What keeps me awake in 2019?

As we dive into 2019 there is a lot to think about in the HR world. 

Some of the trends within the HR function that have caught my attention lately (and by no means any science here) are: personalization of everything, building the employee experience, TRUST, manager ownership, simplify (as my co-worker reminds me daily), focus on people, inclusion and equity matter, analytics and data are value drivers, remote work is the new norm. 

For years, the HR function has been about centralization and standardization.  It was, to be honest, a highly efficient and effective way to ensure consistency.  Well… the world is changing.  People expect personalization.  We need to reverse engineer HR as we know it. Things to consider:

• Instead of designing for the organization, or top-down approaches We need to learn from our employees and design around the movable workforce.  
• The “new employee” could only work for us for 3-5 years (and may even return).  Statistics say 10% attrition is the norm but is it really? With “boomerang” employees, job hopping, and shorter attention spans, are we designing to reality? 
• How are we looking at benefits, recruiting, onboarding, analytics, and well-worn HR paradigms that  exists in benefits?  Should we 401(k) match or should we have college debt match? 
• When onboarding, do we ask about the employee or only talk about the company?
• When training, are we still designing programs for groups – high potentials – or personalizing to the individual?
• When reviewing office space, we must consider introverts and extroverts, needing more people or concentrate, innovation discussions or attention to detail – does your office have options for this?

The employee experience matters.  Start with this premise in mind.  Are you designing an employee experience and culture for everyone or for individuals?  Are you inclusive and fair in your approach to the individual needs?  Or are you designing what the boss wants?  Are we designing an experience to get the most out of individuals?  What can each new employee teach us?

Trust matters.  Simple and clear. Trust is the gold of currency, maybe even above kindness.   The very breakable commodity is priceless. It also can be lost in the blink of an eye.  How do we build a world of trust?  Be vigilant, be introspective, and be honest.  Be as diligent and purposeful about building trust. Be consistent. Don’t be fooled. Be prepared and keep a sharp eye out for trouble, no matter how small it may seem. Your reputation will be built and sustained over time built on trust.

Manager ownership.  As companies downsize, we all take on more.  Where this becomes the focal point is with our people managers.  The days of paternalistic hand-holding are over (at least at work, helicopter parents are another story…). Managers have to take ownership – there is no opt out of leading and learning.  Every day we need to evaluate what are we doing for ourselves, our business, and our team.  The sad reality is that many managers are not good coaches.  How do we adapt and provide systems and tools to allow easy to understand approaches, no formal classes or week-long seminars, but digestible chunks of learning in real time and continuous conversations around learning and development with our teams?

Simplify. As an HR function, we simplify our own internal processes and procedures, simplify the usability and mobility of our platforms, simplify the thinking of the organization. How do we help eliminate unnecessary work, distractions, sunk costs, competing priorities, etc.?  How do we break long-standing traditions, re-design performance management, succession planning, compliance, training to fit the workforce of today? When expectations are to provide a mobile experience, communicate in 90 seconds or less, and be transparent and inclusive. 

Focus on your employees.  Any great HR function leads the way with “focus on the people”, but in all great companies the executives lead the way on “focus on the people”.  What I mean by this is that “talent” focuses on ensuring we have the individual talent necessary to achieve our purpose. Certainly, this is a critically important agenda for any organization. However, by focusing primarily on individual contributions, this only succeeds in making the organizational whole equal to the sum of the parts. This overlooks the central contribution of an organization.  The focus on people must balance the needs of the individual and the needs of the greater organization and find the magic to have the whole add up to more than the sum of the parts.  We all remember those great teams we have been on that overachieved – it was greater than the sum of the talents of each individual. I didn’t delete anything but I question if his paragraph in its entirety is necessary here, it appears to be a thought independent of the direction the rest of the blog is going in.

Inclusion matters. It goes without saying that everyone wants to be included.  Success goes beyond inclusion – it requires equity and fairness.  It requires a culture where everyone feels valued and comfortable being themselves.  At Gannett, we want to educate, empower and embrace.  We speak to our story: shared experiences, diverse voices, common connections, united goals, and one network.  Think of it this way: inclusion is what you do, diversity is about who you are, and equity is about how you operate.

The use of HR analytics matter to drive our people agenda.  Our function needs to be  data- driven and predictive in our use of data.  The ability for HR itself to collect, integrate and interpret large amounts of data and predict the business impact is vital to our future success. HR needs to integrate all the various forms of people data – from sales achievement to engagement scores, to attrition, to ER cases to labor costs, to language – the list is endless. All too often, HR attempts to draw data from a range of unconnected, non-integrated systems. However, technological advances – particularly the introduction of cloud-based HR management systems – make it increasingly easy for all people data to be housed in a single, standard format.  Easier said than done for many of us – but a goal nonetheless.  In essence, what was once considered a niche skill set within HR needs to be given a far greater degree of prominence within the function and across the organization.

The world has changed.  My final thoughts are on remote workforce.  If you are not remote capable, you are missing out on a large percentage of available talent.  Based on studies by remote.co and Gallup: remote workers are more educated, more engaged, more productive, earn more, and allow companies to keep the older workforce engaged longer.  Additionally, remote work lowers stress, traffic congestion, the carbon footprint, decreases real estate needs, and (as seen here in DC on Monday) is unaffected by inclement weather. It is the new norm.  With the use of video calling and better technology platforms like Slack and Google Hangouts – the excuses made by some leaders about why NOT to telework are not holding much water these days.

These are some of the trends that keep me awake at night (besides the growing belt size trend my belly is on).  So, with that, I will leave you with this: as you are finalizing your 2019 goals for your team, focus on where you need to be not where you can be.  Expect more and push your team harder.

Together.   We.  Win.

Dave Harmon
People Division
“Kindness is Currency”
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/davidharmonhr

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