How Can we Keep Our Skills Up to Date?

Today more than ever it is important for the HR professional to keep their skills current and their knowledge of changes in the workforce up to date.  Five ways that you can keep yourself on the cutting edge are outlined below:

Offer your Services to a Professional Association

One of the best ways you can keep your skills up to date is to offer your services or expertise as a volunteer to your professional association.  Offering your services will allow you to meet other HR professionals, expand your skill base as well as provide you with the opportunity to gain experience and improve your presentation skills.  Volunteering is a wonderful way to expand your resume and highlight your commitment to the profession.

Complete a Stretch Objective

Another option that allows workers to brush up skills and demonstrate proficiency to their employer is to establish a stretch objective which will expand your skill level but also take you out of your comfort zone.  Examples of a stretch objective could be working with your city or our municipality to be appointed to a board or commission.  Not only can a stretch objective provide you with a unique experience but you will be using new skill sets which can potentially be added to a work portfolio.

Enroll in Continuing Education and Become Certified

While informal training can be useful, there does come a time to enroll in that formal education or certification program.   It is very important to evaluate all continuing education programs in advance to ensure that the classes are appropriate; credits are transferable so that the courses will be recognized.

Tap into Online Resources

One of the best ways to expand and develop your skills is to subscribe to industry blogs for the latest trends, news magazines, webinars and periodicals that highlight new and emerging trends in your profession.

Develop Your Technology Alternatives

Advances in technology are changing and the way we conduct business is moving at such a fast pace that keeping up to speed with the changes and ways to become more productive is becoming more important than ever.  Over the past several years HR Departments have moved to employee self-service, webinars are replacing conferences and the internet is the resource that people turn to.  Using technology will help you remain ahead of the curve.

 

Is America Facing a Skills Gap and How Can a Culture of Learning Address this Challenge?

Today, in the United States a skills gap is becoming more of an issue as many skilled American’s are retiring and the gap between what employers need and what their employees can actually deliver is becoming significantly wider.  Organizations with a neglected culture of learning may experience high turnover, struggle to retain customers, and may ultimately fail. Organizations with a culture of learning which addresses the skills gap typically thrive by cultivating their employees through learning opportunities and on-going professional growth.  While the skills gap will only worsen over time, there is hope for the pro-active employer that is willing to address this issue.  To meet this challenge, HR leaders can plan and anticipate gaps in employee skills by implementing a series of initiatives which will hopefully reduce this gap.

Conduct a Needs Assessment Survey

Companies today that encourage the collection of employee data and metrics will be in a better position to address the skills gap challenge.  It is often the employees that understand what they require in order to be more efficient, productive and successful on the job.  Human Resources should consider conducting a needs assessment to evaluate the skills require in order to determine what training programs should be considered and who should be made available for this additional support.  Training programs to improve employee skills can include both technical training, certifications as well as soft-skill training.  A survey to determine where the gaps in knowledge should be conducted and then discussed with the employee to develop a plan to meet the employee needs and the requirements of the job.

Create Succession Plans for Key Positions

Succession planning is a step-by-step process for identifying and developing new leaders typically at the exempt level.  Successful succession plans also increase the availability of experienced and capable employees that are prepared to assume these new roles as they become available.  The goal is to replace the departing employee as quickly and efficiently as possible with limited interruption to the business.  Succession planning requires an in-depth understanding of the skills the organization needs and the ability to identify key players who have those skills and could step into a new role and be successful.  Sensible succession plans also require that incumbent employees be suited for a series of positions of greater responsibility.  Fulfilling that objective entails matching individual talents with required tasks. A job analysis to determine any skills gap will reveal where there are deficiencies that are impacting performance.

