Debbie Venables

Senior Consultant, Let's Talk Talent

Debbie Venables is a Senior Consultant at Let’s Talk Talent, where she brings 30 years’ experience in HR and organisational development to every client engagement. She works with organisations across the UK, Europe and the Americas, with growing work in the Middle East, helping them get, keep and grow their best people through talent and performance management.

Debbie describes herself as a practitioner rather than a theorist. She draws on organisational psychology and coaching theory, but her focus is on building practical, usable tools that create measurable business impact.

What Debbie does at Let's Talk Talent

Debbie’s day-to-day work spans performance and talent management consulting, including competency and capability frameworks, coaching culture and learning strategy; change and organisational transformation; and leadership and management development.

Career highlights

More than 30 years in HR, talent, learning and organisational development across financial services, legal, healthcare, IT, mining and engineering, in South Africa, the UK, Europe and the Americas
Designed and rolled out an HR transactional centre that cut new-starter and leaver processing from 14 days to one day, delivering an externally audited saving within six months of launch, in a highly unionised environment with no industrial action
Led change management on a major systems and culture change programme in healthcare that a globally experienced CFO described as the best change management he had seen, for its focus on behaviour change alongside the system change; used play-based methods to test change readiness
Implemented a workplace assessment strategy recognising prior learning at a large South African retail bank, then led a sector-wide project to set workplace assessment guidelines across South African banking
Shortlisted at the North East HR&D Awards for a performance management redesign that embedded organisational values into the process and drove measurable improvements in engagement and results

Qualifications and accreditations

Bachelor of Commerce in Industrial Psychology (Industrial Psychology, Psychology and Business Management), University of Johannesburg
Brain-Based Coaching Certificate, NeuroLeadership Institute, delivered by Results Coaching Systems (ICF Level 1 accredited)
Certified Gallup Strengths Coach, Gallup
Business Trainer Certification, Points of You

Recognition, media and speaking

Panellist, World of Learning, London: building learning communities with purpose and impact, and supporting innovation through learning
Hosts Let’s Talk Talent webinars on change management strategy, using data and AI to make learning stick, and performance management and assessment strategy

Ask Debbie about

Areas of expertise: Change management, performance management and leadership development.

Outside work

Debbie is a wife and mum of two sporty teenage boys and has spent years volunteering in her local sporting community, from coordinating grassroots football events to serving on a swimming club committee, managing meet entries and announcing at the galas. She enjoys cooking, reading, travel and exploring history.