- Rosabeth Moss Kanter
Chief Executives are worried. The translation of strategy into organizational
performance is the critical success factor.
So now is the time when the HR practitioner can and must (if not already), become
recognized as a business partner. This is a critical point for the HR profession and its
role in the future. And I believe that many HR managers can step up to the
challenge.
Strategic HR managers focus on outcomes that support and drive the responses to
the strategic challenges facing organizations. These HR practitioners recognize that
their role is to work with the executive team to anticipate, plan and manage the
challenges of constant change and innovation and to ensure that strategies are
implemented.
10 steps to becoming strategic business partner
If you are not already at the executive table, here are some starting points to
becoming a business partner:
1. If it has not already happened, take a hard look at what your HR department
currently does and whether it is meeting the organization’s strategic business needs
in the most effective and cost-efficient way.
To free yourself from non-strategic HR activities, ensure that an effective and cost-
effective administrative process is in place to deliver essential HR activities.
Outsource any activities that can be more efficiently managed by external providers.
Improve delivery of HR services by creating and implementing an IT infrastructure for
HR that integrates all traditional HR activities from policy to delivery and incorporates
self-service, knowledge base systems, case management, HR information systems,
data warehouse capabilities.
2. Analyse and identify how existing HR activities align with and support the business
strategy. Eliminate any activities that do not contribute or add value to the strategic
goals of the business. Focus on outcomes not output. Assess the skills and
capabilities you need and don’t need in the HR department and re-structure as
necessary.
3. Examine the existing employee capability of your organization. Do you currently
have a workforce with the skills, knowledge and ability to drive the business
strategy? Work with the executive team to explicitly identify and name or describe
what this means for the organization in real terms. Work with that team also to
predict as far as possible, what capability will be needed 12 months, 3 years, 5 years
from now.
4. Develop both short term and longer-term strategies around building and sustaining
employee capability. Explore in detail all the indicators and predictors of attraction,
retention and turn over rates. Research the changing demographics of the
workforce. Develop strategies to deal with anticipated and unanticipated staff or skills
shortages.
5. Explore the levels of employee motivation and commitment to the organization’s
business strategy. Do they know what the strategy is? Do they know what the
measures of success are? Do they know how the organization is performing against
its targets? Develop strategies, measures and indicators for influencing and tracking
motivation and commitment.
6. Frankly identify the leadership breadth and depth in your organization. Work with
other executives and managers to define what leadership means for your business.
Then set in place the relevant strategies to develop it. Be careful of generic
approaches in this area. While leadership skills may have some common and
transposable features, the key to effective leadership capability involves taking into
account the business strategy, the organization’s actual and desirable (if different)
culture, and the results that are needed.
7. Assess your organization’s approach to building the necessary skills and
competencies to deliver your organization’s strategy. Is commitment to learning part
of the culture? Does it need to be? What formal and informal systems are in place to
ensure that learning takes place? What does your organization do to capture that
learning and knowledge development and turn it into an organizational capability?
8. Measure your organization’s change capability. Does it align and support your
organization’s strategy? Are change management skills deeply embedded in your
organization? Are employees equipped, motivated and supported to innovate and
change as the business demands? Has your organization developed its own change
management methodology? What’s your organization’s success rate in change
implementation and management? What’s the role of HR people in change
implementation and management? Do the HR and other systems assist or hinder
organizational change? Set up a project team with representatives from across the
organization to explore these issues and develop a strategic response.
9. Coach your executives and managers in how HR people and HR management,
practices, systems, policies etc can be utilized strategically to deliver business
results. Demonstrate how focus and alignment can turn ‘people issues’ into your
competitive advantage. Earn your place at the table by demonstrating a sound
understanding of the business challenges. Translate the HR initiatives into the
impact on the bottom line. And do not shy away from surfacing the barriers and
obstacles to outstanding organizational performance.
10. Do it now. Don’t wait to be asked. The competitive globalized world of business
will squeeze out non-responsive organizations. Identify and start building your
organization’s unique capabilities. Now, more than ever is the best opportunity and
most pressing imperative for HR to assert itself and its role in the business.
This article is based on a presentation Anne was invited to give this month to the
Annual Conference of the Arabian Society for Human Resource Management in
Bahrain.
