Interview: Europe’s competitiveness is a strategic HR challenge

Bart does not take the easy route of saying that Europe simply regulates too much. He recognises that, for many companies, the cumulative weight of regulation and compliance has become a serious constraint. But in his view, the more important shift is not whether Europe should step back from protecting people, data, and markets. It is whether Europe can pursue those same objectives through methods that create less friction or delay speed, scale, and decision-making. 

“We need to be able to compete with the US, but also with how China is positioning itself,” he explains.

Europe, he says, remains a vast institutional and diverse but incoherent architecture: capable of setting direction and standards at scale, but often slower, more fragmented, and harder to align in execution. When the internal market lacks coherence and speed, organisations find it harder to grow across borders with confidence.

That is why, for Bart, the answer is not to lower ambition, but to remove unnecessary burden. Europe should remain committed to trust, protection, and high standards. But it needs to achieve those goals through regulation that is more coherent, more workable, and less administratively onerous. 

In that sense, the challenge is not deregulation as an end in itself but deregulating the burden rather than the ambition. This is where the competitiveness debate stops being political theory and becomes workplace reality.

Europe is having a competitiveness reckoning. Not as an abstract debate about “more or less regulation”, but as a practical question that will shape investment decisions, talent flows, and where companies choose to grow. How can we ensure Europe remains attractive to invest in, work in, and grow in?

Across the next 18–24 months, HR leaders will feel a cluster of EU developments that share one theme: Europe is modernising the “rules of work” for an economy shaped by transparency expectations, algorithmic management, and cross-border scaling. 

 

Pay Transparency Directive
First, pay transparency is moving remuneration from policy to proof. The directive pushes organisations to make their pay logic more objective, transparent and gender-neutral, from salary ranges and progression criteria to how differences are justified and disputes can be handled credibly. 

Few would contest the underlying objective. The growing resistance, reflected for example in the Swedish pushback and echoed by the VBO, concerns the risk that a legitimate principle is translated into a compliance model that is too rigid, too burdensome, and insufficiently aligned with business reality.

The deeper challenge, then, is not whether organisations support fairness, but whether they can embed it in a way that is workable, credible, and sustainable in practice. What was once handled through managerial judgement, legacy systems, or implicit norms now has to be translated into clearer frameworks, stronger documentation, and more consistent decision-making. Bart captures the strategic point sharply: “This shouldn’t be viewed as a reporting exercise, but as being an attractive employer that can bind people.”

EU AI Act
Second, AI is moving from experimentation to governance in HR. Many people-facing AI applications fall under higher scrutiny because they impact opportunities and rights and require robust privacy and security safeguards. The practical implication is that HR can’t treat AI as a convenient productivity layer; it becomes a leadership responsibility with accountability, human oversight, and the ability to defend decisions. “Just because something is possible doesn’t mean you’re allowed to do it.” Bart explains

Platform work directive
Third, the platform work directive signals a broader trend: worker classification and algorithmic management are becoming regulated not just through employment law, but through the way systems allocate work, monitor performance, and shape outcomes. Even organisations that are not “platforms” should read it as a direction of travel. The underlying logic is simple: “We start from the principle someone is presumed to be an employee, unless the platform proves otherwise.” 

Worker voice and workability
Fourth, “workability” and worker voice are becoming more structured. Topics like the right to disconnect, remote work frameworks, and European Works Council rules aren’t headline-grabbing, but they reshape how organisations coordinate work, consult employees, and make decisions in a modern operating model. The message is less about slogans and more about specificity: “Policies must be concrete.” 

CSDDD (and Omnibus)
Finally, sustainability due diligence (CSDDD) is evolving into a realism test for Europe’s regulatory approach. The original intent, stronger responsibility for human rights and labour conditions across supply chains, remains important, but Europe is also responding to the criticism that requirements became too heavy and operationally difficult. “Europe has moved with the call from the economic sector to soften it.” Bart explains.

Taken together, these signals point to a consistent direction: Europe wants modern safeguards that are workable at scale. HR is where that ambition becomes either a strategic advantage or painfully bureaucratic.

If Europe’s attractiveness depends on balancing speed and trust, HR leaders have more agency than they think.  The most practical next step is not to build a perfect static model, but an HR operating system that can absorb policy change without constant reinvention.

In a world of geopolitical pressure, cost volatility, and shifting expectations, change should be treated as a constant. HR should be supporting employees throughout these changes. That means reducing unnecessary administration where possible, building flexibility into processes, and making sure compliance supports decisions instead of slowing them down.

1) Make pay strategy a driver of attractiveness and retention

Pay transparency should not be treated primarily as a disclosure requirement, but as a chance to build a more ambitious, forward-looking remuneration strategy. Organisations that bring greater clarity, consistency, and credibility to pay — and link it more explicitly to talent, performance, and growth — will be better placed to attract people, retain them, and strengthen trust in the employment relationship

2) Treat AI in HR as governance, not tooling
Map where AI touches people decisions, build human oversight, define how outcomes can be challenged, and set clear red lines. This is not just about compliance. It is about making sure innovation remains workable, explainable, and aligned with the values the organisation wants to uphold.

3) Build cross-border repeatability where possible
Even without full harmonisation, organisations can standardise internal definitions, workflows, and data structures, reducing friction when rules change. That not only lowers administrative workload, but also creates more flexibility to respond faster when business conditions shift.

4) Make “workability” concrete
Remote work, the right to disconnect, and consultation processes should be defined through clear operational guidelines, not informal norms.. The goal is not to create more policy for its own sake, but to build frameworks that are clear enough to protect people and flexible enough to work in practice.

5) Treat change as a structural condition, not a temporary disruption

HR should start from the premise that change is the rule, not the exception. Between regulatory reform, geopolitical shocks, energy uncertainty, and ongoing pressure on labour cost, adaptability has become part of the baseline. The stronger organisations will be those that simplify where they can, preserve room for operational flexibility, and avoid rebuilding their HR model from scratch every time the context shifts.