The new possible: How HR can help build the organization of the future

Business leaders watching their organizations experience profound upheaval because of the COVID-19 crisis may find it difficult to understand what it all means until the dust settles.

But the pandemic hasn’t afforded them, or any of us, that luxury. It has created profound and immediate changes to how societies operate and how individuals interact and work. We have all witnessed an at-scale shift to remote work, the dynamic reallocation of resources, and the acceleration of digitization and automation to meet changing individual and organizational needs.

Organizations have by and large met the challenges of this crisis moment. But as we move toward imagining a postpandemic era , a management system based on old rules—a hierarchy that solves for uniformity, bureaucracy, and control—will no longer be effective. Taking its place should be a model that is more flexible and responsive, built around four interrelated trends: more connection, unprecedented automation, lower transaction costs, and demographic shifts.

To usher in the organization of the future, chief human-resources officers (CHROs) and other leaders should do nothing less than reimagine the basic tenets of organization. Emerging models are creative, adaptable, and antifragile . 1 Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder , New York, NY: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2012. Corporate purpose fuels bold business moves. “Labor” becomes “talent.” Hierarchies become networks of teams . Competitors become ecosystem collaborators. And companies become more human: inspiring, collaborative, and bent on creating an employee experience that is meaningful and enjoyable .

After the pandemic erupted last year, we spoke with 350 HR leaders about the role of uncertainty in their function. They told us that over the next two years they wanted to prioritize initiatives that strengthen their organization’s ability to drive change in leadership, culture, and employee experience.

How are they doing? In this article, we discuss ways that CHROs can continue to meet the moment by rethinking processes in three fundamental areas: identity, agility, and scalability.

How HR fits in the big picture

McKinsey has recently conducted research on how businesses can best organize for the future . The experimentation underway suggests that future-ready companies share three characteristics: they know what they are and what they stand for; they operate with a fixation on speed and simplicity; and they grow by scaling up their ability to learn and innovate.

HR can help propel this transformation by facilitating positive change in these three key areas, as well as with nine imperatives that radiate out from them (Exhibit 1).

Identity: HR can clarify the meaning of purpose, value, and culture

Companies that execute with purpose have greater odds of creating significant long-term value generation , which can lead to stronger financial performance, increased employee engagement, and higher customer trust.

Home in on the organization’s purpose

What is your company’s core reason for being, and where can you have a unique, positive impact on society? Now more than ever, you need good answers to those questions—purpose is not a choice but a necessity.

CHROs play a vital role in making sure the organization is living its purpose and values . HR can articulate and role-model desired individual mindsets and behaviors linked to purpose by identifying “moments that matter” in the company’s culture and translating purpose into a set of leadership and employee norms and behaviors.

For instance, commercial-vehicle manufacturer Scania holds an annual “Climate Day,” during which the company stops operations for one hour to hold sustainability training, in line with its purpose to “drive the shift toward a sustainable transport system.” 2 Scania Annual and Sustainability Report 2019 , Scania, scania.com.

HR can also ensure that clear changes are made to recruitment and capability-building processes by determining the characteristics of a “purpose driven” employee and embedding these attributes within recruitment, development, and succession planning.

HR can also incorporate purpose-driven metrics into compensation and performance decisions. Companies across industries have embarked on these metrics lately. For example, Seventh Generation, a maker of cleaning and personal-care products, recently built into its incentive system sustainability targets for the company’s entire workforce, in service of its goal of being a zero-waste company by 2025. Shell has plans to set short-term carbon-emissions targets and link executive compensation to performance against them.

Think deeply about talent

Organizations that can reallocate talent in step with their strategic plans are more than twice as likely to outperform  their peers. To link talent to value, the best talent should be shifted into critical value-driving roles. That means moving away from a traditional approach, in which critical roles and talent are interchangeable and based on hierarchy.

Getting the best people into the most important roles requires a disciplined look at where the organization really creates value and how top talent contributes . Consider Tesla’s effort to create a culture of fast-moving innovation, or Apple’s obsessive focus on user experience. These cultural priorities are at the core of these companies’ value agendas. The roles needed to turn such priorities into value are often related to R&D and filled with talented, creative people.

To enable this shift, HR should manage talent rigorously by building an analytics capability to mine data to hire, develop, and retain the best employees. HR business partners, who articulate these staffing needs to the executive management team, should consider themselves internal service providers that ensure high returns on human-capital investments. For example, to engage business leaders in a regular review of talent, they can develop semiautomated data dashboards that track the most important metrics for critical roles.

Create the best employee experience possible

Companies know that a better employee experience means a better bottom line. Successful organizations work together with their people to create personalized, authentic, and motivating experiences that tap into purpose to strengthen individual, team, and company performance.

The HR team plays a crucial role in forming employee experience. Organizations in which HR facilitates a positive employee experience are 1.3 times more likely to report organizational outperformance, McKinsey research has shown . This has become even more important throughout the pandemic, as organizations work to build team morale and positive mindsets .

HR should facilitate and coordinate employee experience. Organizations can support this by helping HR evolve, strengthening the function’s capability so that it becomes the architect of the employee experience. Airbnb, for instance, rebranded the CHRO role as global head of employee experience. PayPal focused on HR’s capability and processes to create a better experience for employees, including coaching HR professionals on measuring and understanding that experience, and using technology more effectively.

Strengthen leadership and build capacity for change

Culture is the foundation on which exceptional financial performance is built. Companies with top-quartile cultures (as measured by McKinsey’s Organizational Health Index ) post a return to shareholders 60 percent higher  than median companies and 200 percent higher than those in the bottom quartile.

Culture change should be business-led, with clear and highly visible leadership from the top, and execution should be rigorous and consistent. Companies are more than five times more likely to have a successful transformation  when leaders have role-modeled the behavior changes they were asking their employees to make.

To strengthen an organization’s identity, HR should ask the following questions:

  • How can we develop an energizing sense of purpose that has a tangible impact on our strategic choices and ways of working?
  • How can we identify key talent roles and focus them on creating value?
  • How can we build a data-driven, systemic understanding of our organizational health?

Agility: HR’s role in flattening the organization

Organizational agility improves both company performance and employee satisfaction . HR can be instrumental in shifting an organization from a traditional hierarchy to a marketplace that provides talent and resources to a collection of empowered small teams, helping them to achieve their missions and acting as a common guiding star.

Adopt new organizational models

For instance, as a part of a multiyear agile transformation, a large European bank worked to establish an in-house agile academy led jointly by coaches and the HR function to drive capability building for the transformation.

To be successful, a transformation should touch every facet of an organization—people, process, strategy, structure, and technology. HR can help create an iterative approach by developing core elements of the people-management process, including new career paths for agile teams, revamped performance management, and capability building. It should lead by example as well, by shifting to agile “flow to work” pools  in which individuals are staffed to prioritized tasks.

Create a flexible—and magnetic—workforce

Because many roles are becoming disaggregated and fluid, work will increasingly be defined in terms of skills . The accelerating pace of technological change is widening skill gaps, making them more common and more quick to develop. To survive and deliver on their strategic objectives, all organizations will need to reskill and upskill significant portions of their workforce over the next ten years.

According to a 2018 McKinsey survey , 66 percent of executives said that “addressing potential skills gaps related to automation/digitization” within their workforces was at least a “top ten priority.” HR should help prioritize these talent shifts.

In a more recent survey McKinsey conducted with global executives  about the postpandemic workforce, more than a third of respondents said that their organizations were unprepared to address the skill gaps exacerbated by automation and digitization. The shift to digitization has accelerated during the pandemic: 85 percent of companies have picked up the pace of their digitization (including a 48 percent rise in the digitization of customer channels). In light of these trends and the need to shift skills, there is a clear business rationale behind workforce strategy and planning.

HR should be a strategic partner for the business in this regard, by ensuring that the right talent is in place to deliver on core company objectives. HR can also drive workforce planning by reviewing how disruptive trends affect employees, identifying future core capabilities, and assessing how supply and demand apply to future skills gaps.

