As a result, perhaps, Miller is a big fan of giving people the space to try and work things out for themselves, which also means learning from their mistakes. “We’re the type of company that encourages people to make mistakes – you don’t learn a tremendous amount when you’re told to do something by the letter,” she points out.

From California, Miller moved to New Jersey in a newly-created role running HR for four states. Here next step was to move to the company’s headquarters in St Louis, Missouri, where she was given responsibility for heading up the Canadian HR operation.

 

 

This was another newly created position and involved learning about international law and recruitment – experience that proved invaluable in her next role as head of HR for Europe. For four years, Miller handled European people matters from the US, before moving to the UK in 2003.

Luckily, migrating to this side of the Pond wasn’t too much of a culture shock, however, as she’d already spent a lot of time in the country for work purposes. And rather than stay in hotels during those visits, she’d stayed with co-workers, something that had given her a proper insight into living in the UK as a native rather than simply as a tourist.

Enterprise Rent-A-Car started its UK arm in 1996 and, since Miller has been with it, the subsidiary has seen double-digit growth year-on-year.

 

As a result, the European HR department is now 65-strong and recent acquisitions in France and Spain have expanded the firm’s European presence beyond its more traditional territories in the UK, Ireland and Germany.

But Miller prides herself on the fact that HR is very connected to the business: all of the company’s HR executives, who are graduates, are expected to gain a first-hand understanding of how the organisation operates.

 

There is also a culture of promoting from within, but the key to ensuring that this works is to hire the right graduates from the outset, she believes.

“If you have the right people on the front end who understand your values, then that’s where you build loyalty and people who contribute to the business because they understand that the company is not going to bring someone from outside to do the job they want,” Miller explains.

A lot of the organisation’s best ideas come from its new recruits and people are encouraged to challenge and question how the firm operates and what it does.

 

 

“We’re very much looking at doing things better and cheaper and we build that into the culture from day one in the inductions. It’s not a done-this-for-fifty-years-this-way kind of a company,” she says.

As for staff retention rates, these are a commendable 78%. Miller acknowledges that, as a sales-driven company, making money is the priority. This means that a key focus is on managing the bottom 10% of the workforce on a monthly basis and establishing, for example, whether activities such as training could help boost their performance.

 

But she also believes at the same time that there should be a healthy turnover of staff. “I wouldn’t want to see our retention rates go much about 80%. Then we would probably not be managing the poor performers,” Miller explains.

As well as managing staff turnover levels, HR executives are also expected to find a balance between their responsibilities in representing their employer and their role in representing employees. “It’s a fine line, because you have to respect both, but I get paid by the company not the employees,” Miller notes.

Such a stance can inevitably prove difficult when people want to talk in confidence, however. Therefore, it is about making sure they understand that confidences may have to be broken if they relate to something that could harm the business.

 

“It’s a fine line you walk in HR and it’s a difficult one and most people struggle with that. especially if you’re dealing with people who might be friends,” Miller concedes.

Another difficult area for HR to manage effectively is how best to weather recession. Enterprise Rent-A-Car for its part chose to introduce a pay freeze for a year, but still wanted to make it up to staff in other ways. As a result, it set up up a training programme.

 

“I think that was a wise decision, but often when you’re looking at the bottom line, training is something companies easily think they can cut out,” says Miller.

 

In order to gain buy-in, however, the company also gave staff a couple of options: either everyone would have to undergo a pay freeze or some people could get pay rises but others would have to be made redundant.

 

The pay freeze option won the day, but the firm was careful to ensure that everyone truly understood the reasons for the decision. “We decided as a company that we are going to ‘over-communicate’ this,” Miller points out.

As she has now been with Enterprise Rent-A-Car for 22 years, an obvious question is what is it at this point that still gets her out of bed in the mornings?

 

“I love the fact that every day is different, which is pretty amazing in 22 years, and more important are the people that I’m going to be with, and that’s because we have shared values based around customer service,” Miller says. “If you do not enjoy delighting customers, then you wouldn’t want to work here.”

The one thing that would keep her hiding under the bedclothes, however, is admin. “We open and close our books every month and, while I absolutely appreciate the information in the reports, I find it really difficult,” groans Miller. “It’s only 5% of the job, but it feels much more.”

But that 5% is more than compensated by the other 95%. “I could not imagine working anywhere else and I feel so fortunate,” she says. “I don’t think I know anyone in my group from school who’s in the same career or doing something that want to do.”

 

The secret however, she believes, is to find the career – and the company – that works for you.

 

“Younger people always say things like ‘I want to work in IT’ and think that should mean a Microsoft or Google, but you need to find a company that matches your values. If you find a company that does that, then you’ll be happy – HR is generally the keeper of those values,” Miller concludes.

 

And finally….

Who do you admire most and why?
My mother. She passed away when I was 19 and we were extremely close. Not a day goes by that I don’t see something funny that she would have enjoyed or remember a piece of advice she gave me or the values that she set me up with.

What’s your most hated buzzword?
“I’m a people person”. I hate that. Why not say ‘I like working with people’?

What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
My mother always told me: “Just worry about Donna and stop worrying about what everyone else is doing. Just put your head down and focus on yourself and do the best job you can.”

How do you relax?
Spending time with friends and going to the cinema.