Remote and hybrid work. Digital disruption. Talent shortages.
Skills gaps. HR is facing an unprecedented combination of
challenges. Challenges that require new skills and competencies to overcome.
But research shows that only 2 out of 10 have the competencies
necessary to thrive in the new world of work.
Which competencies are these exactly? There are 4 key competencies that are absolutely essential
for a future-proof HR career, that combined with your functional expertise,
will turn you into an all-round T-Shaped HR pro. Let’s take a closer look.
*MUSIC*
Hi there, I'm Neelie Verlinden and welcome to another episode
of Learning Bites. Before we dive into what it means to be a T-shaped HR professional,
don’t forget to subscribe to our channel, click the notification button, and like this video!
Now, let's get started.
Traditionally, you advanced your HR career by mastering
one or two disciplines such as Talent Acquisition, Compensation & Benefits,
or Learning & Development, with little to no work in other areas. This created a deep but
very narrow set of skills -- and would limit your impact on your organization.
But those days are over. Today's HR professionals need to invest in the depth and breadth of their
knowledge and expand their expertise with general competencies. This creates a T-shaped HR profile,
where the horizontal part of the T represents the four most essential HR competencies and
the vertical part represents your specialism. By developing the four general competencies,
HR professionals can better collaborate across disciplines and departments,
bring out the best in employees, and make a bigger impact on the business.
Let's take a closer look at these four competencies.
1: Digital Proficiency Understanding technology
and how it can drive efficiency in the organization is essential for successful
modern HR professionals. That doesn't mean you need to be a tech expert and
know how to single-handedly configure your HRIS. But the right technological skills,
knowledge and experience will let you give your organization a competitive edge.
An example of digital integration would be mastery of your HRIS, including performing
a needs analysis and taking part in the selection and implementation of a new system.
By the way: if you're looking for more examples of skills that belong to these competencies,
check out our Learning Bite episode on the top skills HR professionals need. You can find the
link in the description below. 2: Business acumen
Speaking the language of the business is the key to aligning HR strategy with organizational
strategy and making a real impact. If you are an HR professional with strong business acumen,
you will be able to better understand the problems your line managers and executives
are trying to solve. You will be able to understand the global context of work and
the internal organizational dynamics in order to identify sources of competitive advantage
and ensure that HR better serves your company, your employees, and your customers.
An example of a business acumen skill is understanding your end customer:
the employees. This is key to creating better HR policies that have maximum impact on the business.
3: Data literacy You don't need to become a data scientist. But
developing your data literacy empowers you to turn information into insights, use data visualization
and storytelling to influence key stakeholders, and deliver more value with data-driven decision
making. And that puts you miles ahead of any HR professional still relying on gut feeling.
An example of a data literacy skill is identifying and measuring HR KPIs,
so that you can use data to gain insight into HR's performance.
4: People advocacy Last but not least,
a T-shaped HR professional needs to be able to create a strong internal culture,
get the best out of people, and act as a trusted champion and communications expert.
An HR professional with this competence actively promotes diversity and fosters inclusion,
works effectively with intercultural differences and skillfully resolves
conflicts -- essential skills in today's increasingly global and decentralized workplaces.
A great example of a people advocacy skill is active listening, which will help you
understand your employees' position so that you can better help them overcome challenges at work.
We now have a better understanding of the T-shaped HR model and the associated competencies.
But how does it help HR professionals overcome the challenges of modern work?
Being T-shaped makes you more agile T-shaped HR professionals are able
to operate in a more agile way, working more collaboratively and sharing more knowledge.
This helps them to create integrated HR activities that create real business impact.
Being T-shaped makes you more data-driven Another benefit for T-shaped HR professionals
is that they are able to communicate using data to influence decision-making. They are also able
to identify and capitalize on opportunities to leverage technology to boost productivity.
Being T-shaped makes you more strategic Last but not least, T-shaped HR professionals
have all the competencies and skills necessary to better align with business stakeholders and,
as a result, come up with solutions that better serve the business, its employees,
and its customers. For instance, you are able to effortlessly communicate your ideas,
and you can move projects forward without having to wait on other specialists.
In other words, you're more efficient and effective than your peers.
But hey, you don't need to take our word for it. Here are some examples of HR departments
putting these competencies to work.
Example 1: Optimizing recruitment with a data-driven approach
A US retailer is overcoming talent shortages with data. After collecting information
across the entire talent value chain, they identified 4 types of employees and how they
affected store performance. They then started approaching promising candidates directly,
and used publicly available data such as LinkedIn profiles and résumés posted online
to make tailored offers to the best job seekers -- even if they hadn't applied.
The company also used an app to streamline the application process, resulting in a
60% faster process from first contact to hire, 80% less paperwork, and boost retention rates.
Example 2: Accelerating reskilling with digital integration
Companies including Walmart, Unliever and Accenture are taking part in a pilot study
that uses AI to map workers’ skills and match them to emerging job roles. One of the outcomes
is that employees were vastly underestimating their skills, and that it would in fact only
take six months to reskill them into new roles in completely different functions.
Example 3: Rethinking salaries in the face of remote work using business acumen
The normalization of remote work has opened up opportunities for employees at Silicon Valley
tech companies to relocate to lower cost of living areas while maintaining their jobs.
It has also opened up a much bigger pool of potential candidates to tech companies,
who have long struggled to find the talent they need. To capitalize on this new status
quo in talent acquisition, HR departments are taking the larger business context into account
and rethinking salary and rewards. While some companies, such as Reddit,
have said that they are not changing the salaries of remote employees,
others are. For example, Stripe has announced they are cutting remote employee wages
by 10% -- but they are offering $20,000 to help employees with relocation costs.
So there you have it: the T-shaped HR profile, what it means, and how it can
help you and your company thrive in our increasingly complex and dynamic world.
Curious to see how you score on the various competencies? We've created a
T-shaped assessment tool to do just that. You'll get a full report of your scores
and how they compare to a benchmark of thousands other HR Professionals. Curious
to know how T-shaped you are? Click the link to the assessment in the description below.
Bye!