Phoebe Hetherington

Phee began her career through Auckland Council’s People and Culture Graduate Programme after completing a Bachelor of Commerce and Psychology, followed by a Masters in Human Rights. The programme gave her broad exposure across advisory, employment relations, remuneration, and business partnering within complex public sector environments. She later moved to London and spent six years at Publicis Groupe, progressing from HR Advisor to Senior HR Business Partner across four agencies in the PR, creative, and sustainability space. During this time, she partnered closely with leadership teams on workforce planning, organisational design, recruitment, leadership capability, diversity and inclusion, and performance frameworks. Since returning to New Zealand, Phee has supported Humankind clients including Oxygen Advisors and Caruso, helping growing businesses strengthen leadership capability, recruitment strategy, organisational clarity, and performance frameworks.

Phee is known for her calm, empathetic, and highly relational approach. She builds strong trusted relationships quickly and helps leaders focus on the work that will create the greatest impact. Clients value her ability to balance employee experience with commercial priorities, creating practical people solutions that support both performance and culture.

One of Phee’s proudest achievements was leading a neurodiversity and inclusion programme across multiple Publicis Groupe agencies in the UK. The work redesigned recruitment, onboarding, and workplace practices to better support neurodivergent employees and was later adopted more broadly across the wider group. She is also passionate about helping growing businesses create stronger foundations for leadership, capability, and long-term performance.

Collaborative, thoughtful, and commercially grounded, Phee works closely alongside leaders to create meaningful and sustainable change. She brings a people-first mindset while staying focused on clarity, impact, and organisational performance.