The One Thing #6: Create the Talent Machine

Being an HR professional and running an HR organization can be quite complex. First, you have to manage many administrative things well: Staffing, onboarding, compliance, training, employee relations, communication, payroll, benefits, time tracking, and generally making sure that people stay out of trouble. And of course if you let any of these things slide or go awry, your reputation is at risk.

But despite this important administrative role, in today’s business climate this is just not enough. Our newest High-Impact HR Research shows that while service-delivery efficiency and process quality is critical to success, it is the talent-related functions of HR that drive the greatest value.

Think about HR this way: Our job in the HR or talent team is not to “manage the organization” but rather to “help leaders and managers manage the organization”. When we looked at the real business impact HR drives among more than 300 organizations, we found that 22 per cent of a company’s value is driven through the quality of leadership, 8 per cent from the quality of first line management, and only 7 per cent from the operations of HR (the rest from other factors such as product strategy, marketing, etc.). This means that among the people parts of the business alone, your impact on leadership is almost four times as important as your role delivering employee-direct HR programs.

This research, which will be published in early 2014, also shows that the biggest drivers of strategic impact today are HR’s ability to create a “talent machine” in your company. In other words, your biggest levers are your ability to help the business select and hire the right people, develop great managers and leaders, onboard and develop capabilities, and create a high level of engagement and career mobility through performance management, coaching, compensation and other programs.

How do we make this happen? Well our new research shows that you have to focus on the following keys to success:

Shifting your HR resources from “generalist” to “specialist” roles, connected to your centers of excellence in what we call a “network of expertise”. Recruiters, OD people and employee relations staff need to be highly trained, aware of the best-practices & new tools and should be networked together to share valuable insights.

Developing standard frameworks and platforms to prevent wasted time and effort. Each HR practice requires different tools and frameworks. Wherever possible these should be standardized, developed as a team, and then shared – but used flexibly in locations where needs change. This includes training modules, selection and assessment tools, coaching guides, and more.

External intelligence: High-impact HR organizations talk with others, benchmark themselves, and continuously scan the vendor landscape.

Creating a senior business partner role who operates as a true consultant. HR can never do everything for everyone, but at a local level HR leaders can function as “local VPs of HR.” A local HR leader can be a true advisor to a business head or senior manager – coaching them on all the various issues they face in management, recruiting, compensation, and other issues. These senior roles should be people who are deep domain experts, senior, and well trained.

Certify your own team. Now is the time to develop your own in-house training program for HR itself. This job, “HR for HR”, is missing in too many companies. Remember your job is to improve and support the most important people in your company – your leaders, managers and employees. You should always have the top skills and knowledge at your fingertips.