Recently Bersin & Associates, a world-class consulting and industry research organization completed a two year study evaluating over 720 organizations to determine high impact HR practices. My article is going to provide you with a few of the findings of their survey, as well as examples of high performing organizations that implement these practices. But before we get there, I want to highlight one of the more interesting comments made in the press release regarding the report:
“This research clearly shows that the days of bloated HR organizations focused on administrative tasks are over. The research also determined that the decades-old “HR generalist” model is no longer effective unless these individuals are highly trained and connected to senior business leaders. The key competencies that drive results today are familiarity with integrated talent management, understanding of workforce planning, and comfort with social networking and HR technology. ”
To me, this really highlights the big changes that need to occur in most HR departments. Entirely new skillsets, and an increase in hard skills are going to be required. I would even suggest older HR generalists look at Jack Welch’s concept of reverse mentoring. The began when Jack Welch, CEO of General Electric, realized he and his management team needed to learn about the Internet and technology applications. Welch required his 600 top executives, including himself, to find younger mentors who were knowledgeable about the internet. Most of the mentors were in their 20’s and 30’s. Younger HR staff are likely to be very comfortable using the new technologies, and can pass along their knowledge to the older staff. This, of course, is also an excellent opportunity for the experienced staff to mentor the new.
High Impact HR Practices:
| Factor | Description | Example Organizations |
| Strategic Business Partner Roles | Companies that empower key HR professionals to take on a “strategic business partner” role create HR teams that outperform the average HR organization by 25 percent or more. Such companies typically outsource HR administrative functions and realign their HR business partners to work with line executives on hiring, coaching, leadership and collaboration. | in the late 90’s Xerox began utilizing HR as a strategic business partner, eventually culminating in VP of HR, Anne Mulcahy, becoming CEO. Under Mulcahy Xerox went from losing $297 million, to making $91 million in 3 years. This is a great example of a company who values HR, and has an HR team with business sense. |
| Advanced HR Skills | Most HR organizations are poorly prepared for the future: they are not fully familiar with social networking, new career models, global recruiting and leadership, or enterprise change management. As a result, HR organizations that focus heavily on more advanced internal HR skills outperform those that do not. | First seen in high tech companies, these practices have spread to other companies with increasing success. NASA has dual career ladders, PwC has partnered with LinkedIN to help develop and attract talent, and Motorola recently undertook a major IT upgrade to better support an increased focus on global recruiting. |
| Knowledge Transfer / Sharing, Knowledge Networks | HR’s strategic ownership of knowledge-sharing, collaboration and social networking drives greater business impact than many traditional HR strategies. Companies that focus on these modern tools for empowerment are delivering twice the business improvement of those that focus on traditional HR strategies such as pay-for-performance or new HR information management systems. | IBM is well known for recent initiatives to improve its culture, challenge its legacy of top-down control, improve insights from engineers and executives all over the world. The most incredible example of this was an experience lead by executives and HR – an innovation jam. This is one of the most incredible examples of collaboration, and using modern technologies to generate value. |
| Workforce Planning | Engaging in the leading-edge practice of workforce planning, including enterprise forecasting and skills-gap scenario planning, is one of the greatest drivers of business results. For example, companies that excel in workforce planning drive four times the value of those who focus on the consolidation of HR technology systems. | Valero Energy Corp. built its own workforce planning system, evaluating large amounts of data that included details of corporate staffing, demographic, and business trends. The system was used to predict refinery staffing, specifically key positions (engineers). What it found was an critical, the model predicted that a serious shortage in critical positions starting in 2007 and continuing at least to 2010. After presenting the results to a board of executives Valero launched a program aimed at filling the talent gap, including a 400% increase in the corporation’s college internship program for engineers. |
Lastly, while these skills above are high impact, your department still needs to excel at traditional transactional processes (even if outsourced, quality control is key).
So, if you are interested in improving your organization’s HR function and preparing for the future, I would certainly suggest Bersin & Associates new study.
Is your organization using any of these practices? If so, and you would like to be profiled here please let me know.
Tyler Totman
Twitter: @FAPhoenix