Laszlo Bock likely inspired countless business minds with his work at Google—including one of this year's HR's Rising Stars, Anthony Ormsbee-Hale, senior vice president of strategic operations at Civitas Senior Living. At the time, when Ormsbee-Hale stumbled upon a book by Bock in an airport bookstore about his work to innovate the tech giant's people operations, he was in a sales and marketing role at the senior living management company.

"I had an operations background, and I loved the idea of being able to create organizational strategy and help support leaders," he says. "That started me thinking, 'OK, this could be a potential career path.' "

As the Texas-based Civitas grew—the organization's operations now span several states, with 2,400 employees—Ormsbee-Hale got his chance to put his career aspirations into action, working alongside the CHRO to create and grow the business' people ops team.