactics:
- First, speak their language. Understand how the leadership team evaluates any other business decision or update, and frame your work through that lens (e.g. impact on growth, efficiency, retention, or risk).
- Second, focus on delivering real value, not managing perceptions. Of course some stakeholder groundwork is often necessary, but don’t let proving your worth take your energy away from actually doing the work effectively. The credibility comes from impact—not just from positioning.
Where do you see the industry heading in five years? Or are you seeing any current trends?
There are so many directions I could go here, but I’ll focus on the one I’m most passionate about right now: productizing HR. Yes, it connects nicely with AI, but the movement started before that, and it’s much broader than automation or tooling.
Productizing HR means approaching People practices the way you would a great product: designing with intention, solving real problems, prioritizing simplicity and scalability, and measuring success through data and outcomes. It’s about building systems that are repeatable, intuitive, and high leverage. Done well, it shifts the People function from reactive support to strategic infrastructure that scales with the business.
I treat every program and process in my scope as a product, each of my team members as a product manager, and our suite of HR products as an ecosystem. I’m expecting this mentality and systemization to become the norm for People functions in the next few years. Honestly, if I get another degree, it might be in product management.
Who is/was your biggest influence in the industry?
This one’s easy: Valentina Gissin, former Chief People Officer at Garner and now at Curana Health. I worked under her leadership for over five years across multiple companies, including Garner. Throughout that time—and still today—she has made it a priority to invest in me and my career, fundamentally shaping my trajectory both as a People professional and as a person.
Valentina brings a first-principles approach to all things People and embodies the fact that the People function is a key driver of business success. She is the modern Chief People Officer that so many of us aspire to be. Moreover, she’s committed to lifting the next generation with her. She builds confidence, puts her team’s development at the forefront, and challenges people to grow, while creating the supportive environment needed to do so. I’ll always carry forward her approach to leadership, and can only hope to have the kind of impact on my team that she’s had on me.
Do you have any advice for people entering the profession?
Two things come to mind:
1. You can’t always be picky about the organizations you work for early in your career, but to the extent that you can: pay close attention to the relationship between the People function and the rest of the business, especially the CEO. Is there a talent strategy in place with buy-in from the C-suite? What types of business challenges is the People team expected to help solve? Are the People professionals leading the charge in proposing and designing solutions, or mostly just executing?
2. The people you work with have an outsized impact on your career, especially early on. They often shape your mindset, your values, and your trajectory. Seek out mentors you trust—if they are your manager at some point, even better. And when you do find yourself working under excellent leadership or alongside people you really learn from, hold onto it. It’s not all that common, and it creates exponential value for your career.