As we usher in the New Year, HR will continue to evolve, here are a few trends that will take centre stage in this new year.
Investing in Talent: The search for the right talent will continue to transform in 2019. As an organization is set to take on new goals, it has to deal with various inevitable external changes and in such a scenario, a good team can make all the difference. With globalization, opening of economies, technology driving the core of every business, employees have to be ahead of the curve and employees have to keep re-inventing themselves to keep up with the fast-paced business environment. For talent to be nurtured, an organization has to create a conducive ecosystem for learning and growth and invest in a manner, that will help harness the potential of its people. Some of the key pillars to building and investing in talent are:
- Empower through learning: Learning can never stop, whether at a junior level or at a senior management level. Learning and development programs have to be designed such that, both an individual and organization grow. Online training and mobile-based modules have seen a high success rate. Organizations that have recently implemented such modules have hugely benefitted from these learning programmes.
- Build a Happier Workforce: Organizations are today investing in ‘Employee Happiness’, an attribute that can go a long way in creating an effective and productive organization. There are various ways and means to create a happy workforce. Studies have shown that happy employees are more aligned to the company’s objectives and add immense value to the growth of the company. Needless to state, happy employees prove to have a high retention rate and develop a strong sense of ownership of the organization. The role of HR is to continuously listen to employees, their needs, their aspirations, their impediments and understand what will help employees co-create. It is equally important to create a measurement framework that will help improvise employees’ happiness and calibrate the interventions.
- Wellness: Employee wellness will take a new dimension in the coming year. Here the aim is to ensure a healthy and fit workforce. Time and again, research has proved that when employees are healthy, they deliver better, are more efficient and definitely more productive. Football tournaments and other sports inculcate a culture of health and well-being. Besides Yoga, mindfulness sessions, nutrition counselling sessions are also a part of various organizations’ wellness program.
Bracing for Diversity: Diversity at the workplace will continue to be an important consideration even in 2019. Millennials are a new breed of talent that most of the times find it very difficult to blend in with the non- millennial set. Setting the platform for freedom, empowerment with discipline and responsibility will be crucial. Also, as businesses continue to expand across various geographies, HR has to ensure that the diverse socio – economic, cultural aspect of the employees are seamlessly integrated within an organization.
Technology: Hiring will largely be driven by technology, recruitments through Artificial Intelligence will soon catch up. This, to a large extent will help reduce bias and make the recruitment process faster and far more effective. Data from social media platforms will be increasingly used to profile candidates and to understand their cultural fit to an organization. Most employee services will soon be driven by technology. We are already seeing ‘chatbots’ servicing employees. Creating ‘digital aware’ workforce will be a key imperative for HR in the near future.