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[ 10 ] HRO TODAY MAGAZINE | APRIL 2014 HRO Today Forum Preview Conversation Starter Our roundtable of experts answer our burning questions. By The Editors Following the success of last year's chief HR officers (CHRO) roundtable, a gathering of CHROs will be taking the stage at the HRO Today Forum to tackle the hottest topics in human capital management today. The conversation is bound to be highly interactive and engaging. To kick things off, we asked some of our speakers about the areas of HR that we see constantly making news—talent management, workforce demographics, technology, and strategic challenges. Something else come to mind? If so, email the questions you'd like to pose to this executive roundtable to Debbie.Bolla@SharedXpertise.com. We'll get them answered on stage at the HRO Today Forum. What is (are) the biggest challenge(s) HR faces today? John Murabito: The top two issues today for heads of HR in the United States are talent and healthcare. I am always concerned with being able to attract, retain, and develop talented workers to fill the needs of a growing organization. At Cigna, my challenge is that we are a growing company and have been for several years, so keeping up with the needs of key leadership positions is a challenge. We are developing new business here and globally and have new competencies in those areas. They are difficult to fill and hard to fill from within, so we can experience a scarcity of talent of key roles. As for healthcare, the costs continue to increase in almost every organization. We need to examine what's the right OUR EXPERTS MICHAEL PILNICK, executive vice president and head of human resources for First Advantage. Pilnick has a narrow focus on leveraging HR to aggressively grow revenue in existing, emerging, and unsaturated markets for the screening provider. JOE CABRAL, senior vice president and CHRO for North Shore-LIJ Health System. Cabral works to drive the firm's business objectives, vision, and values forward in all aspects of talent management and HR. JOHN MURABITO, executive vice president of human resources and services for Cigna Corporation. Murabito helps drive growth through effective human resources and people strategies, planning, staffing, talent management, and succession processes.