Support a Culture of Learning

Professional development programs are designed to enhance professional acumen and/or advance an employee’s worth to the organization.  Building a learning culture will encourage creativity, innovation and if successful reduce turnover over time.  A culture of learning needs to establish clear links between learning, performance and the strategic goals of the company.  While the company supports the programs that will bridge any gaps in skills the employee needs to be held accountable for their own development plan.  The company needs to make the employee available for training, provide the financial resources and budget to support the culture of learning

Finally, the question that every company faces as it considers a learning culture is its readiness to embrace and support such a program. With the skill gap becoming a bigger issue in the future the HR professional will need to support, promote and encourage their organization to develop a learning culture. This will enable the organization not just to survive in a very competitive business environment but grow and thrive.

Why is On-going Professional Development Critical for the HR Professional?

Professional development and the opportunity to learn and grow is very important for the small business owner.  Learning best practices will assist owners, managers and individual contributors understand what is happening not only in their industry but in other industries as well.  The cross-transfer of technology and new management practices and techniques assist the business owner in trying out new and innovative programs at work.  Professional development and training programs should focus on two key training strategies:

Business, Revenue and Sales Growth Training

Creating a high performance work environment will allow you and your employees to make the transition from selling a product or service to selling a solution.  The value of making this transition will ensure that sales practices and processes are consistent yet meet the needs of the customer.  For small business the “sales” component is typically the most important component.  Attracting new business as well as retaining current customers are key to one’s success.  Furthermore, retaining your skilled in-house talent is critical for the company and the culture.  There are many local resources for business owners to learn new skills that can increase the bottom line.  These resources focus on assisting new as well as seasoned business owners in a variety of industries include manufacturing, retail, and general management.

Employee Satisfaction & Loyalty

An increase in employee loyalty can also boost profits and productivity.  Research has shown that satisfied employees lead to greater profitability and growth.   Allocating training dollars can also reduce turnover, improve product knowledge and diagnose any performance issues of key employees.  Creating a high performance culture of learning will identify the strengths and weaknesses of the individual.  Small businesses today want to understand how they can secure more creativity and support from their employees.  On-going training will allow for business owners to determine how to execute the best strategy from the employee’s perspective by enriching their jobs and assisting them with fine-tuning their skills.

As small business owners it is very important that you remain current and up to date to ensure that you are managing your business and people properly.

Why is Professional Development So Important?

When people use the term professional development, they usually mean a formal process such as a seminar, inter-active workshop, conference or a course at a college or university. However, professional development can also occur in informal contexts such, independent reading and research, on-the-job observation or a formal mentoring program offered through their employer.  Whatever the term, the purpose is the same — to improve your skill sets.  Outlined below are five reasons for the HR professional to continue to attend professional development programs.

Improving Your Verbal Communication Skills

Seminars can be a comfortable, open environment for practicing professional communication techniques. Group discussions and activities can also let you practice and hone your interpersonal skills.  Dealing with conflicting opinions among group members and working together to accomplish assignments or tasks is a very important skill for HR professionals to acquire.

Networking Opportunities

Building new relationships and meeting new contacts is important for career growth. Relationships with clients, speakers and vendors can help you gain knowledge from having meaningful conversations with them as well as determining what resources are available for future initiatives and programs.

Learning Something New

Learning about new and more effective ways to accomplish things and gaining additional knowledge about business subjects and concepts are all benefits of attending professional development workshops.  Putting into practice the knowledge that you just gained is a key goal when learning something new.

Becoming an Expert

Professional Development training enables you to gain more expertise in your field and develop new ideas on ways to improve in your job.  Enhancing your technical skills will allow you to be grow and increase your knowledge as well as be rewarding.

Renewed Motivation

Meeting new people and learning new things often leads to great feelings of inspiration. You will want to share this new enthusiasm with your staff and peers.

Enjoying Your Passion

Attending workshops and seminars are usually very fun. It’s a day away from the office and most people love connecting with others who share their interests and passions.

For the Human Resources professional an important challenge is keeping up with our profession, the law, technology and new techniques.  Attending and being open to professional development opportunities is important for your success.

