adminBy Silinganiso Moyo
HUMAN Resource (HR) strategy means getting a competitive business advantage from the way the company manages its human capital. It aims to produce a high value organisation where employees maximise their potential.
Achieving the best for the stakeholders will only be realised by those organisations that have effective HR strategies.
The tendency is that employees will look after the business if they are also looked after by the company. Human capital is a sustainable source of competitive advantage but confusion as to how to leverage this resource effectively prevents many companies from reaching their goals. This shows the significance of clearly articulating and integrating the HR into the overall business strategy. HR, thus, is a strategic business partner that should be involved from the onset, in the vision, mission and goals of the organisation.
The HR must be partnered with the business regardless of the business size as long as the organisation employs people. However, given the unique situation of each organisation amongst other factors, companies find it very difficult to fulfil that role.
The role of the HR practitioner must be compatible with the needs of the changing business environment. Successful organisations are becoming aware of the human talent role in today’s businesses.
Organisations cannot afford to have an HR function that does not contribute to the company’s strategic portfolio. The main purpose of the HR strategy is to ensure that the organisation has the right people, doing the right things at the right time in order to deliver the business strategy.
The encompassing word in strategic HR is engagement. Engagement by HR is much more than just focusing on the business requirements. It means actually developing a good working relationship with internal stakeholders, basically employees at all levels to ensure everyone is engaged in the running of the business and are contributing meaningfully. Engagement of employees entails checking and supporting levels of commitment and congruence to common goals and applying every necessary effort to gain the highest levels of motivation.
Engagement requires explicit company strategies and objectives focused on understandable and measurable outcomes. How can employees feel engaged by vague and ambiguous company mission statements? At times employees do not toe the line because they would not be engaged in the correct way.
The board of directors and management have a duty to ensure there is alignment of the business strategy and their style of management. Principles that make an HR strategist effective:
Honesty: This starts from the moment a new employee gets employed by the company. Real honesty means sharing with employees about the true status of the business. The organisation has a mandate to communicate the bad as well as the good news.
This bold approach can build trust and loyalty, which is the ultimate aim of any HR strategy. Many organisations do not believe in sharing with employees some of the critical business information especially when the business is underperforming; to the detriment of employees who suddenly find the company gates closed without any prior communication.
Added value: Every minute of every hour, all employees should be asking themselves “ls what am doing adding value? Thus the HR strategy must work its way into the fabric of the organisation when it is done properly. An HR strategy without clear, meaningful principles that are lived in the workplace is no strategy at all.
Individually centred: This means each individual should be asking themselves if they are adding value (organisations should only keep those employees who are still adding value) and this cuts across from the CEO to the general hand. There must be no sacred cows. HR should do away with traditional trends that call for standard training programmes, rigid job evaluation systems and pay systems and the view that everyone needs the same set of competences as that shows HR practices are premised on principles of consistency rather than individual responsibility, measurement and accountability, which is an element of effective teams.
It is the responsibility for HR to concientise employees to accept the responsibility for the complete value chain (measured in revenue growth, cost efficiency, quality service and output). All these principles must be enshrined in the HR strategy to ensure the people strategy is business focussed (teams) and individually centred to complement one another. This entails HR practitioners understanding the business operations in totality, applying their broad people skills, being allowed to challenge the status core, engaging employees at all levels, implementing change, and concentrating on deliverables.
Zimbabwean companies stand to benefit from adopting HR strategies described in this article. However, for this to happen requires a mind-set change by HR personnel themselves as well as top management.
Silinganiso Moyo is a consultant with Dispute Resolution Consultancy (D.R.C) (Pvt) Ltd; a Labour Law and Talent Management Consulting Firm. She can be contacted on 0772238496; email: [email protected]
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