On No­vem­ber 29, 2025, I had the ho­n­our of ad­dress­ing the Hu­man Re­source Man­age­ment As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (HRMATT) at its Lega­cy Awards—an event that re­mind­ed me of the ex­tra­or­di­nary pow­er of lead­er­ship to shape not just or­gan­i­sa­tions, but an en­tire na­tion’s fu­ture.

For me, this was more than a cel­e­bra­tion of ex­cel­lence; it was a call to ac­tion.

For 35 years, HRMATT has been a guid­ing force, in­flu­enc­ing work­place cul­ture and dri­ving progress across Trinidad and To­ba­go. To­day, as we stand at the cross­roads of glob­al trans­for­ma­tion, I see HR lead­er­ship not as a sup­port­ing role, but as the en­gine of na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment—the cat­a­lyst that will turn vi­sion in­to re­al­i­ty and chal­lenges in­to op­por­tu­ni­ties.

Why HR mat­ters to na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment

Our coun­try stands at a piv­otal junc­ture. For decades, we have re­lied heav­i­ly on the en­er­gy sec­tor—a source of wealth and op­por­tu­ni­ty, yes, but al­so a lim­i­ta­tion on our eco­nom­ic re­silience. Recog­nis­ing this, the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go re­cent­ly launched the Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print, a bold and com­pre­hen­sive strat­e­gy to di­ver­si­fy our econ­o­my and po­si­tion our twin-is­land state as a glob­al hub for busi­ness, health­care, tourism, ed­u­ca­tion, and emerg­ing in­dus­tries such as mar­itime ser­vices, re­new­able en­er­gy, and ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence.

But let us be clear: di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion is not mere­ly an eco­nom­ic ex­er­cise. It is fun­da­men­tal­ly a peo­ple project. We can­not build new in­dus­tries with­out build­ing new skills. We can­not ex­pand sec­tors with­out ex­pand­ing com­pe­ten­cies. We can­not cre­ate a mod­ern econ­o­my with yes­ter­day’s ca­pac­i­ty.

This is where HR pro­fes­sion­als come in. You are not pe­riph­er­al to this process—you are piv­otal. The poli­cies you de­sign, the tal­ent pipelines you build, and the cul­tures you shape will de­ter­mine whether our re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion suc­ceeds or stalls.

Work­force of to­mor­row

The glob­al land­scape is shift­ing at an un­prece­dent­ed pace. Dig­i­tal­i­sa­tion, au­toma­tion, and green tran­si­tions are re­defin­ing how we work and what work means. Ar­ti­fi­cial in­tel­li­gence, in par­tic­u­lar, is no longer a dis­tant con­cept—it is here, ac­tive and trans­for­ma­tive.

I urge you not to fear AI, but to har­ness it. Do not ask how it may re­place us; ask how it can aug­ment hu­man ca­pac­i­ty and cre­ate new op­por­tu­ni­ties. HR must lead this tran­si­tion by:

• ↓Build­ing dig­i­tal and AI lit­er­a­cy across the work­force

• ↓Im­ple­ment­ing learn­ing and reskilling frame­works

• ↓Reimag­in­ing per­for­mance man­age­ment and job de­sign

• ↓Cham­pi­oning com­pe­ten­cy-based re­cruit­ment and con­tin­u­ous de­vel­op­ment

• ↓En­sur­ing eq­ui­ty, in­clu­sion, and ac­cess as tech­nol­o­gy ad­vances

A fu­ture-ready work­force is not an op­tion—it is a ne­ces­si­ty. And build­ing that work­force re­quires vi­sion­ary HR lead­er­ship.

De­cent work: The non-ne­go­tiable prin­ci­ple

As we pur­sue in­no­va­tion and pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, we must re­main an­chored in a fun­da­men­tal truth: de­vel­op­ment must nev­er come at the ex­pense of dig­ni­ty. Di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion with­out de­cent work will not pro­duce the so­ci­ety we en­vi­sion. Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion with­out eq­ui­ty will not yield trans­for­ma­tion.