Moving to a skills focus also requires innovative sourcing to meet specific work-activity needs (for example, the gig economy and automation), and changing which roles companies need to source with traditional full-time-equivalent positions and which can be done by temporary workers or contractors. In the survey with global executives, about 70 percent said that two years from now they expect to use more temporary workers and contractors than they did before the COVID-19 crisis.

During the pandemic, we’ve seen how organizations have come together to utilize talent with transferable skills. For instance, McKinsey has supported Talent Exchange , a platform that uses artificial intelligence to help workers displaced by the crisis.

Make better decisions—faster

Companies that make decisions at the right organizational level  and that have fewer reporting layers are more likely to deliver consistently on quality, velocity, and performance outcomes and thus outperform their industry peers. The pandemic has trained the spotlight on the power of fast decision making, as many organizations have had to move dramatically more quickly than they had originally envisioned. For example, one retailer had a plan for curbside delivery that would take 18 months to roll out; once the COVID-19 crisis hit, the plan went operational in just two days.

HR can help with strong decision making by empowering employees  to take risks in a culture that rewards them for doing so. McKinsey research revealed that employees who are empowered to make decisions and who receive sufficient coaching from leaders were three times more likely to say that their companies’ delegated decisions were both high quality and speedy .

Introduce next-generation performance management

Companies are experimenting with a wide variety of approaches to improve how they manage performance. According to a McKinsey Global Survey , half of respondents said that performance management had not had a positive effect on employee or organizational performance. Two-thirds reported the implementation of at least one meaningful modification to their performance-management systems.

We identified three practices—managers’ coaching, linking employee goals to business priorities, and differentiated compensation—that increase the chances that a performance-management system will positively affect employee performance. HR plays an important role in embedding these practices in performance management by supporting the goal-setting process, decoupling the compensation and development discussion, investing in manager’s capability building, and embedding technology and analytics to simplify the performance-management process.

To strengthen an organization’s agility, HR should ask the following questions:

  • Can we enable more effective decision making by pushing decisions to the edges of the organization, creating psychological safety  that empowers people, and building capabilities?
  • How do we accelerate the shift to a more diverse and deeply motivated talent base, one that is supported through a human-centric culture that enables outperformance and superior experience?
  • Which organizational areas or end-to-end value-creation streams would most benefit from a shift to new ways of working and organizing?

Scalability: How HR can drive value creation

The new normal of large, rapidly recurring skills gaps means that reskilling efforts must be transformational, not business as usual or piecemeal.

Lean into a learning culture by reskilling and upskilling

Effective reskilling and upskilling will require employees to embark on a blended-learning journey that includes traditional learning (training, digital courses, job aids) with nontraditional methods (enhanced peer coaching, learning networks, the mass personalization of change , “nudging” techniques).

For instance, Microsoft shifted from a “know it all” to a “learn it all” ethos, incorporating open learning days, informal social learning opportunities, learning data for internal career paths, and new platforms and products for its partner network.

Memo to HR: Look in the mirror

To drive and facilitate these workforce initiatives, HR must transform itself first. Talent is consistently ranked as a top three priority for CEOs, yet many lack confidence in HR’s ability to deliver. 3 Dominic Barton, Dennis Carey, and Ram Charan, “People before strategy: A new role for the CHRO,” Harvard Business Review , July– August 2015, Volume 93, Number 7–8, pp. 62–71, hbr.org. The HR function is often overburdened with transactional work and not well equipped to create value for the enterprise.

Yet people-first organizations look at business problems from the perspective of how talent creates value, and HR is well positioned to bring data-driven insights to talent decisions. HR can arm itself with data-driven insights and people analytics to support talent-driven transformation, and HR business partners can then consistently make talent decisions based on data.

Create a value-enhancing HR ecosystem

McKinsey analysis has shown that a preponderance of executives recognize how much external partnerships help companies differentiate themselves. Increased value can be created through ecosystems where partners share data, code, and skills. Success now requires “blurry boundaries” and mutually dependent relationships to share value. The need of the hour is for HR to collaborate on and leverage the landscape of HR tech solutions across the employee life cycle—from learning, talent acquisition, and performance management to workforce productivity—to build an effective HR ecosystem.

To strengthen an organization’s scalability, HR should ask the following questions:

  • How can we set up platforms spanning multiple players in the ecosystem and enable new sources of value and employee experience through them?
  • How can we become the best company to partner with in the ecosystem? How can we set ourselves up for fast partnering and make the ecosystem accessible?
  • What are the critical skills that drive future value creation and how can we upskill our talent base accordingly?

Looking ahead: How transformation happens

As the organization of the future takes shape, HR will be the driving force for many initiatives: mapping talent to value; making the workforce more flexible; prioritizing strategic workforce planning, performance management, and reskilling; building an HR platform; and developing an HR tech ecosystem. For other initiatives, HR can help C-suite leaders push forward on establishing and radiating purpose, improving employee experience, driving leadership and culture, and simplifying the organization.

Given the magnitude of the task and the broad portfolio of value-creating HR initiatives, prioritization is critical.

In May of 2020, HR leaders attending a McKinsey virtual conference indicated that over the next two years, they wanted to prioritize initiatives that strengthen agility and identity. That included 27 percent who said that they would focus on responding with agility and 25 percent who prioritized driving leadership, culture, and employee experience. Next came mapping talent to value and establishing and radiating purpose, each at 13 percent (Exhibit 2).

At a second conference for HR leaders, 4 Survey of human-resources leaders at “Reimagine: Organizing for the future,” a McKinsey virtual conference held in June 2020. about half of the assembled CHROs said that they were focusing on reimagining the fundamentals of the organization and rethinking the operating model and ways of working in the next normal.

We see organizations making this shift. Throughout the pandemic, HR has played a central role in how companies build organizational resilience and drive value . CHROs and their teams can continue on this path by connecting talent to business strategy and by implementing changes in the three core areas of identity, agility, and scalability, as well as the nine imperatives that flow from them.

A more flexible and responsive model will also help organizations meet coming demographic shifts and other workforce changes. Millennials are becoming the dominant group in the workforce (with Gen Z close behind), creating novel challenges for organizations to meet their needs. The prominence of the gig economy and alternate models of working will only grow, with 162 million workers in the European Union and the United States working independently— 70 percent of them by choice . And the rapid spread of digital technology and automation is dramatically reshaping the global economy, with half the tasks people perform already automatable today.

These trends are not new, but they are approaching tipping points, placing organization at the top of the CEO agenda. CHROs can help leadership by transforming their own HR organizations: developing and reinforcing clear priorities; embracing new ways of working, including rapid iteration and testing with the business and seeking explicit feedback; and revamping the HR skill set by embracing agility and digital capabilities.

While clearly a trial by fire, the pandemic also provides an opportunity for HR to accelerate its shift from a service to a strategic function, helping to shape a more dynamic organization that is ready to meet the postcrisis future.

Asmus Komm is a partner in McKinsey’s Hamburg office, Florian Pollner is a partner in the Zurich office, Bill Schaninger is a senior partner in the Philadelphia office, and Surbhi Sikka is a consultant in the Gurugram office.

The authors wish to thank Talha Khan for his contributions to this article.

This article was edited by Barbara Tierney, a senior editor in the New York office.

Explore a career with us

Related articles.

Organizing for the future: Nine keys to becoming a future-ready company

Organizing for the future: Nine keys to becoming a future-ready company

HR says talent is crucial for performance—and the pandemic proves it

HR says talent is crucial for performance—and the pandemic proves it

The future of work after COVID-19

The future of work after COVID-19

I am looking for…

I need support for…

  • Login or other general help
  • Paycheck Protection Program

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

HR strategy

  • HR Outsourcing
  • HR Strategy

Human resource (HR) strategy maximizes the potential of an organization’s human capital so it can achieve its broader business objectives. For some employers, however, transitioning HR from a purely transactional function to a strategic one can be challenging. But considering the competitive advantages enjoyed by talent-driven organizations, it’s an obstacle worth overcoming.

