As anyone who works in HR can tell you, it is about much more than simply hiring new staff and dealing with internal issues. At its core, HR is about communicating a business’s values, improving employee engagement, and developing its people. That’s not to say that HR teams don’t have a long list of ‘nuts and bolts’ activity to deal with, because they do – more than most teams within a business!
A typical HR executive will be working across multiple areas, from the day-to-day admin of human resources, which covers things like holidays, payroll, and general admin, to things like recruitment, interviews and on boarding – it’s a busy department.
With this in mind, it’s worth thinking about the different ways in which your HR team could become more efficient, allowing them to get more done, by working smarter not harder. Here are 3 surefire ways of improving the efficiency of your HR team today..
1. Let technology do some of the leg work
One of the biggest pain points for HR teams is the mountains of admin which naturally come with the territory. Having to deal with employee absences, holidays, sick leave, updating bank details, role and salary changes and bonuses can soon add up to a considerable pile of work, especially for businesses with hundreds of employees.
Investing in tools, such as HR software, can help to automate many of these manual tasks, freeing up hours each day for your team to focus on the more important things, like employee engagement and development – both of which are key revenue driving activities. Not only does this help with efficiency, it also helps to improve the well being of the HR team, who would almost certainly prefer to drop manual admin tasks and focus on areas they’re more interested in.
2. Communication should be priority #1
It’s vital that the staff within a business are 100% on board and invested in the companies values and key objectives. It ensures the entire business is aligned and singing from the same hymn sheet. This in turn helps to ensure employees are engaged in the roles, their objectives and wider business goals. This all starts with the HR team, and should be a high priority focus.
Having a HR team responsible for communicating the businesses values and goals isn’t just an outbound activity. HR teams will need to have their ears close to the ground and ensure they have a detailed understanding of how employees view the business values, and create a feedback process which accounts for all staff and results in actionable insight.
3. Grow your people
One of the reasons often cited by HR professions as a reason for starting a career in HR, is that they relish the chance to help develop others, and help make them the best versions of themselves. Being able to see the new junior developing over the years into a senior position is extremely satisfying, and a sign that the HR team’s efforts are well engineered and working.
There are numerous ways in which a HR team can plan to improve at developing their employees, and it doesn’t have to cost the earth. For businesses with larger budgets to invest in it’s people, there are obviously a range of options available, from high-end training, internal speakers, conferences, and technical training. However, many businesses simply do not have the budget for development – but this shouldn’t stop them. In the age of the internet, training is far more within reach than it used to be, with free and cheap online training courses, as well as a wealth of free information online.
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