Why HR Has to Know the Business First | Phillip Burke, Pike

On this episode of Building People, Companies, and Careers, AccruePartners host Amy Pack sits down with Phillip Burke, SVP of Human Resources at Pike Corporation. Phillip started as an hourly trainee at Walmart, spent about 15 years in store operations, and has since led HR for frontline workforces at Walmart, Belk, and now Pike, where most of the company's roughly 12,000 employees work in the field. He shares why HR leaders need to be business people first, how HR earns its seat at the table, and where he draws the line on using AI in hiring.

• HR leaders need to be business people first, with a working understanding of the P&L, how revenue is generated, and how the operating model runs.

• HR earns its seat at the strategy table by executing operational work like payroll, benefits, and employee questions exceptionally well.

• A new leader should resist the urge to change everything at once and first ask why the organization works the way it does today.

• At the senior level, skills are table stakes, so hiring should focus on leadership, agility, and the ability to grow into what the role will become.

• AI can reduce friction in areas like everyday inquiries, job descriptions, and compensation benchmarking, but hiring decisions should stay with people.

• Apprenticeships and on-the-job training can build long-term careers, and many of Pike's safety leaders started in line work.

• If HR is not enabling the business and removing barriers to growth, it is not doing its job.

Amy: Today we're joined by Phillip Burke, SVP of HR at Pike. Phillip recently stepped into the role after a long run leading HR at both Belk and Walmart. Welcome, Phillip.

Phillip: Good morning, Amy. It's great to be here.

Amy: For listeners who may not know your path, give us a quick snapshot of your career and how you landed in HR.

Phillip: I started out in store operations with Walmart as an hourly trainee, then moved up to assistant manager, co-manager, store manager, and market manager. I was given the opportunity to move to Bentonville as an operations coordinator, where I worked on some HR-related projects. In the mid-2000s, the company was working on board initiatives, and a few operations people were handpicked to come into HR and make sure the work would actually function in the field. That's how I got my start in HR.

Amy: So you bring the perspective of what the frontline worker really experiences. Belk was like that, and now the majority of Pike's workforce is frontline, too.

Phillip: That's probably what's unique about my career. I have about 15 years of operations experience, and in HR I've done nothing but support frontline workers. That includes Walmart's 2.5 million employees globally, Belk's frontline employees in stores and distribution centers, and now Pike, which is a very blue-collar company with men and women on the front lines helping keep the power on.

Amy: Where did you start as a frontline worker?

Phillip: As an hourly trainee in store 1165 in Radcliff, Kentucky, which is right next to Fort Knox. I moved through several stores after that before landing a store manager job at 25 in Coshocton, Ohio. It was quite a ride.

Amy: Not every HR leader can tell the story of starting on the front line and working into corporate HR operations.

Phillip: It helps ground you. The key for me is that you have to understand the business. HR has evolved, and I think you have to be a business person first and an HR person second, while keeping the human side in there. Seeking to understand what the business is all about is critical in today's world.

Amy: You always hear that new leaders should get out to the field to see what people are doing. You came from the field, so that comes naturally to you.

Phillip: Pike is a little different because I'm new to the industry. I'm happy to go climb poles if that's what the company needs, but I have spent time in the field trying to understand our business. It's a very complicated, unique business, and I like to say it's life or death because it's a very dangerous industry. The safety of our employees is the most critical thing we do, and making sure those folks get home to their families every night matters. Our people take safety very personally, because it is personal.

Amy: How many people do you have in the field?

Phillip: Pike has about 12,000 employees in total. Counting the engineering group, about 11,000 of them are field-based or work on projects in the field.

Amy: What were some of the defining moments that shaped how you operate as a people leader?

Phillip: Throughout my career, I've worked in the field or supported field-facing employees. Leading people is in my DNA. But I think everyone comes to a few crossroads where they have to make a decision. For me there were three or four. Leaving the field for the corporate office was one. Leaving Walmart, moving to Charlotte, and joining Belk was another. Belk is a fantastic organization that's been around for 137 years, and I had a great run there. Deciding last fall to leave Belk and move to Pike was also a career-defining moment. You can stay on the path you're on, and that isn't wrong, but we all reach points where we have to decide whether to stay or go a different way.

Amy: And each one offered something different. Walmart is publicly traded. Belk was a family business when you started, then it was sold to private equity. Pike was family-owned, then went to private equity.

