Kelly Services Inc. (NASD: KELYA), one of the world’s largest staffing firms, promoted Laura Lockhart to VP, corporate controller and chief accounting officer, effective March 16.

Lockhart takes over the corporate controller and CAO responsibilities from Senior VP Olivier Thirot, who assumed the role of acting CFO upon the departure of Patricia Little, who stepped down as the company’s executive VP and CFO effective March 13 to join The Hershey Company.

Lockhart's responsibilities include corporate accounting, global forecast and budgets, finance systems and controls, as well as financial operations in Kelly’s EMEA and APAC operating regions. She will report to Thirot.

Lockhart joined Kelly Services in 2006 as senior director of finance systems and controls and in 2008 was promoted to VP of internal audit. In 2012, she was selected to lead Kelly’s pricing and global solutions finance teams.

Prior to Kelly, Lockhart was a division VP at Sears Holding Corp. Previously, she was with Borders Group as associate director of planning and reporting. She began her career as a senior financial auditor with PricewaterhouseCoopers.