What is an HR strategy?

HR strategy is a roadmap for solving an organization’s biggest challenges with people-centric solutions. This approach requires HR input during policy creation and elevates the importance of recruitment , talent management , compensation, succession planning and corporate culture.

HR Strategy

Why is HR strategy important?

Without strategy behind it, HR remains an administrative function and business growth may be hindered. Consider, for instance, two different companies that would like to expand into new markets.

One of them is strategic and gives HR a seat at the table from the very beginning. It researches locations that would be the most advantageous from an employment standpoint and then develops a long-term plan for networking highly-qualified, passive candidates in the chosen regions.

The other company takes transactional approaches to solving problems. Instead of including HR in its expansion discussions, it delegates a hiring manager to recruit candidates without knowing if the desired talent exists in that market or if the employment rules add a significant number of unexpected obstacles.

As the first example shows, when HR is involved and integrated at many levels of an organization, it can create a powerful advantage.

How to create a human resource strategy

Creating an HR strategy means taking a hard look at an organization’s strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats – a process also known as a SWOT analysis. Every business is different, but most follow these steps:

  • Understand the business and its objectives Talk to people throughout the organization to gain a full understanding of the business’s past achievements, the products or services that it offers today, and what it hopes to accomplish in the future.
  • Evaluate employee skillsets Review employee performance, resumes, project history and continuing education to assess the collective workforce skill level.
  • Conduct a gap analysis Determine if employees have what they need to maximize their productivity or if investments in additional resources are necessary.
  • Assess talent strategy Regularly auditing compensation, benefits, work environments and employee engagement can help employers compete for new talent and retain valued workforce members.
  • Develop existing employees If any employees appear ready for new challenges or have skills outside their current role, create a development plan that will allow them grow to with the business.
  • Limit turnover Get to the root cause of why people leave an organization and create a comprehensive plan to address the problem and prevent labor shortages.
  • Plan ahead for succession Knowing which employees can easily fill other positions, should they become vacant, helps lessen disruptions when someone abruptly leaves the organization.
  • Rely on analytics Compensation history, turnover rates, employee engagement and other HR metrics can guide strategic decisions.
  • Create a mission and vision statement Mission and vision statements summarize the HR strategy and serve as a litmus test for all policies and decisions thereafter.

What are the benefits of strategic human resources planning?

One of the primary benefits of syncing HR strategy with broader business initiatives is that it helps organizations allocate budgets in ways that will maximize their return on investment (ROI). Employers who take this approach to HR, may also be able to:

  • Reduce turnover
  • Improve employee engagement
  • Enhance productivity
  • Attract superior talent
  • Enact better policies
  • Minimize business disruptions

Best practices for implementing an HR strategy

Everyone has fires to put out, which is why being proactive rather than reactive in the workplace does not always come naturally. The good news, however, is that HR experts have perfected some tried and true methods for implementing strategy effectively. Best practices are to:

  • Involve key stakeholders Strategy requires collaboration. HR professionals should be involved from the beginning and managers and other senior leaders should sign-off on the plan.
  • Know the budget Without funds to support it, HR strategy quickly becomes pie in the sky. Focus on initiatives that realistically fit within the organization’s budget.
  • Remember the basics Do not overlook administrative responsibilities in favor of strategy. A compliance violation will derail any plan, no matter how grand it is.
  • Recognize transactional solutions The quickest answer to a problem may not always be optimal in the long run. Make it a habit of acting strategically in every endeavor.
  • Monitor and adjust the strategy Measure the strategy’s effectiveness over time with key performance indicators (KPIs). If something’s not achieving the desired results, revise it accordingly.

Frequently asked questions

What are strategic hr functions.

Examples of strategic HR functions include compensation planning, recruitment, succession planning and employee development.

What are four human resource strategies?

  • Limit transactional problem solving
  • Be proactive, rather than reactive
  • Provide people-centric solutions to large-scale challenges
  • Connect people who can solve each other’s problems

What are the types of HR strategy?

There are essentially two types of HR strategies – those that are overarching and those that are specific. Overarching strategies apply to the management of an organization’s people as a whole, while specific strategies address subsets of HR, like talent management or recruitment.

How do you develop a strategic HR plan?

A strategic HR plan can be created by thoroughly evaluating an organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This is known as a SWOT analysis. Once employers know this information, they can create realistic goals that account for what they do well and where they need improvement .

This article offers practical information concerning the subject matter and is provided with the understanding that ADP is not rendering legal or tax advice or other professional services.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Did you know?

ADP offers consulting services that can help optimize HR processes across your business.

Related resources

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Jones Commercial Interiors

Get pricing specific to your business

Your privacy is assured.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Get 3 months FREE!*

Sign up for payroll with ADP, and get 3 months on us .

Call 800-225-5237 or get pricing now.

Compare Packages

*See terms & conditions

aligning human resources and business strategy

Aligning human resources and business strategy

Reading time: about 7 min

You have to consider many factors when you create a go-to-market or business strategy. From brand messaging to product roadmaps to sales processes, effective business strategies also rely on the input of lots of people across many departments. 

Few departments have a better bird’s-eye view of the entire organization than human resources. HR professionals can see both why a strategy exists and how it’s developed and implemented. Yet, too often, HR departments don’t have a seat at the strategy table. Let’s take a look at how HR can help shape business strategy and bring it to life. 

Why HR should get involved with setting corporate strategy

Today, business moves faster than ever—it’s a platitude, but it’s still true. Technologies, industries, and consumers themselves continually evolve in a digitally-driven market, and companies continuously shift their strategic focus to keep pace. 

This culture of change has a significant impact on people. Every business decision has a real-life impact, and HR departments are specially equipped to inform strategy and help employees navigate the resulting changes. 

Consider these reasons why it’s so important for HR to align with business strategy: 

  • Move in lockstep with the rest of the company: Goals are always more achievable when there is universal buy-in and alignment across teams. 
  • Give HR initiatives a strategic focus: In today’s changing economy, there are countless ways to recruit, train, attract, invest in, and support employees. But it’s impossible to tackle every initiative all at once. Aligning with business strategy gives HR a strategic focus and helps prioritize goals. 
  • Secure the right talent: Good talent is always valuable, but companies may need to invest in different skill sets or roles at different times. Understanding the strategic goals of the business will help HR attract and retain the right talent at the right time. 

What role human resources plays in strategic planning

So how does HR become part of the broader business decision-making process? How do HR departments move from a reactive, service-oriented function to a more executive-level, strategic one? 

It starts with setting clear objectives for the department and strong values for the entire organization. Companies with documented values are less likely to ignore the real-life impact of any strategy shifts or big decisions. Consider these steps as you begin.

1. Align and set your HR goals

The main strategic role of HR is to create goals to help meet key business objectives. Goals may vary depending on the company’s strategic plan, but focusing on HR fundamentals is an excellent place to start. Here are some areas of HR most commonly affected by broader strategic business shifts. 

Organizational structure

The way companies are organized largely depends on their current strategic objectives and growth stages. If a company is in a high-growth stage, it may have a sales-driven culture with more sales employees and sales executives in decision-making roles. Mature companies with a retention-focused strategy may hire more customer success roles. 

Aligning human resources

See 7 types of organizational structures—along with pros and cons for each—to find one that fits your strategy.

Employee compensation

Maybe current business goals are more focused on employee retention or culture-building. Conversely, perhaps the company needs to cut costs. In either case, compensation structure may be an important consideration. When HR is aligned and informed on these goals, they can make strategic decisions to help the organization meet them. 

Employee development

Depending on the business goals and immediate initiatives, it may be necessary to train employees on new skill sets. Some employees may resist additional roles and responsibilities, so the role of HR in these situations is to both evangelize additional training and ensure teams are developed to keep pace with shifting needs. 

