Attrition- reasons could be any...better money, challenging profiles, big names, rift with the boss etc.

Developing leaders- I think with changing times, the leaders will have to adopt a more participative approach in dealing with subordinates. I think HR will have to understand the changed psyche of the new generation and conduct leadership programs in line with that for seniors. Understanding the tangible & intangible benefits that employees seek & appreciate. A little less moral policing from HR in not so important issues since I think its important for us professionals to develop good relationships with our people . And yes, standardising compensation plans by not only comparing with with the industry but also other relevant industries. a) Human Resource Accounting b) Training Effectiveness,etc. managing diversity;work life balance;change management and restructuring etc.,

As u say Employee attrition rate ,it is almost true for IT companies now a days its very difficult to stop it coz high packages ,five day working style attracts employees .For manufacturing & Enguineering Industries this rate is low. As a HR person What I think if we are demanding for a bond of 3 to 4 years & give better career development we can stop it for a certain level ,But i dont konw how much it would succsesful for todays competative world .

The Challenges of Human Resource Management

The role of the Human Resource Manager is evolving with the change in competitive market environment and the realization that Human Resource Management must play a more strategic role in the success of an organization. Organizations that do not put their emphasis on attracting and retaining talents may find themselves in dire consequences, as their competitors may be outplaying them in the strategic employment of their human resources. With the increase in competition, locally or globally, organizations must become more adaptable, resilient, agile, and customer-focused to succeed. And within this change in environment, the HR professional has to evolve to become a strategic partner, an employee sponsor or advocate, and a change mentor within the organization. In order to succeed, HR must be a business driven function with a thorough understanding of the organizations big picture and be able to influence key decisions and policies. In general, the focus of todays HR Manager is on strategic personnel retention and talents development. HR professionals will be coaches, counselors, mentors, and succession planners to help motivate

organizations members and their loyalty. The HR manager will also promote and fight for values, ethics, beliefs, and spirituality within their organizations, especially in the management of workplace diversity. The role of the HR manager must parallel the needs of the changing organization. Successful organizations are becoming more adaptable, resilient, quick to change directions, and customer-centered. Within this environment, the HR professional must learn how to manage effectively through planning, organizing, leading and controlling the human resource and be knowledgeable of emerging trends in training and employee development.

Is HR About People Anymore?

Our profession continues to have more in-depth business responsibilies associated with the board room that detract us from our core area of responsibility, people. Our human capital sometimes gets lost in that matrix because we have a harder time balancing the board room and the work areas. What we all have to remember is "people are our business". The true HR professional has to strike that delicate balance between business and people all the while remembering who our customers are, "the people". Our board room is where the people are too.

Writing With Skill

I Tweeted "If you can't articulate the business case, don't expect the funding" on Twitter today as a reminder to all HR executives. Truer words have never been said, especially by Jason Averbook who initially Tweeted this. HR executives and middle HR managers focus so much on effective verbal communication that they easily forget the real fundamentals of effective written communication. Today's way of communicating through VM, social media outlets and text messaging have hindered our overall communication skills. And the bets are on that as the next generation to sit in your seats will be less skilled than you. Think about that!!! There was an article in the Business section of the Atlanta Journal Constitution this past Sunday, June 5th, talking about the failure of individuals today to really be effective writers. And if you cannot write effectively with significant skill then you will not make it to the top levels of the HR pyramid. The article sites the following things to consider when you sit down to write a memo, policy statement, presentation to the board, letter, email, etc: y think about your audience and the appropriate format (email, letter, handbook revision). y Proofread your work carefully - which I do not because I rely on Spell Check - not a good thing. y Be clear -don't rely on technical jargon or acronyms. y Be concise - it is important that you write a 1 page executive report as well as other short reports. y Stay professional - no need to expound on this bullet point. y Be comfortable with revisions - as someone to review your work before you publish it. y Cite references where appropriate. Remember, it is not the readers job to determine what you are trying to say, it's your job to make it clear.