How Can I Keep Employees Engaged at Work - Five Ideas for You to Consider?

It’s not a mystery that employee engagement continues to decline. The Gallup organization indicates that nearly 70 percent of employees are actively disengaged. With  less than 30% of workers in the United States engaged with their current job it is important for the HR professional, working with the leadership team to implement programs and a culture that encourages engagement.  As a manger, you want hard-working employees who are actively engaged with the work they do. This will make your job easier and more rewarding for both you and your team.  The following five ideas can assist you in adopting a culture of engagement.  If you implement these strategic concepts you can create a culture of engagement:

Focus On Employee Development

There are many reasons job applicants accept a new position such as additional compensation or a better benefits program, a more progressive management or a new industry; however, many applicants accept a new position because they want to advance their career.  One Gallup poll found that 87% of millennials (and 69% of non-millennials) view employee development as important in their position.  Employees want to enhance their skills and continue to be challenged by new tasks.  As an HR professional you can focus on employee development in several ways such as adding new duties to the employee’s position to prevent boredom, allow room for growth in the position, or offer a job rotation program so employees can expand their skills and knowledge.

Share the Company Goals with All

To run a successful company, you need a business plan with a list of goals you want to accomplish. To engage employees, you need to involve them in reaching business goals.  You should set annual, semi-annual, quarterly, and monthly goals so employees have something to work toward. Reaching specific goals is something that encourages employee engagement.  Employees want to know how their position fits in with the other positions in the company and they want to learn how their work affects the business as a whole. You can set general company goals as well as goals within each department. That way, each employee knows how their work is impacting the departmental and overall success of the business.

Create a Culture of Development

If an employee doesn’t have a clear understanding of their duties and responsibilities, they won’t be as engaged as you would like them to be. Instead, they’ll be frustrated and not be as productive which can lead to disengagement.  Employees who can master their workload typically take more pride in what they do. Workers who are eager to meet their goals are engaged with the company. Providing technical and management development training to both new and seasoned employees is one of the most important steps you as an HR professional can promote to ensure employees are engaged at work. With a successful training program, employees will learn how to effectively do their job and be as productive as possible. For many employees, training is also the time when they bond with co-workers and develop a connection to the company. Studies have also shown that the more friends employees have at work, the more engaged they are at work.  A study by TINYpulse, Inc. found that only 28% of employees with no work friends were engaged, versus 69% with 25 or more friends. Training encourages relationships among employees which in turn improves engagement and productivity.

Acknowledge and Recognize Employees

Employees don’t automatically become engaged when you give them more praise, thanks, or any other types of acknowledgment; however, employees can quickly become disengaged if they feel like they’re invisible.  It is important for employees to know their co-workers and develop friendships with them. But it’s also important to develop relationships that value respect and professionalism between employer and employee.  Whe the employee puts in extra effort, acknowledge them.  Management should acknowledge employees for their hard work and according to Gallup, Inc. those employees who aren’t recognized are twice as likely to quit.

Let Employees Do Their Job - Don’t Micro-manage Them

If employees are told exactly what to do and how to do it, they won’t improve and their ability to perform on the job will suffer.  Managers that micromanaging staff can be damaging to your company. According to Forbes, Inc. micromanaging resulted in 68% of employees saying their morale was dampened and 55% said that it led to a decrease in productivity. Low morale leads to actively disengaged workers.  Progressive managers allow their employees to be creative, develop new ways of approaching a task and come up with their own ideas. 

To learn more about keeping employees engaged at work along with the survey process please go to our website at www.innoviative-hrsolutions.com.

Is the Employee Engagement Survey an HR Program or Company Responsibility?