Performance reviews

Change management .

As a people-focused department, HR often has the best pulse on employee sentiment throughout the organization. HR departments can encourage employees to share their feedback on new business strategies or technology investments to ensure any changes or strategic shifts make sense from an operational perspective. 

2. Formulate specific actions to hit those goals

Once you’ve aligned and set goals, it’s time to develop action plans to execute your HR strategic vision. Focus on developing and improving processes for recruiting, hiring, employee development, and performance reviews. 

When you develop an action plan, you'll need to have a clear understanding of your organization’s current structure and identify any gaps or shortcomings in your processes. Where should you invest more in recruiting? If budgets are tight, what training or employee development programs could maximize the productivity and effectiveness of your existing talent?  The ability to visualize where every player fits into the larger organization can help HR departments align employees to business strategy, maximize efficiency, and see data in context to drive better decisions. Org charts and related visuals can help HR departments optimize organizational structure at every level and make better decisions, such as: 

  • Assigning employees where their skills can make the most significant impact
  • Making informed decisions about pay, equity, and performance
  • Modeling current and future org structures to determine how best to scale your business

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Does your organization needs to hire new talent to meet its strategic goals? See how to develop a staffing plan.

3. Track and measure performance

Historically, the role of HR has stayed in the “softer,” people-focused side of the business. However, people analytics are now the new HR, and HR departments are just as responsible for reporting on the performance of their initiatives as any other department. 

With human resource alignment around data-driven goals, HR leaders can ensure that decision-making not only aligns with strategic business objectives but also helps drive those goals. HR leaders can analyze data from sales, marketing, and accounting to break down departmental silos and better align with overall business goals.

According to a Bersin by Deloitte study, data-driven HR teams are four times more likely to be respected by their business counterparts, which can result in more input in strategic decision-making. By combining departmental data and HR data and visualizing it all in a single workspace, HR departments can better align their decisions to business strategy. Consider the ways these types of people analytics can impact the broader business:

Employee analytics

Measure the performance of all the HR initiatives in terms of cost, time, performance, then use a dashboard to track recruiting times, onboarding speed, employee satisfaction, and employee salaries. This data-driven approach to people management helps HR departments evaluate pay disparities, track employee retention, identify trends, and see critical employee metrics that will provide quick insights for better decision-making.  

All this gives you the chance to onboard new employees more efficiently, improve employee satisfaction, and reduce retention.

Talent analytics

Today, effective talent acquisition goes way beyond budget and headcount. HR departments can rely on algorithmic data to quickly sift through deep pools of qualified applicants to attract and retain top talent. 

Today, effective talent acquisition goes way beyond budget and headcount. HR departments can rely on algorithmic data to quickly sift through deep pools of qualified applicants to attract and retain top talent. This allows you to identify and attract high-quality employees and improve your workforce planning.  

Predictive analytics

Set up indicators to see when an employee is at risk of leaving the company. HR departments can use data to identify risk facts and predict employee churn and how this will affect the company. This leads to better retention and employee planning

Invest in better people planning 

Modern human resources departments manage much more than hiring, onboarding, and benefits. Aligning HR with business strategy can boost employee satisfaction and performance, ensure teams are aligned to help the business achieve its strategic objectives and increase their influence and decision-making power across the organization. 

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Align teams, boost efficiency, and drive better decisions with Lucidchart.

Lucidchart, a cloud-based intelligent diagramming application, is a core component of Lucid Software's Visual Collaboration Suite. This intuitive, cloud-based solution empowers teams to collaborate in real-time to build flowcharts, mockups, UML diagrams, customer journey maps, and more. Lucidchart propels teams forward to build the future faster. Lucid is proud to serve top businesses around the world, including customers such as Google, GE, and NBC Universal, and 99% of the Fortune 500. Lucid partners with industry leaders, including Google, Atlassian, and Microsoft. Since its founding, Lucid has received numerous awards for its products, business, and workplace culture. For more information, visit lucidchart.com.

Related articles

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Many CEOs believe that their employees are the most important factor in their company’s economic success, so if you want to succeed, find and keep the best talent. Learn how to develop your strategic human resource plan.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Everyone knows that HR is an important department in your organization, but few employees know why. Read our in-depth description of what the HR department does (or what they should be doing) to meet the needs of employees.

Bring your bright ideas to life.

or continue with

  • Employee Success Platform Improve engagement, inspire performance, and build a magnetic culture.
  • Engagement Survey
  • Lifecycle Surveys
  • Pulse Surveys
  • Recognition
  • Talent Reviews
  • Succession Planning
  • Apps & Integrations
  • Dashboard Discover dynamic trends -->
  • Scale Employee Success with AI
  • Drive Employee Retention
  • Identify and Develop Top Talent
  • Build High Performing Teams
  • Increase Strategic Alignment
  • Manage Remote Teams
  • Improve Employee Engagement
  • Customer Success Stories
  • Customer Experience
  • Customer Advisory Board
  • Not Another Employee Engagement Trends Report
  • Everyone Owns Employee Success
  • Employee Success ROI Calculator
  • Employee Retention Quiz
  • Ebooks & Templates
  • Partnerships
  • Best Places to Work
  • Request a Demo

Request a Demo

HR as a Strategic Partner: The 2024 Planning Guide

hr as a strategic partner

Table of Contents

What is a strategic hr partner, why you should become a strategic hr partner, what are the barriers to hr becoming a strategic partner, how to become a strategic hr partner, investing in impact: getting the most from strategic hr planning.

HR as a Strategic Partner: The 2024 Planning Guide

When HR departments operate in a silo—and their programs are disconnected and misaligned with the business’ strategic goals—it's a missed opportunity for both HR and senior leadership.

In fact, 70% of CEOs expect their CHRO to be a key player in enterprise strategy, but only 55% say their CHRO meets this expectation.

HR is in a unique position to impact key performance indicators, including company culture and employee engagement. But without a strategic HR partner to guide those efforts, your impact will fall short.

Ready to Move From HR Tactics to HR Strategy? Download the Complete HR Planner  for 2024

In this article, we’ll cover exactly what it means to be a strategic partner in HR, why it’s important, and how you can build a strategic plan for your HR department this year.

The role of HR as a strategic partner is to develop and direct an HR agenda that supports and drives the overarching goals of the organization.

In other words, a strategic HR partner bridges the gap between the work of the HR team on the ground and the mission of the C-suite.

To do this, strategic HR partners make sure that the HR policy, procedures, and governance align with the big picture. Strategic HR partners ask, "How can HR help create an engaging, high-performance culture that drives the whole business forward?"

1-Nov-01-2023-04-25-23-7189-PM

How to move from HR Tactics to HR Strategy

Transitioning from the tactical role of HR manager to that of a strategic HR partner is pivotal in today's dynamic business landscape. While both roles are vital, they serve distinct purposes within an organization.

The HR manager has long been the backbone of HR departments, overseeing the day-to-day operations, ensuring compliance, managing payroll, and handling recruitment. HR managers are essential for maintaining the smooth functioning of HR processes, but they primarily operate at a tactical level, focusing on the immediate needs of the workforce.

Becoming a strategic HR partner marks a significant shift in HR's function. 

Instead of getting caught up in the minutiae of daily HR tasks, a strategic HR partner operates at a higher altitude, aligning HR initiatives with the overarching goals of the organization.