Turning a Wide Eye

So youve monitored your brand for a while, you understand how to draw and apply conclusions youve drawn from the data youve gathered but you sense that theres something missing. One thought crosses your mind what are others doing in this space, or lets take it one step further what exactly are your competitors doing in this space? You might be driven by curiosity or you might be driven by the annual benchmarking report, whichever it might be youll quickly find a lot of value in monitoring the wider industry conversations including your competition. Making use of social data to understand your competition is important for several reasons and may at the most basic level help you benchmark a brands marketing, communications and general perception against that of others in a similar space. In addition to this, the data can provide insight into competitor activity online, the way in which other products are marketed in social media, online service innovations and how they speak to or with their own customers within social networks. All of this is invaluable information that you can slice and dice and think of incorporating or avoiding in your own business. Before diving into a competitor analysis you will need to consider the right competitors to measure. You may intuitively think of your closest competitors which is a useful start, however, you should also look into third party data sources to gain a complete view on what companies, products and services compete in your market, at similar price points, or perhaps have just launched. You should also consider non-branded competitors: in banking, for example, brands compete against other uses of money investments, pension products and so on. Remember that extra data points really add value to any and all of this analysis, though: revenue figures, advertising spend, awareness of discrete marketing campaigns, etcetera, complete the picture correlations and causations should underlie the data returned from social systems. Doing an industry wide assessment of the space you operate in can also help uncover up and coming competitors, ones that you may not have identified in a traditional competitor analysis. Based on this you can make predictions about what is likely to develop in the market place. Be sure to take a step back however and consider where your client is in a wider context; why does brand X have a particularly strong presence in your market? Is it due to obvious factors like a high traditional marketing spend or a strong set of social presences? Can you replicate their success? Perhaps no one in your market is particularly successful in social channels; in this case theres a first mover advantage waiting there for you to take! Youll be surprised at the opportunities you might uncover when you move beyond monitoring just your brand. Chances are youll uncover information that you didnt actually know you were looking for but will go a long way towards giving you a competitive edge.

For HR professionals, the new century will take up where the old one left off - with the struggle to recruit andretain a trained, satisfied workforce.

Recruiting will continue to be a key issue, John A. Challenger, CEO of the international outplace firm Challenger,Gray & Christmas, tells Human Resource Management News. "The search for people with the proper experience is making HR a primary, critical factor in a company'scompetitive position. One dot-com executive said the focus on recruiting is the #1 business strategy," hesays. No Relief from Shortage HR cannot expect quick relief from the worker shortage, according to a survey by Manpower Inc. 24% of businesses surveyed by Manpower hope to hire more workers in the first quarter of 2000, while 10%plan to decrease employment. With the unemployment rate standing at 4.1%, "the type of worker being sought in the new year increasingly ismore skilled or higher educated than in the past. The pool of such people is running dry," says Jeffrey Joerres,president and CEO of Manpower. Of the 10 industry sectors surveyed by Manpower, the biggest demand for workers came from manufacturers ofdurable goods, where 30% of companies reported plans to hire new employees and 9% said they would lay offworkers. Growth doesn't come cheaply. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that more than twothirds of the 30occupations expected to have the fastest employment growth had median hourly earnings in 1997 above thenational median. The four occupations expected to experience the fastest employment growth - computer engineers, computersupport specialists, systems analysts, and database administrators - all reported hourly earning in the top quartileduring 1997. High pay for high-tech workers is expected to continue. Challenger foresees HR using best practices to create an environment that attracts people and makes themwant to stay. "HR will be tailoring the softer benefits. Instead of stock programs, they will listen to individuals andgive them access to things that work for them, that make the environment their kind of place. For one person thatmight mean coming in at 10 a.m. so that they can see the children off to school. For another person it might be tuitionsupport." Companies should be prepared to handle downsizing, even in today's tight labor market. HR should be preparedto handle the challenge of taking care of those people, he says, because

