Author: Arend Pryor | Created: 03/15/2021
Details: Sharing content created as part of pursuing my MBA degree
Assignment: The business environment changes so quickly that advice is often outdated. Assume you are a consultant. Based on your experience and readings, think about a few significant changes you see in the business environment today.
Analyze 3 changes that you believe will have the most impactful change for organizations. Answer the following:
What impacts will each of those changes have on HRM?
What should an HR Director be doing today to be ready for the impacts of each of those changes?
The changes that take place in the business world today are frequent and at times, can be very complex. This has a direct impact on the world of Human Resources Management (HRM) and the Human Resources (HR) Directors. Especially those who look to stay ahead of the game by looking for trends in the marketplace and making plans to implement these changes while staying aligned with the organization. Trends such as a need for employees to work from home (WFH), moving away from annual performance reviews, and utilizing predictive analytics to plan for future HR activities. Utilizing a strategic HRM approach to respond to such trends, allows for companies to effectively plan and continue to meet their goals (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, & Wright, 2019).
Prior to the recent coronavirus pandemic, the ability for full time office employees to WFH was offered as a job perk and not a requirement. Additionally, it was only offered for those where it made sense. However, as a result of mass numbers of people quarantining with their families during the recent pandemic, WFH has now turned into a requirement in order for many companies to remain in business and to keep their employees safe. One of the impacts on HRM during this time has been in the area of work-flow analysis. This requires identifying the inputs required for a particular job, tasks associated with processing, and identifying the quality of the outputs or results (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, & Wright, 2019). For jobs that require employees to view and discuss sensitive information from home, new policies and training have become necessary to maintain compliance of viewing and processing sensitive data away from the office. This has also impacted the communication methods used by HR staff and caused an increased reliance on currently used technology and possibly those never before used. As an HR Director, some of the areas to focus on in order to be ready for the changes of having employees work from home should include:
Policies and Procedures: Identify changes needed to existing policies and procedures to account for working from home.
Training and Development: What impact will this change have on the company’s ability to administer training and development programs? Will some programs need to be converted from in-person to virtual?
Discrimination and Harassment: Add a new section to this training that outlines expectations of employees when working from home and include situations that may occur.
Another change on the horizon for many companies is that of moving from annual performance reviews to a system that provides employees with feedback on a more frequent basis, such as every two to three months (Milligan, 2017). From an HRM perspective, this deals with the process of performance management, which outlines results to be achieved by groups within the company, creating a plan to achieve these goals, evaluating performance, and providing feedback (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, & Wright, 2019). The biggest HRM related impact of a change like this would be a need to redesign the company’s current performance management process and analyze each step to identify what changes to make and how frequently to provide feedback. As part of the decision process in preparing for a change like this, HR Directors should look to do the following:
Communication: Present the idea to the senior management team, talk about the issues with the current process, and talk about the potential benefits of a more frequent model
Research: Gather info on how other companies have implemented similar plans and identify best practices
Proposal: Create a proposal for redesigning the current performance management plan including how best to align it with the company’s current goals and strategies, and gather feedback.
Companies have been using data to analyze areas such as sales and inventory, which in turn drive business decisions in these areas. Human resources departments also make use of data to analyze labor supply and demand in order to forecast and identify potential labor shortages in their industry (Noe, Hollenbeck, Gerhart, & Wright, 2019). With this in mind, it should come as no surprise that some HRM groups are now looking to push things a bit further by adopting the use of predictive analytics for areas like recruiting, health and safety and even employee retention. The impact of using predictive analytics would be in its ability to help assess the probability of future outcomes and identify potential opportunities and risks ("Predictive Analytics", 2021). As an example, this could help company’s identify whether a candidate is likely to be a top performer based on possessing characteristics similar to that of its top performers. In preparation of this move, HR Directions should plan for the following activities:
Research: Determine what resources and skills are required to perform this type of analysis and either train or hire additional staff. Identify the areas to examine and determine what specific measures and data elements should be captured.
Communication: Review the idea with the senior management team, talk about the benefits of such analysis and the expected outcomes. Get feedback from the team and set goals that align with those of the company.
With so many influences in the marketplace today, keeping up with the changes and planning ahead can be tough to manage. This is why HR Directors play an important role in identifying these trends and determining how they will impact the HRM environment. Some of the most popular trends on the rise today include the need for more employees to work from home, moving towards a more frequent performance review process, and using predictive analytics as a tool for helping make future plans and decisions. Identifying the impact that these trends can have and planning an approach to take in advance can aid in the SHRM process and ensure success for the future.
References
Milligan, S. (2019). 6 trends that changed HR over the past decade. Retrieved from
Noe, R. A., Hollenbeck, J. R., Gerhart, B. A., & Wright, P. M. (2019). Human resource
management: Gaining a competitive advantage. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill
Education.
Predictive analytics(2021). Retrieved from
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