The roles of a strategic HR partner

  • Strategic Advisor: Strategic HR partners act as trusted advisors to top leadership. They leverage their deep understanding of HR and the organization to provide insights and guidance on strategic decisions. This includes talent acquisition strategies, workforce planning, and initiatives to improve employee engagement.
  • Problem Solver: They are adept at identifying and addressing complex workforce challenges. Whether it's resolving interdepartmental conflicts or devising innovative solutions for talent retention, strategic HR partners are the go-to problem solvers in the organization.
  • Mentor and Coach: Beyond managing HR processes, they invest time in nurturing talent within the HR team and across the organization. They mentor emerging HR professionals, helping them grow into future strategic partners themselves. Additionally, they coach managers on effective leadership and people management.
  • Independent Leader: While collaborating closely with HR departments, strategic HR partners maintain a degree of independence. This independence allows them to offer unbiased perspectives, ensuring that HR initiatives are aligned with the organization's best interests.
  • Driving Alignment: The primary goal of a strategic HR partner is to ensure that everyone within the organization is pulling in the same direction. They work closely with HR departments and the leadership team to align HR strategies with broader organizational goals, fostering a unified and purpose-driven workforce.

Strategic HR partners are the architects of HR strategy, contributing directly to the achievement of organizational objectives. 

By shifting the focus from tactical HR tasks to strategic HR initiatives, businesses can navigate the evolving needs of the workforce, foster innovation, and drive sustainable growth. 

Embracing this transformation is not just a choice; it's a strategic investment in today's competitive business environment.

Too often, HR teams operate in a silo, disconnected from the conversations and decision making happening among senior leadership. This can create misalignment between HR and the rest of the business and hinders HR’s ability to support (and ultimately drive) strategic business outcomes.

Successful, high-performing organizations build alignment across teams and departments. And HR is uniquely positioned to enable and promote alignment when working together with senior leadership as a strategic partner.

HR is the glue that binds teams and organizations together—which means HR has the potential for high impact across the organization. From behind-the-scenes administration to internal communication, leadership training, and recruiting and onboarding programs, HR plays a critical role in company culture, employee engagement, and ultimately, business performance.

That’s where HR as a strategic partner can really make a difference for both HR efforts and overall business success.

Strategic HR partners can help drive individual, team, and organizational performance using a variety of tactics.

1. Have CEOs refocus on talent strategies

Today's CEOs and senior leadership teams are increasingly recognizing the pivotal role of talent strategies in achieving organizational success. The need to attract, retain, and develop top talent has become paramount. HR, as the steward of talent management, needs to step into a strategic partnership to address this demand effectively.

2. Use workplace culture as a performance driver

Research from Quantum Workplace underscores the undeniable connection between culture and performance. High-performing organizations attribute their success to a culture that reflects their values and beliefs. 

75% of high-performing organizations say that their organization's culture reflects their values and beliefs. 70% of high-performing organizations say that their organization's culture drives desired organizational outcomes and business results.

organizations perceptions of culture

Such cultures drive desired organizational outcomes and business results. HR, as the cultural architect, plays a pivotal role in shaping this performance-enhancing culture.

3. Navigate complexity in the modern workplace

The contemporary workplace is a complex ecosystem, influenced by factors like globalization, technology, and shifting employee expectations. HR must evolve to navigate this complexity. As a strategic partner, HR can help organizations adapt, ensuring that their workforce remains agile, motivated, and aligned with strategic goals.

4. Performance and engagement are no longer in silos

The conventional approach of segregating performance and engagement strategies no longer suffices. Recent findings highlight a strong correlation between employee engagement, productivity, and performance. 

Engaged employees lead to satisfied customers, a critical driver of business success.

Almost all respondents (92%) agree that organizations with highly engaged employees have happy customers, with 72% in strong agreement.

2-Nov-01-2023-04-25-23-7188-PM

HR, as the curator of these strategies, must integrate them seamlessly to achieve these outcomes.

5. Rethink your organizational investments

Many organizations invest heavily in employee success with the primary goals of improving productivity and retention. However, according to Quantum Workplace research, only around a third have actually achieved these goals. 

More than half of respondents say the primary business goals for their investments in employee success are to improve productivity and retention (53% and 52%, respectively). But only around a third have actually achieved these goals.

3-Nov-01-2023-04-25-23-7536-PM

HR, as a strategic partner, can lead the way in reevaluating and redefining these investments to ensure they align with broader organizational objectives and drive the intended results. 

And the need to invest is greater than ever.

According to Brandon Hall Group, a significant number of organizations express dissatisfaction with their current performance management processes. 

62% state that these processes don't enhance performance, and 70% admit they don't drive employee engagement.

These figures underscore the urgent need for HR to step into the role of a strategic partner, revamping and realigning HR strategies for greater effectiveness.

6. Tie performance to your bottom line 

In the competitive business landscape, every aspect of an organization contributes to its bottom line. HR, when operating as a strategic partner, becomes a catalyst for enhancing overall business performance. 

By aligning HR efforts with organizational goals, HR not only positively impacts employee engagement and retention but also contributes significantly to the company's financial success.

It’s easy to encourage HR to become a strategic partner. But unfortunately, many organizations encounter barriers to success. In order to get the most impact from your HR team, you have to work to remove the most common barriers to success.

  • Employee Success Is Not Prioritized: In some organizations, the broader business strategy may not prioritize employee success and engagement. This misalignment can hinder HR's efforts to contribute strategically, as the overall corporate focus may not align with HR's objectives.
  • There’s a Resistance to Change: The resistance of teams and employees to embrace change is a common challenge. Even when HR introduces innovative solutions or strategies, the lack of buy-in and adoption from teams can impede progress. Some organizations may pressure HR to consolidate and make the most of existing technology and resources rather than investing in new solutions. While this approach can have merit, it may limit HR's ability to innovate and adapt to evolving challenges.
  • Outdated Processes and Technology: Outdated, manual, or siloed processes, along with obsolete HR tech, can create inefficiencies that bog down HR professionals. The time-consuming nature of managing these systems can hinder HR's ability to engage in more strategic endeavors. HR teams need tools and technologies that simplify their work and streamline processes. This requirement extends to solutions that not only benefit HR professionals but also make tasks easier for everyone in the organization, from managers to employees.
  • There’s a Fear of Added Chaos and Workload: HR professionals often operate in highly demanding and chaotic work environments. Balancing a long list of tasks, from recruitment and onboarding to policy enforcement, can leave limited bandwidth for strategic activities. HR teams may resist adopting new solutions because they fear these changes will add to their already overwhelming workload. The perception that new tools and strategies will demand more time and effort can be a significant barrier.
  • They Lack Managerial Support: HR can't do it all alone. To become strategic partners, HR professionals need strong support and involvement from managers. Without managers actively participating in initiatives, HR's efforts to drive change and improvement may face significant roadblocks.

These roadblocks can make it difficult to see the desired impact. Despite their best efforts, barriers may cause strategic investments to fall short of expectations, making it challenging to demonstrate their organizational value. As a result, strategic initiatives may get pushed further and further to the backburner.

But there is hope!

Recognizing and addressing these barriers proactively and reactively is crucial for HR to evolve into a strategic partner.

While it may seem daunting, becoming a strategic HR partner really comes down to the right investment, the right leadership, and the right plan. While we may not be able to help you with the first two, our team of employee success experts put together a proven plan to help HR become a strategic partner. 

Below, we outline a 12-month HR plan that you can easily customize for your organization. While the months below are designed to start in January, it’s never too late to start working on your plan to become a strategic HR partner.

Ready to get planning? Follow along with our comprehensive CHRO planner that  allows you to set goals, take notes, and scale your strategy. Download the  planner here!

Month 1: Building a Culture of Employee Success 

In order to begin, you must work to bridge the growing divide between leaders and employees. The key is to invest in shaping the organization with a human-centered and data-driven perspective, unifying everyone around the common goal of employee success. This month emphasizes the interconnectedness of engagement, performance, culture, and retention, highlighting three essential components: 

  • Enhancing the employee experience
  • Inspiring employee impact
  • Fostering organizational magnetism

It's an ongoing commitment to creating an environment where employees feel supported and engaged, ultimately driving the organization toward its goals.

Month 2: Becoming a More Strategic HR Leader 

As we mentioned, 70% of CEOs expect their CHRO to be a key player in enterprise strategy, but only 55% feel this expectation is met. Strategic HR leadership is essential, especially when business leaders recognize the need for HR to be agile and adaptable. 