The In­ter­na­tion­al Labour Or­ga­ni­za­tion re­minds us that de­cent work is pro­duc­tive work. It is work that is safe and healthy, fair and eq­ui­table, and com­pen­sat­ed with a fair wage. Our work­force must not on­ly be skilled but re­spect­ed. Not on­ly pre­pared for mod­ern in­dus­try but pro­tect­ed with­in it.

As we ush­er in new sec­tors—dig­i­tal in­dus­tries, cre­ative econ­o­my ex­pan­sion, agri­cul­ture mod­erni­sa­tion—HR must en­sure that trans­for­ma­tion is peo­ple-cen­tred. That no work­er is left be­hind. That pros­per­i­ty is shared, up­ward mo­bil­i­ty is re­al, and fair­ness is mea­sur­able.

Lega­cy in mo­tion: From an­tic­i­pa­tion to ac­tion

The theme of this year’s awards, Lega­cy in Mo­tion, is more than a slo­gan. It is a chal­lenge, a call, a re­spon­si­bil­i­ty. For too long, we have re­peat­ed the same nar­ra­tive: change is com­ing, progress is near, trans­for­ma­tion is pos­si­ble. Tonight, I ask that we piv­ot from an­tic­i­pa­tion to ac­tion.

Let us reaf­firm our com­mit­ment to na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment. Let us work to­geth­er—Gov­ern­ment, pri­vate sec­tor, labour, ed­u­ca­tion, and you, our HR pro­fes­sion­als—as one ecosys­tem de­ter­mined to build the pro­duc­tive and in­no­v­a­tive work­force T&T needs.

A di­ver­si­fied econ­o­my re­quires a dig­ni­fied work­force. Pro­duc­tiv­i­ty must walk hand-in-hand with hu­man­i­ty. Growth must rise with fair­ness as its foun­da­tion.

Cel­e­brat­ing ex­cel­lence, build­ing for­ward

Your 35-year lega­cy is ev­i­dence of your com­mit­ment to this mis­sion. The ex­cel­lence rep­re­sent­ed in tonight’s awardees af­firms that we have the tal­ent, the pas­sion, and the ca­pa­bil­i­ty to shape the fu­ture we de­sire. But lega­cy is not on­ly what we cel­e­brate from the past—it is what we build for­ward.

As Min­is­ter of Labour, Small and Mi­cro En­ter­prise De­vel­op­ment, I pledge the Gov­ern­ment’s con­tin­ued sup­port for poli­cies that pro­mote de­cent work, skills de­vel­op­ment, and in­clu­sive growth. To­geth­er, we can en­sure that the re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion of T&T is not just eco­nom­ic, but so­cial—not just struc­tur­al, but hu­man.

May HRMATT and its mem­ber­ship con­tin­ue to lead with vi­sion and in­tegri­ty. May your lega­cy con­tin­ue to move us—bold­ly, con­fi­dent­ly, pur­pose­ful­ly—in­to a re­vi­talised T&T.

The Hu­man Re­source Man­age­ment As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T (HRMATT) is the lead­ing voice of the hu­man re­source pro­fes­sion lo­cal­ly. HRMATT Says is a col­umn meant to ad­dress is­sues and con­cerns of pro­fes­sion­als and the gen­er­al pub­lic fo­cused on hu­man cap­i­tal de­vel­op­ment. To­day’s ar­ti­cle is writ­ten by Min­is­ter of Labour, Small and Mi­cro En­ter­prise De­vel­op­ment Leroy Bap­tiste. Learn more about HRMATT by vis­it­ing our web­site: www.hrmatt.com. Fol­low us on Face­book, LinkedIn, In­sta­gram and Twit­ter. Con­tact us at: 687-5523 or via email: sec­re­tari­at@hrmatt.com