As a result of our firm’s type of work we interact with clients across the country from many industries.  One common theme that we hear over-and-over again is how I can make the survey process not just an HR initiative but rather a program to enhance the employee’s engagement with the company?  If HR professionals adopt this six step approach following the survey the survey process will become more successful:

1.   Study the survey results and initiate dialogue between managers, supervisors, teams and individual contributors to review the findings and identify priorities.  Move as quickly as possible from dialogue to action planning, encouraging individual, team and collective ownership of the process at all levels.

2.   Determine three to five action items at a time. They should be achievable to provide early wins in the process. Attempting to do too much at once limits success.  Using the available reporting determine areas where satisfaction and engagement are low and identify challenges.  Excellent benchmarks include previous surveys, the overall company ratings and the “market”.  Use this tool to measure your success.

3.     Ensure transparency, be inclusive and maintain ongoing communication.  Provide feedback to managers and recognize that HR is there to support and facilitate the process and not fix the problems.

4.     Establish accountability for improvement efforts and results and keep checking on your business partner’s progress.  A key way to ensure that improvement is made by aligning the survey results with the performance management process

5.   Acknowledge and celebrate the improvements achieved as each goal or action item is brought to fruition.  Continue to stress that the achievements made are a result of good planning and the company’s commitment to make improvement.  

6.   Continue to follow-up and hold all people accountable for the success of the survey and the action   planning  process

To learn more about the survey process please go to our website at: www.innovative-hrsolutions.com.

New Year – New Goals what Needs to Happen in 2018?

As the budget process for many companies draws to a close, HR professionals have to prioritized their initiatives for 2018 and assign budget dollars to ensure that their initiatives occur.  Three important HR initiatives are  critical in order to meet the needs of the organization and the employees over the next twelve months.

Compensation Planning

With unemployment currently at 4.1% in the United States many Americans are enjoying the benefits of working in a rewarding position.  However, a limited pool of qualified talent increases competition both in the private and public sectors.  This in turn challenges those HR professionals that are in a compensation planning and design role.  Retaining talent will be a increasing challenge over the next year and without the compensation team evaluating the salary ranges to ensure that benchmark positions are at market, higher turnover maybe the result.  While some organizations view compensation planning as an annual event handled through the merit increase program most progressive companies view the management of direct pay, commission, bonus and incentive programs as an on-going process in order to support the company.  The addition of either a compensation professional or the outsourcing of this type of service is critical for organizations to maintain a competitive pay structure.  Ensuring that the merit increase budget supports an aggressive pay plan along with additional dollars to reward performance is a key responsibility for the Human Resources department.

Professional Development

General employee satisfaction is often determined by how and what employees are learning on the job either through “on the job” training or coordinated professional development activities.   Typically, satisfied employees are more successful in meeting the goals of the company if they are being challenged and are learning new tasks.  Not only is some training mandated by law but HR professionals need to budget for more targeted training in order to support the development needs of the staff.  HR professionals will need to determine what training is needed at their company through a needs analysis.  This process will ensure that employees are provided with the necessary skills and sufficiently trained in order to be productive.  When budgets are tight training will often be the first line item to be eliminated which sends the wrong message to the staff and is often not in the best interest in the company.

HR Infrastructure Upgrades

Continually improving the technology and the company’s infrastructure will often times improve morale, tend to produce greater financial results and will send the message that the leaders of the company are investing in the future of the company.  An annual audit of key indicators to determine where technology and infrastructure improvements are needed will help the leaders of the organization set priorities and allocate financial resources in order to improve the business.  This audit will also set forth a road map for the employees and the leaders to communicate the expectations and goals for the future.  The planning for and the budgeting of these key improvements will assist in holding key leaders accountable and assist the employees in understanding what the long-term goals of the organization are.

Human Resource professionals must prioritized their initiatives and allocate a reasonable budget to ensure that three key initiatives are in place for 2018.  These include an aggressive compensation program to retain talent, on-going professional development to challenge the staff and improved skills and HR infrastructure upgrades to monitor technology improvements and where appropriate allocate the budget for capital improvement.  HR professionals need to prioritize and promote these three key process improvements and if done properly a budget will include these initiatives for 2018.

