From chaos to clarity: Cerys Cook's journey as HR leader

Before stepping into the role of chief people and transformation officer at Swift Medical, Cerys Cook’s professional journey began far from HR.

“I actually started my career as a chef... I was working super long hours [in a] really high-pressured environment, very male-dominated, and people were yelled at and basically treated like commodities on basis,” she recalls.

These experiences, marked by burnout and lack of respect, led Cook to seek out better ways to treat people in the workplace. She transitioned out of the restaurant industry with the intent to return and transform it. However, her career path veered into the startup world, where Cook found her niche.

“What really struck me is that the early-stage companies were willing to give me an opportunity when I didn't have 10, 15 years of experience, and really let me build,” she says.

That passion has continued to define her leadership style at Swift Medical in Toronto, which specializes in digital wound care management, where she has worked since September 2021.

“I discovered pretty quickly that that is who I am at heart — I'm really a builder. So, there was an opportunity to not just contribute to an organization, but to create something, so building systems, culture, strengthening leadership, developing ways of working together from that level zero,” says Cook.

“That’s what I love most is creating clarity where there's chaos in startups ... and helping the people inside of that chaos to clarify it, and then helping them to thrive.”

Educating HR leadership

Cook has worked as an HR leader at companies such as bluedot, Viva Naturals, PUR.

And her formal HR education includes a BA from the University of Toronto and a Human Resources Management diploma from Sheridan College, earned with high honours. However, she doesn’t see formal education as essential for every HR leader.

“It's an interesting debate,” says Cook.

“You need to understand people, the ways in which they work, how to motivate; you need a strong team that is working with you, that does understand the regulations, the legal parts — all of the administrative, must-have things that keep the organization free from risk. So, you do need a team that has that knowledge.”

But as head of people, you need to understand the language of business and how to connect all the people initiatives to the business strategy, she says.

“They have to be deeply linked or else they just become these siloed projects that the people team is working on that don't really drive business outcomes.”

That philosophy guides how Cook leads at Swift Medical.

 “I was really brought in to strengthen the people strategy and the operations of the people side of the business, and to start building just enough structure,” she says.

“A lot of the focus was on setting a higher bar across leadership, across culture and across performance, while staying very deeply grounded in our mission, which is very appealing to me.”

Cook believes that the right amount of structure enables agility.

“I am a true believer that the foundational structure actually gives you more ability to be flexible, because people understand what is expected of them, so that they are delivering results,” she says.

Changing software platform to rebuild

Since joining Swift Medical in 2021, Cook has overseen significant changes, including multiple CEO transitions and the challenging decision to rebuild the company’s software platform from the ground up.

“Every startup hits this place where you're building your software without knowing where you're going, because you're building as your customers get interested, and you're trying to figure out product market fit. And so what happens... is that you have a system that wasn't built for scale,” she says.

“Eventually, we’ll be sunsetting our legacy platform. We're almost there. It's been a time of uncertainty, and we've had a team that's really leaned into that, and it feels like now we're in this exciting time where… we've emerged stronger, [we] have momentum, we have a clear path forward.”

Today, the company has a workforce of about 60 in Canada and 80 globally, says Cook.

“We're on this precipice of rebuilding our growth story. But it's been a couple of years [where we], like, every other company in the tech industry had to make some really difficult decisions on the reorganization of their teams.”

Culture in a fully remote world

And the employees are all fully remote, with people working from Canada, the U.S. and globally. It was a tough but important decision, she says.

“We thought, ‘Okay, well, we want to have the same employee experience for everyone, so we're going to lean right into we're fully remote’ and we closed our physical office in May of 2024.”

Adopting the work-from-home approach still involves experimentation and improvement, Cook says, but they’ve built in “deliberate rhythms” to maintain connections among employees, such as a “reflect and connect” meeting on Fridays with the whole team along with in-person, quarterly meetings for the executive team, and regular off-site meetings for other groups.

And twice a year, Swift Medical plan to bring the whole company together for a “homecoming” to maintain those important connections, she says.

“Culture isn't built in the big moments, necessarily, it's the day-to-day, little things that happen. So, we have intentionally designed our org structure for that cross-functional collaboration.”

It’s also important to hire people who understand the remote work setup, and the asynchronous communication to get things done, says Cook.

“If people in the interview process are really valuing that in-person interaction above everything else, and that's really important to them, this environment, it won't set them up for success, it will fail every single time. So, we're really honest about that from day one.”

Building trust through flexible benefits

At the heart of Cook’s people strategy is a culture of trust and ownership, and that includes building a benefits program to reflect that, she says, citing as an example an unlimited vacation policy that is now called flexible time off.

The new policy bundles vacation, wellness and other types of leave into one flexible program.

“We want it to be flexible, because life doesn't happen in these neat, predictable packages… there needs to be flexibility for individuals,” says Cook. “We're looking at those individual circumstances rather than applying these blanket policies.”

And if there is misuse, these are addressed “individually, directly and respectfully with that individual,” she says, instead of being punitive to everybody in the organization.

“We really believe in treating people like adults, leading with empathy, and that way that they can show up in the best possible ways for themselves and for the business.”

Systems that drive clarity and performance

One of Cook’s current focus areas is strengthening leadership and operational clarity.

“We've had a lot of change throughout the years. We're finally at this moment of stabilization with a leadership team that's been in place and very engaged. So, we're seeing that traction start to happen,” she says.

Swift Medical has also implemented an entrepreneurial operating system, along with focusing on clear accountability structures to “improve meeting hygiene,” Cook says, highlighting the need to reduce unnecessary meetings and promote asynchronous communication.

To that end, Swift Medical also conducts quarterly “listening tours” — one-on-one conversations between Cook’s team and every employee.

“So, the organizational noise that we're hearing at the time, we'll base our questions around that,” she says, explaining how they use these conversations to address any “friction points” and ensure alignment.

From the chaos of the kitchens where she originally worked, Cook says she still driving towards helping people thrive.

“I can always say I got into the people business to make work better for people, and I stay because we really aren't fully there yet, but we're getting closer, so I have hope.”