Phillip: In my last job at Walmart, I was VP of global HR operations. I led HR technology and helped stand up shared services and HR processes globally, so I got to learn the cultures of many of the countries where Walmart operated. Then I spent seven or eight years at Belk working with private equity, and Pike is owned by private equity now as well. It all built on itself and landed me where I am today.

Amy: You also have a lot of total rewards, compensation, and benefits experience, which is unusual. HR leaders usually take either the generalist path or the total rewards path. How did you merge the two?

Phillip: Honestly, I knew nothing about compensation or benefits until I was given the opportunity to lead a compensation and benefits team. I had great leaders at Belk who challenged me to learn it and lead it. With my background in operations, HRIS, and HR shared services, I learned a lot at Belk about total rewards. I know a little about all of it, but I certainly don't know everything, and the team at Pike is teaching me how this works in the construction and energy sector.

Amy: Had you not left Walmart, you probably wouldn't have had that opportunity because the organization was so big.

Phillip: That's a fact. If I'd stayed, I probably would have hit my plateau there. It's a great company, but internally you know when it's time to go. There's only so far a leader can take an organization, so part of it is knowing when to say when, feeling good about moving on, and leaving things better than you found them.

Amy: You're early enough in this role that you're still assessing things. When you step into a new organization, how do you evaluate the teams, culture, processes, and platforms, and what are you listening for?

Phillip: First, you have to resist the temptation to change everything at once. It's easy to walk into an organization and say that's wrong, that's wrong, that's wrong, and I'm guilty of that to some degree. What's harder is pausing to ask why we're doing it the way we're doing it today. Once you seek to understand how you got there, you can shape how to move forward. I'm not evaluating how the organization was built or thinking about how I would have built it. I'm trying to understand, from both leaders and employees, how we got here.

You can see a structure, but that isn't the full story. It's about getting to know the people behind the scenes who are carrying the weight and driving the organization forward. Once you find those folks, you understand the inner workings of the company and who the potential leaders are.

Amy: You see who has the potential, the capacity, and the curiosity.

Phillip: Absolutely. The people at Pike are so intellectually curious. They don't just want to know what we're doing. They want to know why. When you have an organization asking the right questions about what we're doing, why we're doing it, and how we'll get it done, that's the difference between good and great.

Amy: HR carries two jobs at once: the operational backbone the company depends on and the strategic work of shaping where the business is going. Technology is also changing how jobs are done every day. How do you define the role of HR today, and how do you balance the two?

Phillip: In a lot of cases you could see those two competing, but I don't see it that way at all. I'm looking for a 50/50 split. HR is somewhat transactional by nature, including payroll, benefits administration, and answering employees' day-to-day questions. If you don't get those right, you don't earn the right to a seat at the table to help shape strategy. So the goal is to do the operational things exceptionally well, which gives you the opportunity to help shape where the organization is going.

Amy: Many HR leaders want a seat at the table but don't always have one.

Phillip: You have to earn it.

Amy: It's also interesting when we're working searches and the HR position doesn't have a seat at the table, but the company wants someone capable of sitting there without necessarily knowing what that looks like.

Phillip: It cuts both ways, so be careful what you ask for. What I've learned is that people often don't know what they don't know, and that includes me. It's a fine balance, like threading a needle. You have to execute flawlessly while also generating the strategic thought leadership that moves the organization forward.

Amy: Much of your workforce builds careers through experience and training rather than a traditiBuilding Career Paths for a Frontline Workforceonal path, which was your story, too. What does it take to build real career paths in an organization like that, and why does it matter to the business?

Phillip: That's probably what differentiates Pike, and it's similar to Walmart in a lot of ways. When I was at Walmart, about 74% of management started out as hourly employees, which is a phenomenal number. Pike is very similar. College degrees are important, and we have many employees who have one, but at Pike careers are built through hours of apprenticeships and on-the-job training, along with our learning and leadership academies. It's not just a job. People are building long-lasting careers, and we have employees who have been with us 40 or 50 years. You can start as a ground person and work your way up to area supervisor, operations VP, or whatever you want to do.

Amy: You mentioned safety and the risk in the field. Do people move from the field into your safety team?