 

What Makes and Effective Team?

 

We recently completed an employee engagement survey for a hi-tech client and after evaluating the survey results five key findings surfaced.  The respondents indicated that they wanted more transparency from the leadership team along with more timely decisions.  The respondents also indicated that they were looking for more responsibility, an improvement in communication and, finally, a work environment that is more engaging and team oriented.  So. let’s delve deeper into the detailed results.

 

Transparency

 

The survey respondents indicated that the leadership team needed to be more transparent and open with the employees.  A business is a reflection of the leaders of the organization, and if the leaders ensure transparency, the team will mirror this value.  Honesty was determined to be a key value of the company, and if practiced more consistently, the result will be an effective better functioning team that trusts and believes in the executives.

 

Timely Decisions

 

Good leaders are creative, innovative, flexible and decisive; however, decisions-makers may be forced at times to deviate from the set course and make a decision without all of the information.  It is during these critical situations that the team will need to look for guidance, evaluate the data and reach a decision that is the best given the available data.  The survey respondents indicated that the decision making process was often too protracted.  The leaders were afraid of making decisions and were risk adverse.  Some risk is acceptable and the respondents, including the leaders of the company, determined that decisions needed to be more timely even if the information was incomplete.

Ability to Delegate

Trusting the team and learning to delegate to subordinates are an important signs of strength, not weakness. Delegating tasks to department managers and individual contributors is one of the most important skills a leader needs to have.  The key to delegation is identifying the strengths of the team, and capitalizing on those strengths and hold each team member accountable for their decisions.  This will prove to your team that as a leader you trust and believe in them and are fair.  The survey results indicated that the respondents wanted to have more responsibility and management needed to learn to delegate more, provided that decision-making parameters were established and properly communicated.

 

Being a Good Communicator

 

Being a good communicator is critical to all leaders in a growing organization.  Knowing what you want accomplished and explaining the company’s vision for the future to the team are extremely important.  The survey results indicated that the leaders lacked the ability to communicate the vision and strategy.  Healthy lines of communication were also determined to be poor.  The respondents requested that management establish an all-hands meeting, newsletters, webinars and state-of-the-company presentations to improve communication.  Communication is also managing by walking around and creating an open door policy.  Making it a point to talk to the employees on a daily basis was determined to build trust and keep the leaders in the loop.  The results also indicated that the company executives need to make themselves available to discuss the strategic as well as tactical issues.

 

Having a Sense of Humor

 

Because the respondents spend so much time at work the survey results indicated that they want to be a part of a company that can “work-hard and play-hard”.  Challenges happen all the time in business.  A client may go elsewhere, the company website goes down, the telephone lines to customer service are interrupted or the company’s line of credit is not extended.  Guiding the team through these or any challenges without panicking and with a sense of purpose is as important as tackling the underlining reasons why a particular event occurred. It was determined that having a sense of humor will pay off as it will allow the team to laugh at the mistakes and learn from them.  Good leaders are successful in building a team, encouraging healthy discussions and learning from the daily business challenges.

 

In Conclusion

 

The employee survey results were communicated to the employees and action plans were developed and are currently being implemented.  The leaders of the company made a commitment to ensure transparency in the process, be inclusive and maintain on-going communication.  They also agreed to establish accountability measures for improvement by evaluating the progress made over the next survey cycle.  This initiative was truly a team effort regardless of level in the organization.

 

 

 

Is On-going Professional Development Important?

Professional development and the opportunity to learn and grow are very important for the HR professional and business leader.  Learning best practices will allow for managers and individual contributors to understand what is happening not only in their industry but in other industries as well.  The cross-transfer of technology and new management practices and techniques will enable the HR professional to try out new and innovative programs at work.  Professional development and training programs should focus on two key training strategies:

Business, Revenue and Sales Growth Training

 

Creating a high performance environment will allow your employees to make the transition from selling a product or service to selling a solution.  The value of making this transition will ensure that sales practices and processes are consistent yet meet the needs of the customer.  In HR, while the “sales” component is typically not external, key to attracting external talent is the ability to “sell” the company and the culture.