To succeed in this role, understanding your organization inside and out is crucial. You must proactively plan for the future, be an agent for change, and base decisions on data-driven insights. 

This month's emphasis is on building an engaged, high-performance culture aligned with your organization's long-term goals. It's about earning the trust of the C-Suite by clearly demonstrating the connection between employee success and overall business success and guiding strategic actions accordingly.

Month 3: Empowering Everyone to Own Employee Success 

HR faces mounting challenges, with many HR leaders considering leaving due to the increasing pressure and responsibilities. To address this, HR must clarify its role as a driver and coach in engaging all levels of the organization in employee success initiatives. This involves partnering with leaders and teams to define, launch, communicate, measure, and adjust strategies, along with establishing the necessary processes, systems, and tools.

Leadership's role is key in advocating for employee success, as they influence organizational culture the most. HR should rally leadership to strategize and clearly communicate the vision and any associated changes.

Managers are vital in employee communication and feedback. HR should empower them with insights, tools, and resources to understand and enhance team engagement, trust-building, feedback processes, recognition, coaching, alignment, and team development.

Additionally, employees themselves play a pivotal role. 

HR should create safe spaces for them to provide open and honest feedback, share ideas and concerns, and collaborate with managers and leaders on developing solutions. This collaborative approach fosters a "culture of us," where everyone is invested in addressing challenges and opportunities, enhancing connectivity, trust, and adaptability, ultimately contributing to a thriving organizational culture.

Data is your friend. HR strategy should always be driven by data and evidence—not hunches or assumptions. Get comfortable pulling reports and reviewing and analyzing data.

Your ability to use data to identify key insights and tell stories that drive action on the right things at the right time is one of the most valuable contributions a strategic HR partner can make.

Month 4: Assessing and Improving Your Culture 

While most executives agree on the importance of a strong culture for business success, there's often confusion about what culture truly entails. This lack of clarity hinders meaningful change.

To invest wisely in this area, leaders must first gain a comprehensive understanding of culture, recognizing that it's not just about rituals and norms but deeply embedded in daily workplace practices. Culture encompasses how decisions are made, communication styles, celebrations, behaviors, and how employees are rewarded and recognized.

A healthy culture should primarily foster employee engagement, which hinges on connecting employees to their work, teams, and the organization as a whole. When assessing how work gets done, leaders should consider how each aspect contributes to or detracts from employee engagement.

Performance management is a critical component of culture. By adopting effective practices, leaders can drive alignment, motivation, growth, and engagement within the organization. Conversely, a flawed approach can lead to toxicity, distrust, and burnout. Hence, performance management should be wielded as a tool to strengthen and enhance organizational culture.

Month 5: Predicting and Preventing Turnover 

In Month 5, the focus is on predicting and preventing employee turnover . Unwanted turnover can be expensive and detrimental to productivity and morale. However, by investing wisely, you can build a culture that retains top talent. 

Begin by gathering data on why employees are leaving and staying, and where issues are most pronounced. Actively listen to your employees through various channels, from formal surveys to informal one-on-one conversations. Data is your ally; it helps you understand the intricacies of turnover, empowering you to make informed decisions. 

By embracing predictive analytics tools, such as Quantum Workplace's flight risk tool , you can proactively address turnover concerns, turning your talent into a competitive advantage.

Month 6: Making Your Culture a Magnet for Talent 

It’s month six! Congratulations on making it to the halfway point. (You deserve a coffee, if you ask us!) In Month 6, the focus is on making your culture a magnet for talent . Retaining top talent becomes even more critical when labor market conditions are competitive. To achieve this, strengthen your Employee Value Proposition (EVP) by aligning it with what matters most to your employees, such as career growth, flexibility, recognition, and meaningful work. 

Continuous EVP enhancement is essential as it reflects your organization's commitment to meet employee expectations. Invest in employee growth and development, as stagnation often leads to disengagement. Equip managers and employees with tools for mapping and tracking development together. 

Regular and meaningful 1-on-1s provide an opportunity for you to cultivate a culture of connection, highlight core values, and provide recognition. Finally, stand out in the talent market by benchmarking your EVP against competitors and crafting a unique proposition that sets your organization apart.

Month 7: Building Your Employee Listening Strategy 

This month, the focus shifts to building your employee listening strategy. While annual employee engagement surveys have been standard, today's dynamic business environment demands more frequent feedback. 

Research shows that regularly surveyed employees have higher engagement levels. Effective employee listening is essential in navigating ongoing challenges and uncertainties.

It provides valuable insights, dispelling speculations and identifying knowledge gaps. To invest wisely, adopt a flywheel approach to employee listening, continuously improving and gaining momentum. Move away from the once-a-year survey mindset; instead, aim for at least four feedback opportunities per year to drive continuous improvement. 

Ensure your strategy is based on a proven employee engagement model , offering a comprehensive understanding of engagement drivers and measurement techniques to implement timely, targeted strategies.

Month 8: Analyzing Your Survey Data 

In Month 8, the focus shifts from collecting to analyzing your survey data effectively. While employee survey data is invaluable for improving engagement, performance, and retention, it can be overwhelming. 

To invest wisely, you need to understand the data thoroughly before taking action. Start by grasping the big picture—assess overall favorability, identify key engagement drivers, and track trends over time. 

Next, zoom in on specific areas and demographics to pinpoint overlapping or differing perceptions. 

Extract insights from open-ended survey responses to add depth to quantitative results. Benchmark your results against industry or regional standards. Grant managers access to survey results, enabling them to provide valuable insights and work with their teams to prioritize engagement. 

Help employees understand their role in improving engagement by providing reports with individual recommendations for enhancing their workplace experience.

Month 9: Making Post-Survey Action Easier 

Month 9 is all about optimizing post-survey action, a critical yet often challenging phase. Many organizations struggle to effectively act on employee survey results , risking trust and engagement breakdowns. 

However, taking action is essential; employees witnessing feedback action are 12 times more likely to stay engaged. To invest wisely, create a scalable process using the AFTER framework:

  • Analysis: Share results early with leaders and managers.
  • Focus areas: Highlight high-impact areas for team focus.
  • Team ideation: Empower managers to facilitate team discussions on survey results and actions.
  • Execution plan: Assist managers in identifying best practices and creating measurable action plans.
  • Reminders: Communicate changes and progress throughout the year.

Don't let fear or uncertainty paralyze progress; focus on using feedback as a roadmap for improvement. Encourage everyone to participate actively in understanding and acting on survey results, empowering leaders and managers with frameworks, processes, and tools to ease administrative burdens and facilitate team action planning, as it's key for employee success.

Month 10: Evolving Your Approach to Employee Performance 

Don’t stop just yet. Here is where the real growth and impact starts to happen. Month 10 highlights the critical importance of redefining employee performance management, as a staggering 70% of organizations admit their current processes don't engage employees, and 62% don't enhance performance. 

Performance management is the foundation of building a highly engaged and productive workforce. 

To make the most impactful investments, organizations should first determine their unique objectives for performance management. Organizations should prioritize empowering managers and teams while acknowledging that the approach should evolve over time. 

Investing in the right technology is key. When choosing a technology , focus on reducing HR's administrative burden, enabling managers to drive performance, and meeting employees where they are in terms of technology adoption.

Month 11: Empowering Managers as Performance Coaches 

Managers are the pillars that hold your employee success strategy in place. But all too often, they don’t receive the support and coaching they need. 

Month 11 focuses on empowering managers as effective performance coaches, addressing the fact that 57% of managers feel unprepared for their roles and lack training. 

To tackle this challenge, HR and organizational leaders need to provide support, tools, and resources for managers . Simplifying the performance management process is essential, ensuring managers fully understand each step. Building managers' confidence through training and communication is crucial, not just a one-time explanation. 

Additionally, providing managers with essential tools , such as recognition, 1-on-1s, feedback mechanisms, goal-setting capabilities, and talent reviews can enable them to effectively engage and develop their teams for business impact.