Phillip: They do. My boss, James, also runs safety. Our QEPs are the safety people on the ground working with our linemen, foremen, and general foremen. They inspect the work and handle job hazard reports every day, and the vast majority of them started in line work. If you want someone who is safety conscious, they have to understand what goes into the work, so it's a natural career progression.

Amy: At the SVP and enterprise level, what's changed about what you look for when building your own team compared to earlier in your career?

Phillip: Early in my career, as an assistant manager or store manager, I was screening for whether someone could do the job. Did they have the skills and competencies to execute against the priorities? At my level now, I have to assume they already have that.

Amy: It's table stakes.

Phillip: So I don't spend much time on it. I spend time on what kind of leader they are. Are they going to build a team? Do they have a vision and the ability to bring people together to build something great? What's changed most is the importance of learning speed. With AI, things are changing so fast that the question isn't only whether someone can do the job today. It's what the job will look like three or five years from now and whether they can evolve into it. I'm looking for agility and for people who can bring employees together.

Amy: That makes complete sense. We provide an interview prep guide for candidates, and we recently released a client interview prep guide to help hiring leaders interview for the subjective skills. The skill set is table stakes, but they don't always know which questions reveal curiosity, adaptability, and flexibility. The fundamentals of a job will still be there in two or three years, but how it's done may look very different.

Phillip: You're spot on, and that's exactly how I look at it. Skills and competencies are changing so fast that it's more about the ability to learn, adapt, and grow into future roles. I hate using HR terms like lifelong learner, but in today's world I learn something every hour, and you have to adapt as the needs change.

Amy: AI is moving quickly and affecting hiring, workforce planning, and employee experience. How are you thinking about where it earns its place in HR?

Phillip: I'm trying to be very thoughtful, because it's a very powerful addition to the workforce. I use tools like Claude, and it's almost like having another employee or two working for me. What I'm asking is where it reduces friction for our people and our company. Today it's helping with everyday questions, and we're using it to help rewrite job descriptions. That doesn't replace the human touch. You have to keep a human in the loop, because AI still doesn't know what it doesn't know. Compensation is a big emerging area, where AI can pull market data together for the jobs you're pricing and return a minimum, midpoint, and maximum.

Where I don't want my team using it is anywhere a human should make the decision. I don't want it used in hiring decisions, and I'm even reluctant to have it review job applications. Those are moments where one human is evaluating another, and that human touch needs to stay. I also don't want it making decisions that I, my VPs, or my directors should be making, particularly around hiring and coaching. Balanced the right way, it's a phenomenal tool, but there are places where we're not going.

Amy: It can hallucinate, and you don't need that in your hiring decisions.

Phillip: That's correct. Hiring is hard enough as it is.

Amy: As you look ahead, how do you see the HR function evolving, and what capabilities will define the next generation of people leaders?

Phillip: I tell my team you have to be a business person first. If you don't understand the P&L and how revenue is generated, how can you support and enable the business? At Pike, I'm focused on helping our team become more fluent in the business and more comfortable with the data, the P&L, and the operating models. That's where your own skills and human judgment come in to empower the business. A lot has changed in the last 20 years, especially since COVID. HR is now seen in many cases as a business enabler, so the key is to understand what drives and powers the business, no pun intended.

Amy: Do you have anyone who has gone from the field into HR?

Phillip: One of my VPs, Mitch Hardy, spent about 14 or 15 years in the field. It's been a great fit. He brings a business perspective to HR and helps us look at problems the way the business does. Molly, another VP, started in benefits and worked her way up. I appreciate the value both of them bring to the organization.

Amy: If someone wanted to pursue a career in HR, what's the one piece of advice you'd give them?

Phillip: Get as close to the business as possible. Don't sit behind a desk trying to learn HR. Learn the business first. At Pike, that means learning what our engineers do, what our construction division does, and what Pike Electric, Power Contracting, and Burford's do. If you understand the business, you can bring real value back to the organization, and that gives HR more credibility. If you can sit down with business leaders and talk business, you've accomplished something.

Amy: You're the second leader I've talked to who started on the front line, and both of you said it's not the technical part of the job that matters most. It's the business part.

Phillip: I agree. I have two sons in the workforce, and the advice is the same: if you know the business, we can teach you the technical components of HR or finance. Knowing the business makes it easier to grow your career in whatever direction you choose.

Amy: Because you know the business, you look for ways to say yes and find solutions. Our clients often tell us they need an HR leader who is solutions-oriented and understands the business, and that's what you bring.

