5 HR Trends to Look Out for in 2020

Editor's Note: Take a look at our featured best practice, HR Strategy: Job Leveling (26-slide PowerPoint presentation). Job Leveling is a disciplined approach to gauge the value of work for individual positions across the organization. It entails ascertaining the nature of work done by each position, authority levels, and the effect of each job on business results. Jobs that are configured inadequately bread [read more]

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The human resources department is one of the key cogs that helps make a business go round. Without your employees, your business simply couldn’t function, so it’s important your HR department is functioning at a high level in order to keep everything running smoothly.

As you would expect, HR has changed greatly with the advent of new technology and this means there are plenty of opportunities to streamline your HR in 2020.

So, what areas should you be looking to improve on in your HR in 2020, and how can you go about it?

1.    HRIS Tools

Human Resource Information Systems can make a big difference to the performance of your HR department. Your HR department is responsible for a wide variety of tasks and an HRIS helps bring all these tasks into one easy to use system.

HRIS tools help eliminate inefficiencies and make tasks such as payroll, time and labor management, benefits, time off, and recruitment that bit easier.

2.    Flexible Working

Being able to work flexibly has been a huge positive for employees since business began, but in 2020 we have the technology to allow more people to benefit from flexible working hours.

Your workforce can easily contribute just as well when they’re out of the office as they can when they’re in the office, so allow them to set their own schedule. Studies show that remote workers are often more efficient than their office-based counterparts so empower your employees to work flexibly and reap the benefits.

3.    Office Wellbeing

Your employees spend a huge chunk of their lives in the office, so it needs to be a space that’s encourages wellbeing and happiness. If you can offer your employees a space they feel comfortable working in and want to return to every day, then you go a long way to keeping your best workers happy.

There are lots of little things you can do to encourage this. From subsidized healthy meals to standing desks, yoga sessions, visiting chiropractic wellness sessions, the list is endless. All the small things you do for your employees add up and can make a big difference.

4.    Internal Promotion

The workforce is gradually changing, and millennials are beginning to make up a large part of it.  Few people like getting looked over for promotions, but studies show that millennials are particularly driven to succeed and will quickly look elsewhere if they think their goals aren’t being met.

Having a system for internal promotion is a great way to keep your existing workforce happy and lower those turnover rates. You want to keep your best employees in your company and through internal promotion, you have the ability to do this.

5.    Communication Tools

We have access to more communication methods than ever before, and yet it’s common for employees to feel isolated within a big company. It’s vitally important that your business has open communication flows and that everyone has easy access to the tools they need.

Making sure your business is using modern, effective communication tools to enable employees to do their best work is a great place to start.

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The purpose of Human Resources (HR) is to ensure our organization achieves success through our people. Without the right people in place—at all levels of the organization—we will never be able to execute our Strategy effectively.

This begs the question: Does your organization view HR as a support function or a strategic one? Research shows leading organizations leverage HR as a strategic function, one that both supports and drives the organization's Strategy. In fact, having strong HRM capabilities is a source of Competitive Advantage.

This has never been more true than right now in the Digital Age, as organizations must compete for specialized talent to drive forward their Digital Transformation Strategies. Beyond just hiring and selection, HR also plays the critical role in retaining talent—by keeping people engaged, motivated, and happy.

Learn about our Human Resource Management (HRM) Best Practice Frameworks here.