Month 12: Planning for the Future

A whole year in the books! You’ve made it! But you’re not quite done yet. 

Month 12 focuses on planning for the future by addressing the challenge of identifying and developing top talent. With nearly half of organizations facing difficulties in recognizing top talent and a significant portion of managers lacking effective development conversation skills, this month emphasizes the importance of nurturing top performers and preparing for talent turnover. 

Organizations are encouraged to start by defining future business needs, identifying critical roles, and understanding the skills and traits valued most. Building an agile and collaborative talent review process that assesses talent gaps and opportunities is crucial, with regular reviews supported by objective data. 

Integration with a succession plan ensures the proactive development of key talent for future roles, with personalized development plans for candidates. 

Continuous plan updates based on evolving data and organizational needs round out the strategy.

In the ever-evolving landscape of HR, the road to success demands more than just good intentions. It requires strategic investments in impact—choices that drive meaningful change, engage your workforce, and empower your HR team. 

The days of assumptions and guesswork are gone. Today, it's about confident decisions, data-backed insights, and targeted actions. It's about efficiency and simplicity, freeing your team from clunky tools and empowering them to be true coaches. It's about energizing partnerships that provide the support and expertise needed to propel your HR initiatives forward.

As you embark on this transformative journey, remember that your success hinges on these critical investments. The path to becoming a strategic HR partner, one who not only influences but drives your organization's success, lies in your ability to harness the power of impact.

To guide you through this strategic HR journey, we invite you to download our complete CHRO Strategic Planner . 

This comprehensive, hands-on 12-month strategic HR planning guide will help you turn these principles into actionable strategies, paving the way for a future where HR isn't just a function but a force for positive change. 

Don't wait—invest in impact today and lead the way to a more engaged, productive, and successful workforce.

2024 CHRO Strategic Employee Success Planner

Published March 1, 2024 | Written By Natalie Wickham

Related Content

Employee listening flywheel cover

[eBook] The Employee Listening Flywheel

Features-of-Performance-Management-System-1

How to Select a Performance Management System

how to keep your best talent

How to Retain Top Talent

Quick links.

  • Performance

Subscribe to Our Blog

2024 CHRO strategic employee success planner

View more resources on Employee Engagement

  • All Resources
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use
  • Terms of Service

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

HR strategy for business growth: 7 ways HR can contribute to business development

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

While you might focus on sales and marketing as your business’ principal drivers, you can’t afford to overlook the importance of a solid HR strategy for business growth.

Your company’s largest single asset isn’t the patents or real estate holdings, but your employees. If you treat your employees well, they can propel your company to new heights.

The role of HR in business growth

Human resources professionals are in a unique position to help shape the way businesses operate. Because people who work in operations, marketing, and middle management tend to look at the business through the lens of revenue, they tend to lose sight of its core values.

Your HR strategy is the bedrock of a successful company. Decades of research show that robust human resource management practices lead to higher business growth rates.

Here are seven ways your HR strategy can contribute to the success of your business.

1. Hire the right people

With a great team behind you, it’s possible to achieve so much. You can tackle a long list of tasks in a short space of time because you know the person you assigned the task to will complete the work. Moreover, the work will be of the quality you expect. Unfortunately, the opposite is also true.

It is important to develop an effective system that helps you identify and hire the best candidates for a job. An effective recruitment process can help you identify suitable personnel. You should also have a review process to ensure that the people you hired perform and have a process for dealing with staff who fail to hit their targets.

Setting up a thorough hiring and review process takes time. You will experience problems. However, you need such a system to help you identify and hire competent staff if you want your company to grow fast.

2. Build a strong culture & promote it

Organizational culture is a collection of values, expectations, and practices that inform how your team works together. Your organizational culture impacts the environment that your staff experiences when they come to the office.

The organizational culture will impact how people perceive your company and the type of employees you attract. For example, consider Google.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

You can see why a lot of people want to work for Google. They’ve created an organizational culture focused on business growth and support their staff’s personal and professional goals.

The organizational culture is set at the top. Determine what you want to stand for as a company and how you want your staff to treat each other. If you can create a great organizational culture, you’ll find it easy to attract the best talent. Not only that, you’ll reduce employee turnover .

HR should then work with everyone in the company -- from C-level leaders to rank-and-file employees -- to help implement the organizational culture, ensuring people know what it means to work for your business. Besides, HR leaders should promote and reward employee behavior that reflects the desired culture.

Relevant: Watch our webinar on How to create a winning company culture

3. Training new talent

The recruitment journey doesn’t stop when the successful candidate signs on the dotted line. To formally welcome your new hire, your HR team will need to create an employee onboarding process that will equip them with the skills and organizational knowledge they need to do their jobs properly.

Spend time developing your onboarding process

One element of the onboarding process will cover the company and the culture. All employees, regardless of their position, should learn about the company and the corporate culture you are looking to create.

The earlier you instill the values of collaboration, transparency, and continuous improvement to your new employees, the better.

In addition to a general onboarding, every employee will have to learn the skills and processes specific to their role. If you are going to hire multiple employees for the same position, you should systemize staff training.

Create guides with the information people will need, assign people to supervise new employees, etc. Having such a process in place can reduce the amount of time new employees spend learning and speed up the time it takes to deliver to their potential in the new role.

4. Participate in growth planning

As your business grows, you will need to hire new staff. You might need to train staff to do new tasks, or you might decide to expand into a new market. Whatever the strategy, growth planning, and the ability to execute your plan will be critical to your success.

Relevant: Why a growth mindset is a crucial recruitment skill

Your HR team should play a key role in growth planning. Your HR team will need to be aware of the positions you want to fill. Yet it’s not just that. Your HR team can provide valuable insights regarding how a team that you want to expand is operating, what problems are likely to arise, and even things like how long it is likely to take to fill these positions.

All of these are critical to mission success. For example, after you submit a project proposal for a large client and win the bidding process, you will need to get the right people to help deliver results for the client. Involving human resources in the project planning process will help them identify the skills needed for the project and identify people both within and outside the company who could be part of the project team.

5. Minimize employee turnover

Finding, hiring, and training employees is a significant expense for any organization. Ultimately, the cost of finding a replacement is proportional to the difficulty of the role and the number of suitable candidates available.

A study by the Society for Human Resource Management estimated that a salaried employee’s replacement cost is equal to six months’ wages. That sounds about right for a person in a senior role at a company.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

The impacts of employee turnover are not just financial. Staff turnover can impact delays to projects and service delivery, lead to loss of productivity, and hurt the team or company morale. Anything that your HR department can do to reduce unwanted employee turnover is likely to promote business growth.

6. Take feedback from employees

If you want to monitor employee satisfaction, it’s important to ask for feedback. Employee feedback is one of the most important data sets that you can gather about how your company operates and living up to the company culture you want to build.

Because your HR team has exposure to almost everyone in your organization , they are in the best position to solicit employee feedback and analyze the data to develop solutions to common issues.

Employees are also more likely to submit feedback to HR personnel because they know that their concerns will be handled professionally and their data is in safe hands.

Relevant: 10 questions for employee satisfaction surveys

7. Employee growth & performance management

One of the most important aspects of an HR strategy for business growth is employee growth and performance management.

A good performance management system is key to monitoring employee development . Part of how you monitor an individual’s growth in the company is tracking their performance, measuring it against certain key performance indicators, and identifying their strengths and opportunities for improvement.

Your HR team should take the lead in implementing the performance management system. The data that a performance management system gathers is a valuable source of insights about employee goals and potential career movements.

Relevant: 5 ways to upskill your workforce

In innovative organizations, HR teams are not seen as the people who hire and fire new employees. The HR team is an integral part of the business. A great HR team seems to fade into the background, yet much of what they do underpins business growth.

It makes sense to involve the HR team in the decision-making progress. Your HR team’s work will impact your ability to execute expansion plans, attract the best people , equip them with the skills they need to thrive in the organization, and keep them from leaving . The seven tips I shared are just some of the many ways an effective HR strategy can pave the way for business growth.

