Often now treated as partners as opposed to a lower level department, the role of HR has grown drastically in its influence over the past years. By taking an active role to manage the human capital in a way that aligns with business goals, they have transformed the landscape by proving that well taken care of employees do nothing but benefit corporations. As 2014 has ended, it is central to look to the future. Though similar issues remain a constant focus, there are three major issues foreseeable on the ever changing landscape of the horizon.
Originally defined as attracting, recruiting and retaining talent, managing talent is beginning to shift focus.
Instead of merely rehabilitating the poor performers, companies are beginning to spend much more time on rewarding their top talent. Such a transition varies greatly in execution from company to company, but the vital component to expanding this feature lies with HR’s ability to unite workforce desires with management designs. On top of this, many businesses are further pursuing individually designed retention programs aimed at tailoring careers for the best on their teams.
Similar to retaining basic talent, leadership development is far more important now than it ever has been as the older generation starts to make way for the younger. Even though the time and money needed to take current employees and train them for upper management responsibilities is large, it is of utmost strategic value to pursue this avenue. By simply convincing upper management to dedicate resources toward integrating such development at every level, corporations have the ability to build clear and direct pipelines to the more senior positions.
Tying into the leadership dilemma are workforce demographics and, namely, the aging workforce. With a large divide between older workers well attuned to the rigorous needs of leadership positions and the influx of younger talent that has never been trained, companies are in desperate need of a way to preserve the knowledge of the older within the minds of the young while still inspiring them. It will inevitably fall to HR to oversee this transfer of knowledge by acting as mentor. This will prove to be quite the challenge as values and preferences of both generations will need to be catered to.
The New Year is a time for change. With it comes great advances and even greater challenges. For HR, 2015 holds a plethora of issues that must take precedence. Management, development and demographics are the top concerns professionals are witnessing emerge in prevalence. Luckily, with planning and awareness, each one is a potential avenue of growth. In the end, success comes down to open communication and an ability to marry the plans of the upper management with the needs of the employees.
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2 Comments
heber
@NewToHR http://t.co/6WtmxUYyQb
Sanderson Rec
@NewToHR collaborating with other departments and becoming better strategic antipators (using big data) are 2 key challenges