The One Thing #13: Be strategic partners

The days of traditional banking are gone. The days of building your product and people breaking down your door to buy it are gone and the days of HR being non-strategic are gone.

In 2014, many markets will finally be recovering from the recession and assuming parts of Europe does not fall into deflation, (which is a real threat and if it happens, it will stall the recovery as it did for Japan), then many businesses across the world will start 2014 optimistically. Instead of discussing controlling costs, managing working capital and hiring freezes, discussions will be about growth and new opportunities.

Coming out of the recession, businesses will be leaner, fitter and more agile. They will be looking to do more with less. Enter HR. HR will need to partner the businesses to fuel the growth. They can no longer wait for the businesses to submit their plans and then respond reactively; they must become the businesses “Strategic Partners”. The demand on HR is to play a more active and value-adding role.

The crises over the last few years was the catalyst for this transition. In leading companies, many HR teams were already practicing this relationship with the business lines. The crises have increased this best practice as it is a logical move to collaborate with the businesses in planning and executing plans. It is a win-win for everyone.

The challenge for HR teams is that this requires a paradigm shift and openness to change that is often absent. The crises has placed pressure on HR teams to change as leaders demanded more from everyone and this is a clear area of opportunity.

Collaborating with the plans for each business means HR must practice a strong business acumen. For some this is not issue as they have been partnering the business for years. Jardine Matheson Group out of Hong Kong is a good example of this where Ritchie Bent, Group Head of Human Resources, Department is held in high esteem. He reports directly to the Group’s MD (“Taipan”) and HR’s core purpose is to provide the Holding Company and business units with strategic HRM support to help them grow larger, more effective and profitable operations. Acquiring the business acumen takes time and patience and HR must become the student before becoming the strategic partner in many cases. Once they do, they can then partner the businesses in developing the plans.

But HR’s role does not stop there. They must also support the execution of the plans in 2014.

HR as a strategic partner, has a unique view and position across each line of business and is a neutral, in other words, not an internal threat. This places a new requirement on HR to understand the challenges of implementation and specifically how people engagement is critical to the execution.

Only when HR is able to bring a voice to the development of the plans and an additional pair of hands to the implementation will they be considered strategic partners. After all is not HR who announces it is now a strategic partner but the business expressing their view on HR.