Petra Odak is a Chief Marketing Officer at Better Proposals, a proposal software tool that helps send high-converting, web-based business proposals in minutes. She's a solution-oriented marketing enthusiast with more than 5 years of experience in various fields of marketing and project management.

Get the MidWeekRead

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Get the exclusive tips, resources and updates to help you hire better!

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

Hire better, faster, together!

Bring your hiring teams together, boost your sourcing, automate your hiring, and evaluate candidates effectively.

hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

IMAGES

  1. 6 Steps to Create a Strategic HR Plan [With Templates]

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

  2. Why Is Human Resource Planning Important? (2023)

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

  3. Hr Strategy Template

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

  4. How to Align Human Resources (HR) with Business Strategy

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

  5. Human Resource Planning Guide and Templates Every HR Team Needs

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

  6. 9 Tips To Make HR More Strategic In Its Approach

    hr strategy and planning from birth to business results

VIDEO

  1. ACA IN THE NEWS: Getting Ready to Start College (Spectrum News 1)

  2. 🔮Choose Your Date of Birth🥰ನೀವು ಯಾವಾಗ ಮದುವೆಯಾಗುತ್ತೀರಿ? Timeless Readings in Kannada✨

COMMENTS

  1. HR Strategy and Planning: From Birth to Business Results

    A human resource (HR) strategy is a plan produced by the HR staff function for deploying people resources, that is, the talent, energy, and performance of people, to achieve the business strategy ...

  2. A Comprehensive Guide to Developing an HR Strategic Plan

    Evaluate and adapt compensation and benefits programs to be more competitive. 5. Create the document layout and design. There's no point in preparing an HR strategic plan if it's not accessible and engaging. The key to getting people to read and absorb the plan is to present the information clearly and concisely.

  3. How To Develop an Effective HR Strategy [2024 Edition]

    How To Develop an Effective HR Strategy [2024 Edition] Written by Erik van Vulpen. 11 minutes read. It takes a capable workforce to meet the demands of an organization's ambitions. When HR practices link employees to business goals, outcomes improve. An HR strategy centers HR efforts where they need to be to help the company thrive.

  4. HR Strategy and Planning: From Birth to Business Results

    Semantic Scholar extracted view of "HR Strategy and Planning: From Birth to Business Results" by E. Gubman. ... {HR Strategy and Planning: From Birth to Business Results}, author={Ed Gubman}, year={2004} } E. Gubman; Published 1 March 2004; Business; No Paper Link Available. Save to Library Save. Create Alert Alert. Cite. Share This Paper. 24 ...

  5. The Ultimate Guide to Developing an Effective HR Strategy

    An effective HR strategy closes the loop between people, strategy, and results, helping the organization grow and thrive. Work with your peers in the C-suite to envision a clear path for the business. By understanding the organization's mission, goals, and values, HR leaders create and implement strategies that align with the organization's ...

  6. HR Strategy: What is it and How to Create One

    To drive HR strategic planning and any HR transformation initiatives, follow these five steps to create an effective human resources strategy that supports enterprise business goals:. Understand your organization's mission, strategy and business goals.; Identify the critical capabilities and skills.; Evaluate the current capabilities and skills of your talent and the HR function, and ...

  7. PDF Enabling business results with HR "Measures that matter"

    HR program performance while providing actionable insights and information on the function's efficiency and effectiveness. Similar to how an organization's HR programs and strategic choices are made in support of broader business objectives, HR metrics and measurement tools focus on HR's contribution to overall business issues.

  8. The new possible: How HR can help build the organization of the future

    HR should be a strategic partner for the business in this regard, by ensuring that the right talent is in place to deliver on core company objectives. HR can also drive workforce planning by reviewing how disruptive trends affect employees, identifying future core capabilities, and assessing how supply and demand apply to future skills gaps.

  9. HR Strategy: What is It and How to Create One

    How to create a human resource strategy. Creating an HR strategy means taking a hard look at an organization's strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats - a process also known as a SWOT analysis. Every business is different, but most follow these steps: Understand the business and its objectives. Talk to people throughout the ...

  10. Aligning human resources and business strategy

    1. Align and set your HR goals. The main strategic role of HR is to create goals to help meet key business objectives. Goals may vary depending on the company's strategic plan, but focusing on HR fundamentals is an excellent place to start. Here are some areas of HR most commonly affected by broader strategic business shifts.

  11. 11 Successful HR Strategy Examples To Consider for 2024

    7 Steps to creating an HR strategy. We've outlined 7 key steps based on Deloitte's HR Strategy Framework to help you design an HR strategy: . 1. Consider the market and trends: Analyze the external market and trends that are impacting your industry. 2. Understand the business strategy: Know the business strategy and be clear on the must-win battles for the business, the key value drivers ...

  12. PDF Creating value through HR HR Strategy

    Based on the HR Strategy Framework, Deloitte is uniquely positioned to assist your organisation to strengthen its strategic role and contribution of your HR function to ensure the execution of business strategy. Our 10-step approach helps organisations to define and execute an effective HR strategy as well as develop and deliver services

  13. HR as a Strategic Partner: The 2024 Planning Guide

    The role of HR as a strategic partner is to develop and direct an HR agenda that supports and drives the overarching goals of the organization. In other words, a strategic HR partner bridges the gap between the work of the HR team on the ground and the mission of the C-suite. To do this, strategic HR partners make sure that the HR policy ...

  14. Enabling Business Results with HR

    Contact us. To continue the conversation, please contact David Fineman. David leads the HR Transformation Talent Analytics and Workforce Planning program. E: [email protected]. P: +1.857.636.3130. Data-driven HR insights are uncovering issues, influencing organizational decisions, and driving continuous improvement.

  15. PDF BUSINESS STRATEGY FOR HR

    business strategy development skills . Suggested Use Take the assessment yourself to guide your personal development path to being a high-impact strategic HR partner in your business . Have your entire team take the assessment and develop your plan to align your efforts to build these skills across your entire area .

  16. How HR Can Influence Organizational Strategy

    Modeling strategy by developing a strategic plan for the HR department to demonstrate its value. As a first step in developing a strategic plan, assess where the organization is today.

  17. Strategic HR

    Create an HR strategy implementation plan in order to execute strategy. Content. The content for this program consists of 3 core modules: Understanding Organizational Strategy and its Implication ...

  18. Delivering Business Outcomes: HR's Growing Strategic Role In ...

    HR plays a central role in benefits design, ongoing administration and management, and benefits communication. This starts in the recruiting process, and it continues during onboarding and ...

  19. 7 HR strategies for business growth

    Here are seven ways your HR strategy can contribute to the success of your business. 1. Hire the right people. With a great team behind you, it's possible to achieve so much. You can tackle a long list of tasks in a short space of time because you know the person you assigned the task to will complete the work.

  20. How to Plan HR Strategy: A Step-by-Step Guide

    1 Assess your current situation. The first step is to conduct a comprehensive analysis of your current HR practices, policies, and performance. You need to identify your strengths, weaknesses ...

  21. 13 Essential HR Tactics To Improve Strategic Management Planning

    Identifying the key priorities will naturally drive alignment among talent, strategic objectives and results. Often, HR professionals overlook the importance of focusing on the key issues that the ...

  22. HR strategy and planning from birth to business results

    Document 1 of 1 HR Strategy and Planning: From Birth to Business Results Author: Gubman, Ed Publication info: HR. Human Resource Planning 27. 1 (2004): 13-23. ProQuest document link Abstract: Human resource strategy and planning has changed and grown significantly during the last 25 years. We can track these developments from functional strategies in the 1980s to capabilities strategies in the ...

  23. Strategic HR

    Create an HR strategy implementation plan in order to execute strategy. Content. The content for this program consists of 3 core modules: Understanding Organizational Strategy and its Implication ...