"it says something about the organizationto the people who stay. A lot of time HR has to be the one to stand up for the people in the face of all the costcutting." End of the Weekend Among the changes that Challenger foresees is the end of the weekend. "Technology, as well as the change in thetraditional workweek and how jobs are defined, will combine to give us more autonomy over when we work," hesays, and more and more that means working on weekends. "We are paying more for productivity and performance and output - when you can do it or when it needs to bedone. Time is going to be more flexible in the coming years." To stay competitive, employers will rely on what Challenger calls "Inter-econ workers" who will be willing to workthe flexible hours associated with an increasingly Internet-oriented, nonstop marketplace. These workers arecomfortable with the latest technology and rely heavily on portable tools such as cellular phones and palmtops.There is already evidence of this new, more flexible worker - in 1997 27% of the civilian labor force workedflexible schedules, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. These work arrangements have many advantages, but Challenger cautions that they may cause workers even morestress. "We're all becoming like doctors, but it's not a life-or-death matter," he says. "I think people will carve outpriorities and set up barriers. We will have to come up with new ways of deciding when we turn off the cellphones and don't check the voice mail." Finding Balance HR's job will be to put together programs that help employees find the right balance between home and work,according to Challenger. That will be especially important for baby boomers, who are turning their attention awayfrom their children toward their elderly parents, who are living longer and need care. Increased use of telecommuting can help maintain a proper balance, he says, allowing employees to work at homeand avoid lengthy commutes. While "telecommuting is the next big transforming movement," it creates its own potential problems, according toChallenger. "How do you create teamwork, morale, synergy, a connection among employees? It's harder to createsynergy in isolation."

HR is accustomed to dealing with a diverse workforce, he says, and will find a way to direct these workers towarda common purpose. People will continue to find a sense of community outside work, Challenger believes, but they may feel the lossof the central workplace. "We may see the creation of a 'director of socialization' as more people are asked to be on the road and are notlinked to a central office," he predicts.
If you happen to meet the HR Head of a large organization, just ask him what his biggest challenge is. He will say 'retention of people'. The same person after a few minutes for the same question will answer 'attracting talent'. Probably his answer the next day will be 'staff motivation'. Different answers from the same individual at different times does not mean that he is not sure of what his problem is but it depicts the fact that the priority of HR challenges keep changing from time to time. The biggest challenge for HR in the 21st century is to identify its biggest challenge. Most of the big companies' values are tied up in intangible assets. The study of intangible assets breaks them into three components. The first is processes. Processes are important for any industry and they determine the output of any activity. Companies should manage their processes well and derive maximum results out of them. Next important intangible is the customer base, or the brand value. Over the last one and a half decades, companies are focusing more on driving maximum value for existing relationships.

Three Components of Intangible Assets The third major intangible is the workforce and the investment made on the employees. The challenge here is to optimize the return in the workforce investment and also ensure that the investment that we make is driving the expected output. It is very important to be significantly different from competitors and always be in the minds of

future employees and shareholders. 'People are our biggest assets' has become the buzzword for all organizations and 'how are these great assets managed' remains a million-dollar question! This paper answers such unanswered questions and sincerely attempts to enable the HR fraternity to overcome their current challenges and make the HR roles interesting. Emerging New Markets There was a tremendous focus on the US and the UK geographies till a couple of years ago especially in the IT industry. But now the scenario is changing and more countries in the Europe are emerging as potential markets. Asian countries like India and China are redefining the landscape. Many MNCs prefer to set up a base in these countries because they provide a beneficial ground on several aspects, be it manpower, skill, knowledge or anything else. Indian companies are setting up their bases in other countries as well. It is evident from several business reports and articles that the focus is shifting from US, UK to Europe and, of course, APAC. The challenge for HR is multifold in this regard.

These challenges listed in the box above are just a few top priorities, the list grows longer and longer as we get into further details. Another hard fact here is that each one of these items in the list can be broken down into few smaller items, which also serve as big challenges to organizations.

