Head of HR, South East Asia

Head of HR, South East Asia and India

Singapore | Confidential Search | Replacement role

The Organisation

Our client is a US-headquartered global technology leader operating at the heart of critical digital infrastructure. With a presence across more than 100 countries and a business built around the systems that keep the modern world running, this is a company in the middle of a significant and deliberate transformation. They are not digitising around the edges. They are rewiring how they operate, how they grow, and how they lead people across one of the most dynamic regions in the world.

The Role

The Head of HR, SEA and India is the senior people leader for the South East Asia region, based in Singapore. The role carries a dual reporting line to the President HR Asia and the President SEA, the regional business head. This structure is intentional. The person in this seat is expected to operate as a genuine business partner at the most senior level, not an HR function manager who attends leadership meetings.

The region spans Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Philippines, and India. It is a complex, multi-market environment with distinct labour dynamics, talent pools, and cultural operating conditions in each market. The role requires meaningful travel across these markets.

This is a critical hire at a critical moment. The business is mid-transformation and the HR leader for SEA needs to be the person who makes that transformation land — on the people side, on the capability side, and on the culture side.

What This Role Is Actually Being Asked To Do

Most HR leadership roles ask for someone to manage a function. This one asks for something different.

The incoming Head of HR needs to have a genuine point of view on digital adoption in the workforce, not as a concept, but as something they have personally driven. Proof of concepts introduced, adoption curves managed, resistance navigated. They need to know what it takes to bring a workforce through significant change and have done it before, in this region, at this level of complexity.

The business transformation team is already moving. The HR leader needs to be their most important partner in shaping how change is designed so that people can actually absorb it, not just be asked to comply with it.

Beyond transformation, the role carries full accountability across talent management, learning and capability development, retention strategy, and talent acquisition for the region. Attracting top talent into a high-performance technology environment, in a competitive market like Singapore, is not a passive brief. It requires an HR leader who thinks commercially and acts with urgency.

The Candidate

The right person for this role will have built their career at the intersection of HR leadership and business transformation. They will not be a generalist who has observed change programmes from the side. They will be someone who has been in the room where transformation decisions are made and shaped those decisions from the people perspective.

Specifically:

Strong and current experience across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and India is essential. These are not interchangeable markets and the candidate needs to understand each of them on their own terms.

Experience in high-technology, digital infrastructure, or transformation-stage businesses is strongly preferred. The operating environment here is fast, technically complex, and commercially demanding. HR leaders from traditional industries who have not worked in this context will find the adjustment significant.

A demonstrated track record of introducing and driving digital adoption across a workforce — including proof of concept work, stakeholder alignment, and measurable outcomes — is a core requirement, not a differentiator.

Experience as a true business partner to a transformation or change programme, where the HR leader was part of the design and not just the communications plan, is what separates the right candidate from a capable one.

Gravitas at the most senior level is non-negotiable. This person will sit with the regional President regularly. They need to be someone that business leaders seek out, not defer to out of politeness.

Manufacturing background is a must.

Compensation

Base salary SGD 300,000 | Performance bonus 40% of base | Full executive benefits package. Budget has limited room for negotiation.

Location

Singapore. Regular travel across SEA and India is an inherent part of the role.

This search is being managed by Axentia Global, a specialist executive search firm focusing on leadership roles across retail, supply chain, and industrial sectors. Axentia operates a retained, confidential search model — every approach is made directly by a senior partner. Qualified candidates are encouraged to apply in confidence. All enquiries are handled with full discretion.