Invest, Don't Exit: AXA GBS Bets on People for the Future

Amidst headlines filled with corporate restructurings and workforce reductions, AXA Global Business Services (AXA GBS) has been quietly taking a different approach: it’s deeply investing in its existing talent, focusing on their learning and long-term growth. 

Over the past two years, the organization has been executing a sweeping, skills-first transformation, mapping every employee to a role, identifying the skills and competencies they need, and charting a clear development path with personalized learning interventions for where they might go next. The results begin to tell a compelling story.

When Damanjit Singh Sidhu joined AXA GBS, he was working in procurement. He then transitioned to a Financial Planning and Analysis role despite having no previous experience, seizing the chance to develop new skills. This opportunity was made possible through I Own My Career, a key employee program. 

“AXA GBS provided the platform for me to explore new roles and gain new certifications, broadening my skills and opportunities,” Sidhu says.

A Different Kind of Transformation

Rather than relying on job titles as proxies for capability, AXA GBS has built a talent architecture where skills, from data analytics and AI to process automation and customer engagement, sit at the center of every talent decision.

"Skills are the currency of the future, and at AXA, we are committed to investing in them," says Isabelle Isnard, Chief Human Resources Officer at AXA GBS. She says their learning and development programs were designed to build academies aligned with evolving business needs and mapped to individual employees' aspirations. 

Isnard notes that employees from insurance operations are moving into business analyst roles, and that people from corporate functions are leading automation projects, emphasizing that this was at the heart of their “care” for their people.

The initiative, which began formally in 2024, operates under the banner of a Skills-Based Organization model, complemented by a flagship employee program called I Own My Career. Together, they aim to shift the focus of career ownership from the organization to the individual, with the organization providing tools, talent development through academies, career conversations, and structured individual development plans to make that ownership meaningful.

Another product of I Own My Career is Manali Rajwani. She initially worked as an IT PMO, immersed in numbers and spreadsheets. Today, she manages process and policy transformation, collaborating with global partners to advance their transformation initiatives. Manali also participated in an employee resource group called Change Agents, which led organizational transformation projects alongside leadership teams, which gave her a glimpse of the skills she needed to build for her career transition. 

“By building the right skills and having the right exposure, I transitioned from handling numbers and spreadsheets to shaping ideas and driving transformational strategies,” says Rajwani. 

The traditional definition of work has been redefined, with promotions and performance conversations driven by metrics that lack a correlation with business outcomes. 

AXA GBS revised its global promotion, rewards, recognition policies, and behavior compass (which outlines core behaviors and competencies customized for various roles and levels) to support the skills-based model, focusing on skills, expertise, and behaviors—a cultural shift aligned with business strategy.

The Architecture Behind the Ambition

The transformation hinges on two key pillars. A skills marketplace grants employees visibility into learning paths aligned with AXA GBS's priorities. For example, an insurance claims specialist can become a business analyst after skills assessment and upskilling through a dedicated academy. Currently, 12 employees are part of the BA (Business Analyst) Academy, with more expected. Plans include expanding academies for insurance expertise, testing centres of excellence, and cybersecurity.

Second, data-driven talent mapping has enabled the organization to identify where skill shortfalls exist across teams. Once identified, targeted training programs are deployed. The organization is positive about this, as it nurtures increased career mobility and a meaningful reduction in reliance on external hires.

Rather than a one-size-fits-all training calendar, employees receive recommendations tailored to their current skill profile and career aspirations. Real-time feedback loops have been built in to ensure programs remain relevant as business needs shift.

Anthony Gama, Lead – Strategic Workplace Planning at AXA GBS, explains that the impact includes shorter development cycles for new initiatives, greater operational flexibility, and, most importantly, a workforce that feels engaged rather than controlled. By implementing a system that maps every employee's skills, we gain both a broad and detailed understanding of the organization's current skill set.

A People-First Philosophy With a Business Case

There is a solid business reason for the softer story: hiring externally costs money, onboarding takes time, and institutional knowledge is lost when employees leave. Growing talent internally helps AXA GBS preserve its 30-year insurance legacy, reduce recruitment costs, and retain employees familiar with the company’s culture and operations.

Prashanthi Thorat, Senior Executive Vice President and Head of Insurance Operations Services and Corporate Functions Services at AXA GBS, shared an important insight. "Evolving one's career is not optional, it is essential to building capabilities that drive performance, resilience, and long-term value, for people and for the purpose we stand for as an organization," she explains.

"We understand that investments must be made in the right places, and we are choosing to invest in our people to help them evolve their careers, upskill or reskill, and provide opportunities to explore beyond the boundaries of traditional work."

With over 4,500 employees across India and Morocco supporting AXA in about 35 countries, the scale is significant. The organization must drive cultural change from the top while maintaining it at the manager and team level. With strong employee engagement, it invested in change agents to lead the transformation, educating them on industry change management principles.

Industry Recognition

In February 2026, AXA GBS was honored with the Workforce Transformation & Capability Building Award at the IFCCI HR Conclave & Awards in New Delhi, a recognition that spotlights organizations treating learning as a continuous, measurable cultural practice rather than an occasional intervention.

The award specifically recognizes efforts to future-proof workforces through redesigned roles, progressive skilling, and modern learning ecosystems, criteria that AXA GBS appears to have met across the board.

A Model Worth Watching

Whether the skills-first model can be sustained as AXA GBS scales into its second phase remains an open question. Embedding this kind of culture takes years, and the risk of it becoming performative, a branding exercise rather than a structural commitment, is real.

But for now, the organization offers a timely counterpoint to a dominant narrative that frames technology primarily as a displacer of human work. At AXA GBS, it is being used, at least in part, to do the opposite: to identify what people are capable of, show them what they could become, and invest accordingly.

In an era of mass redundancy announcements, that is, quietly, a radical act.