Attitude & Behavior of the Workforce There is a phenomenal change in the quality of workforce that is available in the market these days. I was interviewing a candidate last week for a position in my team, and this candidate who had two years of experience in HR was giving me electric responses. While I was pleased to note that he had a grip on what he knew and also what he wanted to do next, I was taken aback when he said, "I will start applying to other companies," in response to my question, "What will you do if you feel unhappy with your job profile after a couple of years?" The emerging young workforce is very confident but at the same time too short-sighted. We may argue that the market is good and they just want to make hay while the sun shines, but the fact is these people want to make all the hay in one day. For small hiccups, our people conclude that they got themselves married with the wrong company and they decide on a quick divorce without thinking through, the options for remarriage are plenty though. With the rapidly developing economic conditions and exponentially increasing number of job opportunities across the globe, personnel retention is already a challenge. When you consider the fact too that the attitude and behavior of these new recruits both fresh and lateral entrants are changing drastically, my contention that retention is a nightmare to HR Heads will become obvious.

Leadership Development "I want more leaders to carry the organization forward." "We need leaders to meet our vision." These are some of the common statements we would hear from a CXO of any medium or large sized organization. While there is a lot of effort, time and money invested on leadership development initiatives, we have very little evidence that these initiatives are driving the expected results. A clear indication that the performance has increased because of these initiatives is still lacking. Hence, many of these initiatives, which do not evidently produce a measurable result, make justifying them for every stakeholder and shareholder a tough task day-by-day. We need to come up with totally new approach for leadership development and that continues to be a big challenge for HR in the current scenario. In our organization, we have come up with certain new approaches for identifying and grooming our leaders, which I would discuss at a later stage in this paper. As illustrated in the figure below, it is very important to ensure a balanced growth, and it is needless to mention that balancing is the biggest challenge in leadership development. Having leaders in either excessiveness or scarcity is not a healthy sign for any organization.

Retaining & Managing Talent Many years ago Mckinsey coined a term "war for talent", which is now being looked at as a competition between organizations to attract new talent. What I would like to prescribe here is that we just have to shift gears and focus more on retaining the talent that we have and also come up with new ways of developing talent. It is a good sign that many organizations are moving away from a skill-based approach to a

competency-based approach. A system that enables HR to maintain and manage the current competencies and enable employees to plan their development either to higher proficiency levels in their existing competencies or new competencies is a need of the hour.

I am talking about a learning and competency management system under retention of employees and I have also clubbed talent management along in the heading because they both go together. At any point in time, an employee who believes that his organization continuously invests in developing his talent and also provides him enough opportunities to deploy his talent in the field will never allow the thought of quitting creep into his mind. But on the one hand, getting more investment into talent development initiatives is currently a challenge, and on the other side creating a career plan for every employee that enables him/her to continuously deploy his/her talent remains a bigger challenge. Innovation & Talent development It is absolutely beyond debate that 'Innovation' is now mandatory for the success of any business. There are several drivers that can cultivate innovation in an organization and one of them is developing the skills and talents of its employees through various modes of learning. PwC has released a report where the statistics very clearly shows that the investments on training and development activities are much higher in the US than Europe or APAC countries. That could possibly be one of the reasons that most of the innovations come from the US. Japan could be an exception to this but they have restricted themselves to technology innovations while we need innovations in every field. We still do not have instruments to measure and provide a direct correlation between the investment made on innovation trainings and the number of creative outputs. But what is evident from the PwC report is that the companies that are showing maximum innovations are the companies that invest a lot on training and talent development.

