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Executive Leadership
Build. Scale. Deliver.
I have built and led a regional transformation business, from shaping the offer and winning clients to building the team and delivering the work.
Ahmed Assalih
Executive HR Transformation & AI Strategist
Business, HR, technology. Transformation that delivers.
For 25 years I have worked where these three worlds meet, across EMEA. That experience now shapes how I lead, advise, teach and write about transformation and AI.
- 25 years HR, technology and business
- MEA + Europe International leadership
- 22 countries, 50+ entities Multi-country transformation
- Business Unit builder From strategy to delivery
- Author & Professor The Death of Skills, 2026
One career. Four lenses.
My career has taken me from technology to HR, then into entrepreneurship, business leadership and teaching. I do not see those as separate careers. Each one changed the way I approach transformation.
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Strategic Transformation
Make complex transformation safer.
I work with leaders when an HR transformation needs clearer choices, stronger governance, or a practical way out of a difficult situation.
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HR Tech & AI
Understand what sits beneath the technology.
My relationship with HR technology started with implementation, interfaces and data. That background helps me challenge architecture and AI decisions from a business and HR point of view.
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Future of Work
Teaching and writing as a way of thinking.
Teaching and writing give me another way to work with what I have learned in the field. They also make me question some of the models HR has relied on for years.
Selected Impact
A few examples of what I have built and led.
Building an HR Transformation Business
At Sopra HR, I helped create a regional HR Transformation activity from the ground up. That meant deciding what we wanted to sell, building the team, developing client relationships, and making sure delivery followed through.
- Business Unit Built from the ground up
- Double-digit Annual growth
- ~25% Operating performance
Transforming Talent Across 22 Countries
One of the programmes I led brought more than 50 entities across 22 countries onto a shared Talent Management approach. The technical solution mattered, but so did the differences between organisations, cultures and local practice.
- 22 Countries
- 50+ Entities
- Multi-country Governance model
From HRIS Architecture to HR Leadership
I began at Royal Air Maroc on the systems side, leading HRIS implementation with developers and HR experts. Over time I moved into Talent, then into HR leadership for an organisation of more than 6,000 employees. That path still shapes how I look at HR technology.
- 10 Subsidiaries
- 5 + 20 Developers and HR experts
- 6,000+ Employees
My approach
The Logician-Engineer Method
When a transformation is struggling, my first instinct is to understand how the pieces connect before recommending another tool or another programme. I look at the data, the processes, the technology, the organisation and the people who will have to make it work.
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01
Diagnose
Where does the problem actually sit?
- Data
- Processes
- Organisation
- Technology
- Governance
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Architect
How should the pieces fit together?
- HR model
- Systems
- Data flows
- AI
- Operating model
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Make it live
Who has to use it, and can they?
- Governance
- Decision rights
- Change
- Capabilities
- Measurement
New book, 2026
The Death of Skills
What AI reveals about your talent, and what your skills are hiding from you.
For most of my career, HR systems have described people through jobs, competencies and skills. Those models have been useful. AI is making me question where their limits are.
The Death of Skills grew out of that question, and out of what I saw building and running talent systems in several countries.
Five frameworks from the book
- Potential Stack
- Time-to-Skill
- Fortress, Front Line, Laboratory
- Trajectory Radar
- Pay-for-Agility
Ideas & Insights
What I am thinking about at the moment: HR transformation, AI, and the way work is changing.
If AI Does the Junior Work, Who Will Build the Seniors?
The hidden talent challenge behind the AI productivity revolution
HR AI 2025: The Year Reality Hit Hard
The hype party of 2024 is over. 2025 was the year we had to clean up the mess. Here is the true story of our industry last year.
Beyond the Hype: Pragmatism is the Only Strategy
As we close 2025, the noise around AI has been deafening. I have spent the year auditing distressed HR tech projects and rescuing stalled...
I teach what I have practised.
I use the same material I work with during the week, drawn from programmes I have led rather than from commentary on trends.
Keynotes
AI, the future of work, skills and HR transformation
Executive education
Executive committees, CHRO teams and HR leadership
University
HR Master's programmes, HR Tech, AI and digital transformation
About Ahmed
Engineer. HR leader. Entrepreneur. Author.
I trained as an engineer at ENSEEIHT in Toulouse and started in 2001 at Royal Air Maroc, deploying HR Access across the group and around ten subsidiaries with a mixed team of developers and HR specialists. From there I moved into Talent and Recruiting, and then took over the HR department of a group of more than 6,000 employees.
In 2013 I left to build my own practice, founding Créative RH Consulting before joining Advyteam Group as Partner and General Manager for Morocco. Since 2017 I have led HR Transformation for Sopra HR Software across the MEA region.
I teach on HR Master's programmes now, speak internationally and write. My 2026 book, The Death of Skills, came out of questions I could not answer while running programmes.
Start a conversation
I am open to selected executive opportunities, strategic assignments, speaking and academic collaborations across EMEA. If any of that fits, write to me.
- Executive and leadership opportunities
- Strategic transformation and advisory
- Speaking and media
- Teaching and academic collaboration