HR Pulse

The changing world of HR

The on-going pressure organisations are feeling through the current tough economic climate has forced many organisations to intensify their focus around Talent Management.

The on-going pressure organisations are feeling through the current tough economic climate has forced many organisations to intensify their focus around Talent Management. ResourceLink, a fully web-based integrated Human Resources and Payroll solution provided by Business Connexion, enables the process of true Talent Management to start with the inception of a comprehensive recruitment campaign and then touches on all those HR activities during an employee’s life cycle, with each of these activities being analysed for maximum efficiency and cost effectiveness.

As HR professionals have traditionally been seen as those solely responsible for all the tasks that lie within the employee’s life cycle, the opportunity has now arisen to move line HR management functions back into line through the self-service module within ResourceLink. By enabling both employees and managers to access and update the relevant HR information, ResourceLink allows this responsibility to be easily moved from the HR department down to the relevant levels within the organisation. 

The implementation of the ResourceLink self-service module instils a totally new culture within the organisation when speaking about employee-related data: HR now becomes the custodian of data, and line managers and employees assume the responsibility and ownership of their data, thereby ensuring a far greater accuracy, as it is now controlled at source. This move certainly supports the thrust from the HR team around the changing role of the HR department, from being too administrative to becoming more strategic.

In order for HR to start implementing any changes in their role, there also needs to be a complete change of focus in their activities. A move needs to be made from their activities being administratively focused to that of being strategically focused, i.e. being focused on the core aspects the business through the concept of Talent Management. To successfully make this change, the HR department needs to:

• Align their strategy with that of the organisation’s business strategy;
• Start fulfilling a more strategic role within the organisation overall;
• Create a new focus on People Management through Talent Management;
• Become an internal team of HR consultants within the organisation;
• Ensure that their systems and processes are up to date with current technology and business requirements.

In order to have the time and resources to address these issues, HR needs to rid itself of the burden of being the administrator in the organisation. It has been on this topic most HR practitioners have agreed, i.e. less admin. and more strategic work

Unfortunately, administration will never disappear: It needs to be moved to where it belongs within the organisation, i.e. at line management and/or employee level.

A number of years ago, it was a dream to have an HR system where an employee could sign-on, request information or initiate a transaction (a leave application form or data update), and then have that transaction moved through the layers in the organisation. To get this to work correctly, the decision-making process would have to have been based on factors such as the organisation chart, relevant job grades and reporting structures. During this entire process, the employee and all relevant parties would need to be communicated with, via the software, to ensure each person knew where their transactions were, who the next ‘authoriser’ was in the process, and also the current status of any transaction.

The good news is that today, ResourceLink is able to provide self-service technology combined with a workflow engine to manage and control business processes, and through the use of automated email communications, ResourceLink is also able to ensure that the relevant communications are sent at the correct times.

The major challenge faced in adapting to this change centres around the fact that the focus in implementing self-service technology revolves around change management throughout the entire organisation as this technology affects not only the HR team but the entire workforce.

In summary, although technology now provides us with 24/7 connectivity through tablets and other hand-held devices, organisations must be ensure that they have implemented a best-of-breed business solution to cater for their HR needs. Being connected is one thing, having access to true value adding information when and where needed, is another.

References: The War on Talent research – McKinsey 1997

* Rob Bothma is an HR Systems Industry Specialist at Business Connexion, a non-executive director at the Institute of People Management and co-author of the 4^th Edition of Contemporary Issues in HRM.