Challenges at Different Levels of Talent Development The report also clearly highlights that companies that produce better business results invest a huge sum in training and talent development. I would like to quote my own organization as an example for this. I am proud that I am part of a true learning organization and all of us who work for our organization can loudly say so with due respect to the enormous investment which goes into our learning and development initiatives. Creating an innovative culture within the organization, creating an environment to share ideas, motivating people to innovate are some of the key challenges for HR under this head. Employee Engagement & Commitment from Employees I remember when this term called 'employee engagement' was introduced into the HR portfolio, it meant including the fun element at work. Rejuvenating the employees with loads of fun activities was the key task of employee engagement personnel. It helped organizations to create a sense of belonging among employees and in turn indirectly demanded a certain degree of commitment from them. Some organizations have gone one step beyond and have included the families in such events. Loyalty to the organization was considered to be the in-thing in every employee's mind. But unfortunately, today these employee engagement activities just remain as entertainment activities and they do not add any value to the expected outcome. There is again very little evidence in this area too to measure the impact it makes on the organizations. 'Be loyal to your job but never be loyal to your organization' is the definition for loyalty now-a-days among young professionals. We can go on debating whether it is the right thing to do or not, but the bottom line is that we need better

employee engagement activities which will create a bonding between employees and organizations.

Survey Conducted on Employee Engagement Activities (Different IT Companies)

With the 21st century underway, nonprofit, government, and private organizations seek to adapt to an ever-changing professional environment. Within these organizations, human resources, HR, departments face particular challenges. Their role, human resources management, includes the hiring of new employees, the administration of benefits, and the monitoring of regulation compliance. To best prepare themselves for the changing face of human resources management, HR departments must rise to the challenges of retaining and building a talented workforce.

Multi-Generational Workforce
y

One major challenge human resources departments face is serving multiple generations within a single workforce. Today, Baby Boomers, Baby Busters, Generation X, and Generation Y staff members may work in the same organization, often with differing needs, expectations, and strengths. While approximately 76 million Baby Boomers are currently employed in the United States, as they retire, the 21st century will see extreme changes in workplace expectations and environment. For the incoming workforce, the "hired for life" mentality of the past will be obsolete as workers increasingly change employers after 3 to 5 years of work. Placing more emphasis on proper work-life balance, they will be motivated by learning opportunities and positive feedback. To retain these employees, human resources departments must be ready to respond to these needs.

Changing Role
y

As they prepare themselves for the 21st century, human resources departments must adapt to their changing role within an organization. Moving from a traditional to a strategic approach, human resources management in the 21st century will be much more dynamic than in the past. The basic personal functions that characterized traditional human resource management, such as maintenance of personal files and records and the processing of documents, will be replaced by a focus on promoting the abilities, skills, and knowledge of employees. HR departments can best prepare for their changing role by adopting a "human investment perspective" that is more active than reactive and that no longer relies on the hierarchical organizational structures of the past. Instead, the focus will be on catering to the needs of consumers and employees and using business strategies in human resources policies and practices.

Recruitment Challenges
y

Recruiting a workforce that reflects today's reality is another challenge for human resources departments. To address the challenge of attracting a new generation of employees, HR professionals can tap into the popularity of the Internet. With online job postings and company websites, human resources departments are now able to conduct around-the-clock recruiting. With this wider scope, recruitment efforts can no longer be limited to the HR department and will increasingly involve numerous departments and actors within an organization. To develop a workforce that reflects the diversity of consumers and clients, HR departments should reach out to minority groups that were discriminated against and excluded in the past. Recruitment strategies can include the use of minority recruiters, targeting universities with high minority enrollment, and forging relationships with minority organizations such as the Congressional Hispanic Caucus or the United Negro College Fund.