Employee Satisfaction & Loyalty Training

An increase in employee loyalty can boost profits and productivity.  Research has shown that engaged employees lead to greater profitability and growth.   Allocating training dollars to a manager’s budget can reduce turnover, improve product knowledge and diagnose any performance issues of key employees.  Creating a high performance culture of learning will identify the strengths and weaknesses of the individual.  Allocating the resources to bridge the performance gap will create a culture of loyal employees.

Employers today want to understand how they can secure more creativity and support from their employees.  On-going training will allow for the manager to determine how to execute the best strategy from the employee’s perspective by enriching their jobs and assisting them with fine-tuning their skills.

Over the next several months the Society of HR Management, the NGLCC, The California HR Conference sponsored by PIHRA and Arizona SHRM will be hosting their annual leadership conferences across the nation.  These premier organizations will explore progressive HR programs and new technologies.  Conferences provide an excellent venue for HR professionals to network with other business partners from across the United States and the world.  You are encouraged to attend these professional development learning opportunities to increase your knowledge and skill level.

What is a Key Indicators Report in Human Resources?

As we move into the fourth quarter one idea for the Human Resources department is to provide an annual Key Indicators Report to the leadership team.  This report would summarize the Human Resource activities over the past year along with establishing goals and objectives for the organization for the next 12 months.  In essence, this is a performance review on the function.  What would the sections of the Key Indicators Report include?

Benefits Plans

Each year HR departments examine the benefit plans to ensure that they are at market and are meeting the needs of the employees and their eligible dependents.  This section of the report would include the costs associated the each benefit and the changes that were implemented.  Typically the benefits offered by the company are often one of the key drivers of retention.  With a detailed analysis of the plans offered, along with the expenses associated with each plan, management can be in a better position to determine if the benefits are in alignment with the company’s long term strategy.  Additional examples would include the dollars associated with the 401(k) employer match and soft benefits such as a gym membership or an EAP.

Compensation

Pay and rewards are key elements for also retaining staff.  Each year HR department evaluate the salary ranges, job descriptions, pay and incentive plans.  As part of a Key Indicators Report this section would evaluate the merit increase program to determine if those employees that receive the highest performance ratings are also receiving the largest percent increases.  A simple matrix evaluating pay and performance can be created to summarize the performance process correlating that with pay.  Additional examples to include in this section with be a summary of any changes to the incentive plans, any modifications to the performance review document or process as well as examining the merit increase program to project future labor expense.

Talent Management

Turnover is very expensive for companies today; particularly in a tight job market.  As part of the Key Indicators Report this section would evaluate the number of employment requisitions filled over the past 12 months and the source for finding talent, any associated expenses filling positions as part of a search process and the use of temporary services.  This evaluation will also assist management in finding how many days it takes to replace a position and identify if there are any trends in with respect to turnover.

Leadership Development

Employee development is critical in today’s job market and this section of the report should include the training programs offered by the company, the number of employees that participated in company-sponsored training programs and the outcomes as a result of allowing employees to participate in professional development. Employees who enjoy their job and are satisfied with their career are more engaged and aligned with the business.  Engaged employees who believe that the company is willing to invest in their development will also remain at the organization longer which can result in less turnover.  Elements of this section of the report would include an analysis of the programs offered, the costs associated with the training and the needs analysis that was conducted in order to determine what programs would be of benefit to the staff.

Finally, the report should be presented to the leadership team in person to stress the importance of the Human Resources function over the past fiscal year as well as looking to the future.  This opportunity to review past accomplishments can also lead into a discussion of the future budget, programs and additional headcount to support the needs of the organization.