Phillip: If you are not enabling, empowering, and removing barriers so the business can grow, you're not doing your job. HR can be the engine that pays people, offers great benefits, and handles career pathing and succession planning, but at the end of the day we're here to drive the business. Over the last several years, every company I talk to wants leaders in every function who know the business and can help grow it.

Amy: What was your first real career lesson?

Phillip: My first store, store 1937 in Coshocton, Ohio. It's the only job I've ever left where I cried when I left. My boys were born there, and the people in that store helped me raise them. I came in at 25, thumping my chest and thinking I had it all figured out. The store was already really good, but I wanted it to be great. I quickly realized I wasn't the one in charge. They were. They were patient with me and taught me the real business of running a store, along with how to engage with people, meet them where they are, and understand what's going on in their lives. The store had about 250 to 300 associates, and they taught me how to be humble, how to learn, and how to lead.

Amy: What's one quote you're known for?

Phillip: Probably the biggest one right now is "Don't get bitter, get better." My team knows I say it all the time. There's more to it than the words, though. It's easy to get pushed and feel sorry for yourself, and I've been there. The key is to stand up, treat it as a learning experience, and if you're going to fail, fail forward so you don't keep making the same mistake.

Amy: What's the best piece of career advice you ever received?

Phillip: It came from Don Swann, one of my favorite leaders of all time, who is now retired. I was a store manager in Weirton, West Virginia, and wanted to be a market manager. Within a couple of weeks of agreeing to it, he brought me to Columbus, Ohio. On his first tour with me, we started at 7:30 in the morning and went until 9:30 or 10:00 at night without eating and barely taking breaks. He walked every aisle, every category, and every four-foot section, and he pointed out everything as if I'd been there six years instead of six minutes. At the end of the night, he asked if I was hungry and said, "Lesson learned for you today, young man, is learning isn't always fun." He taught me that market managers are running businesses, often over a billion dollars a year in revenue, not just stores.

Amy: What's your favorite lunch spot?

Phillip: For lunch, I go all over Uptown. My favorite restaurant in Charlotte is Osteria Lucca in Park Road Shopping Center. My wife, Jessica, and I go there almost every Friday night and sit at the bar. We know the staff, the atmosphere is great, and the food and service are always on point.

Amy: Phillip, it's been a pleasure. I thought I knew a lot about your career journey, and I learned even more today.

Phillip: It's been a ride, and I'm very grateful for all the people who have worked with me, pushed me, and mentored me along the way. As I head toward the later years of my career, I'm trying to pay it forward. Helen Walton said it best: it's not what you gather in life, it's what you scatter. I want to spend these years supporting Pike, our leadership team, and our HR employees. I also want to thank AccruePartners. We do quite a bit of business together, and I love the relationship we have with Amy and the team.

Amy: Thank you. I always say it takes two to tango.

How does HR earn a seat at the strategy table? 

Phillip Burke says HR earns it by executing operational work like payroll, benefits administration, and employee questions exceptionally well. He aims for a 50/50 balance between transactional excellence and strategic work.

What should a new HR leader do in their first months?

Phillip recommends resisting the urge to change everything at once. He focuses on understanding why the organization works the way it does and identifying the people who are carrying the weight and driving it forward.

What do senior leaders look for when hiring for leadership roles? 

At the senior level, Phillip treats skills as table stakes. He looks for leaders who can build teams, adapt quickly, and grow into what the role will look like three to five years from now.

How should HR teams use AI? 

Phillip uses AI to reduce friction in areas like everyday inquiries, job descriptions, and compensation benchmarking, always with a human in the loop. He does not want AI making hiring decisions or decisions his leaders should own.

What is the best advice for someone pursuing a career in HR? 

Get as close to the business as possible. Phillip believes HR professionals who understand the P&L and how the business operates bring more value and earn more credibility with business leaders.

Phillip Burke is the SVP of Human Resources at Pike Corporation. He spent about 15 years in Walmart store operations before moving into HR, where he has led HR operations, technology, and total rewards for frontline workforces at Walmart, Belk, and Pike.

Building People, Companies, and Careers is produced by AccruePartners, the Carolinas' leading talent advisory and workforce solutions firm. Hosted by AccruePartners Co-Founder Amy Pack, each episode features business leaders sharing insights on leadership, talent strategy, and career growth.

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