Read more: What Challenges Face Human Resources Departments in the 21st Century? | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/list_6855860_challenges-resources-departments-21stcentury_.html#ixzz1PjrAjO6I

Countries in the Arab region are faced with the challenge of developing their populations' skills and technical knowledge, or human capital, in order to compete in the 21st century global economy. The authors describe the education and labor market initiatives implemented or under way in four countries in the Arab region Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to address the human resource issues they each face as they prepare their countries for a place in the 21st century global economy. Three of these countries Oman, Qatar, and the UAE are in the Arabian Gulf; the fourth, Lebanon, is in the Levant. Together, they highlight the similarities and dissimilarities of the challenges faced by countries in the region and the responses to those challenges. The study answers three main questions: What are the human resource challenges each country faces? What education, human capital, and labor market reforms have recently been implemented or are under way to address these challenges? What mechanisms and information are used to assess whether reforms are meeting their objectives, and is there evidence of success? Answers were sought through analysis of relevant literature, the most-recent population and labor force data from international and in-country sources, and a series of elite interviews in 2006 with government officials and individuals in private organizations in the four study countries. The authors found that while the study countries have instituted reforms to their education and training systems

that are designed to raise the skills of the population, and have made changes to the labor market and economy aimed at facilitating the use of human capital in diverse sectors of the economy, a disconnect remains between implementing reforms and evaluating them to ascertain whether they are having the intended effects. In many cases, reforms have only recently gotten under way, so it may be too early to measure their impact. In other cases, however, the lack of systematic assessment stems from gaps in the data needed to track the effects of policy changes. If policy evaluation is made integral to reform, the countries in the Arab world will have the information they need to make the best investments in their human capital in the decades to come.

A new model for the human resource function has evolved in concept and practice over the past several years. Many companies have reduced costs and improved the quality of operational services by contracting with vendors for services (outsourcing) or establishing internal centers to provide shared services. Such restructuring has been supported by new, more powerful information systems, such as PeopleSoft or SAP, and online information access for managers and employees. At the same time, companies have invested in capabilities to enhance business performance, deploying specialized human resource expertise (through centers or networks) and consultants or leaders within business units. The experiences of such leading companies as IBM, United Technologies, Clorox, Johnson & Johnson, DuPont, Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems have been examined and reported in numerous studies and reports. What were once innovative practices are now characterized as current practices and trends in the strategic repositioning of the human resource function.(1) I believe that they will be vital as companies compete in the 21 st century business context. Companies that fail to align their human resource function with the changing business end up with fragmented approaches for managing people. They have higher costs for providing human resource services. They are not able to develop and implement innovative peoplemanagement strategies that gain competitive advantage. Many companies say they embrace the new human resource model but are not yet "walking the talk."

Challenges of Human Resources Management in The 21st Century

y Introduction y Strategies for Changes y The New Environment y Reshaping Human Resources (HR) y Conclusion

Challenges of Human Resources Management

Introduction

Human beings are the most important resource in an organization. A firm s success depends
on the capabilities of its members. Most problems, challenges, opportunities and frustrations in an organization are people related. Human Resources Management is one of the toughest duties of a manager since humans differ in terms of attitudes, values, aspirations, motivations, assumptions, psychology, and life goals.

Looking at todays competitive world, managerial level staff will require more conceptual and strategic skills. Thus, managers should for example ensure a suitable, relevant and up-to-date training for specific skills of lower level employees. Managers have to be proactive, able to anticipate technological developments and prepare their staff for whatever technological changes that might take place. This will be a successful task only when the HRM itself is fully aware of those changes and has the means to deal with them.

HR managers have a number of roles to fulfill. They are the guardians of the key assets of the organizations. They are also counselor and protector of employees and directly responsible for productivity. The government, including the Ministry of Labor, expects HR managers not only to comply with labor laws, but also to promote harmony at the workplace; this will directly contribute to healthier and more attractive work environment. As a result, both job hunters and seekers will feel compelled to target such organizations in their search for new job opportunities. The success or failure of HR depends also on the top management recognition of the importance of HRM, and secondly on its commitment to assist HR to carry out its functions. Human Resources jobholders need capability, integrity and professionalism in order to succeed in the ever-changing environment.

Strategies for Changes

The first corner stone to achieve is the development of new initiatives, programs and agendas. Human Resources must move beyond being the police of policy and regulatory guard . Instead, HR must be the pioneers in assisting the organizations achieve results, especially by helping employees to enhance their capabilities to ensure organizational objectives are met.

The future of HR depends on its ability to align HR with the changes that are happening in the workplace and the economy. New models of competitiveness are needed so that organizations can better service their customers. Consequently HR must be the champions to help gear employees to provide added value.

The new approach of HR is to emphasize new mindsets and new ways of thinking about business instead of sticking to policies and bureaucratic patterns. HR professionals should and must focus on cultural change, and the development of human capital, especially in international organizations. Think globally. Act locally .

HR should sponsor a model of change, which will help the employees adapt to and be comfortable with changes. Here, a lot of question may arise, such as: How do we decide which practices to be transformed and which should be kept for purpose of continuity? How do we change and learn rapidly? How do we honor the past yet change the future? How do we capture the hearts and minds of employees?

The New Environment

The 1990s have been called the era of Employee Empowerment. This means the
management delegates as much power and authority as possible to low level employees to enable them to make their own decisions and participate in the managerial decision-making as well. This way, the employees will be more motivated and productive. The empowerment process is effective under the following conditions:

1.

2. 3. 4. 5.

The employee must be given adequate training and knowledge regarding his job and responsibilities, which includes technical knowledge, decision-making skills and group process skills. Both employees and management share a common vision and goals, and are really committed to achieve them. Both employees and management possess common values, in term of job implementation, behavior standards and ethics. Benefits and profits are to be shared together (shares, bonuses...) Management should show and have trust in lower level employees.

Reshaping HR

The changes which affect the HR performance are:

y y y y y y y

HR should not act as a therapy clinic HR must measure their outcomes HR practices must create value by increasing the organization s intellectual capital HR must attempt to make employees committed to achieving organizational goals, and not merely to make employees happy HR practices must be aligned with company strategies HR must champion the needs and development of employees and yet become partners in the business HR should receive corporate priority. Business firms should be ready to boost their investment in staff development; this is rewarding on the long run if its properly implemented HR should focus on the skills to be acquired taking into consideration the understanding of the international dimensions of political, economic and social development HR should promote the collaboration between public training institutions, the universities and the public sector in terms of planning an effective training program

Conclusion

Actually, the nation s capacity to face the challenges of globalization and industrialization of business towards the 21st century depends heavily on the human resources. Firms have the capital, technology and human resources; but the HR is the one who can help facing the challenges of business globalization. Capital can be generated. So can technology. But the human resources are needed to propel the organization and the nation through the coming challenges with encouragement and motivation.

As may know, Ive been running a short survey over the last few months. This is now closed and Ive been through the results. A lot of my questions for qualitative, making it difficult to communicate the results in a short summary but Ill come back to individual questions from this over the next couple of months.

Anyway, I started with key business challenges. Your (my readers) most popular responses included:

y y y y y y y y y

Dealing with recession Revenue growth Profitability Understanding customer needs Ensuring performance Dealing with the uncertain economy Dealing with market turmoil Dealing with political interference Globalisation.

I then asked what HRs own challenges would be to respond to the above business challenges. Your responses included:

y y y y y y y y y y y y

Job design Strategic recruitment Retaining talent Employee capability and engagement Performance pay Leadership development Social networking HR measurement and analysis Automating HR processes Integration of HR applications Being creative Managing change.

(Some of these also appeared in the business challenges section which I thought was a very positive sign.)

And I asked about how difficult HR teams would find it to respond to these challenges, and what the major issues would be. Here are the results:

HRs values and perspectives seem the most suited to dealing with its own and its businesses challenges with a quarter of the sample rating its values as very well suited. Im surprised how well this aspect has scored as I often feel HR has a lot of beliefs which limit its own effectiveness (acceptance of its support role, lack of interest in new insights, too much focus on measurement etc). The capabilities of HR professionals is also rated quite strongly, with two-thirds of you suggesting that current capabilities are well or very well suited to the challenges. Again, this seems more positive than my experience! Some of you mentioned ongoing transformation of the HR function and the need to reskill HR professionals in newer areas like measurement and analytics and in areas supporting interventions to deliver business strategies (requiring better understanding of business models and cultures etc). The quality of HR management process is much less well scored with two-thirds of respondents suggesting that process quality is either poorly or very poorly suited to dealing with HRs challenges. This is less of a surprise to me, and agree that a lot can be done to improve processes. HR operating models are also rated less strongly than values and perspectives, but not as low as processes, but still with a majority suggesting that these models are poorly or very poorly suited to HRs challenges. Again, I suggest thats about right.

I also provided a other category and here you suggested it is the way HR is perceived which is the major issue, as a generally poor perception means that when competing on budgets for projects, HR usually looses to other core business projects. There was also a view that the poor perception is based mainly on ongoing needs to meet new customer requirements and implement more effective technology meaning that HR is never able to change quickly enough to meet the demands being placed on it.

I also went on to ask more about the effectiveness of your HR strategies.

Strategic HCM?

I didnt ask specifically whether you were doing HCM ie managing your people in a way that would accumulate human capital as 1. this isnt the definition everyone uses and the question would have been interested differently by different people, and 2. I know the positive responses would have been very low! But I did ask whether your HR strategy is tailored to your particular organisation (ie is it purposefully and significantly different to that of your competitors / other similar organisations) which is a key aspect of an HCM strategy. And once again, I was surprised by the high proportion of positive responses. About half of you suggested that you do have somewhat tailored HR strategies with a further 15% suggesting these are well tailored to your particular organisation. One third of you suggested that your HR strategy is not really tailored but only a handful suggested there was no tailoring at all.

Social capital? I did ask whether your organisation has a strategy to improve collaboration / to develop relationships between employees (eg through Enterprise 2.0 / use of social media tools, organisation design, facilitation of communities etc) which I deal with in my other blog,Social Advantage. Again, I thought responses were very positive, and only slightly lower than my question related to HCM above. So two-thirds of you suggested that your organisation had something of a strategy (about the same as the number who responded that your organisation has a well tailored, or something of a tailored strategy in my question above). And about 15% said you didnt really have a strategy in this area with a similar number saying you didnt have a strategy like this at all (about the same as the number as suggested that you do not really have a tailored HR strategy). So similar positive and negative responses to my earlier question, but with more of the yeses responding with somewhat, and more of the not reallys responding with no, to the second question.

HRs role I also asked about HRs role within these strategies, and here responses were quite low, perhaps because Id just mentioned things like enterprise 2.0. But about 20% of you still said that HR has a leading role and another 20% suggested you have a joint or equal role with the rest of the business in HR strategy. But although nobody said HR was not involved in strategy, nearly two-thirds of you suggested HR only has a supporting role. Thats not great, is it?

HR measurement I also asked whether you have an effective approach for measuring progress against your HR strategies. Over 80% of you suggested that you do have a somewhat effective approach with nearly all of the rest of you suggesting that your approach is fully effective. Again, another surprising result for me, and although I agree HR has been increasing its capability here (a point also made in I4CPs recent research that I reviewed recently), from what I see I still think there is a long way to go to make these approaches really effective.

Surprises? So whats behind these surprises youve been giving me? Well, youre the people who are doing the real work (most respondents were internal practitioners not suppliers), and I only work with a

relatively small number of clients each year, so in many ways you are closer to this than me, and your aggregated feedback is very powerful. Still, Im not totally convinced. I just think there are huge opportunities for improvements within HR. Most of you see some of this. I think my perspective a little further away from the coal face allows me to see more of these, or at least see them differently. Its why I think close partnership between HR Directors and insight based HR consultants like me is so powerful. Ive got the understanding of how things could be really different, and youve got a handle of how things work now in your own organisation. You put these two things together and I think youve got a really good basis for dealing with your particular business and HR challenges, whatever these are.

Bibliography http://innovativehrstrategy.blogspot.com http://www.inc.com http://www.coolavenues.com http://www.ehow.com