Well, it’s that time of year again. As the new year is here, we have an opportunity to change 
habits that didn’t work so well last year. According to the Book of Odds: From Lightning Strikes to Love at First Sight, the Odds of Everyday Life, nearly half of all adults make a New Year’s resolution. This desire to make resolutions is seen at our homes, gyms, and even the boardrooms. And for chief human resources officers (CHROs), resolutions can be part of a total transformation of the HR organization as well as the entire business.
CHROs, does your organization still use the phrase “people are your most valuable asset”? Now is a great time to ask if you are serious about making this a reality for your people. As businesses worldwide prepare for the Future of Work, 2015 is certainly the time to maximize your employees’ worth and, by extension, the value of your HR organization.
You have a seat in the executive boardroom – now is the time to get vocal and starting taking action. Here are five resolutions you may want to consider for your list in 2015 – and beyond.
1. Start thinking about the long-term viability of your organization
If you’re at the boardroom table agreeing with your fellow executives, you’re not needed. To show the value of HR, you must contribute a vision, a purpose, and a different point of view. More important, you must have the courage to speak out on people topics that do not support customer-first thinking, innovation, and the acceleration of your best people.
Do you have a strategy to address these realities of your current – and future – workforce?
Have a succession plan for the Boomers
Accommodate new work habits and a different definition of “coming to work”
Quantify the skills gaps in your company
Maintain a corporate culture that fosters innovation and customer success
Develop data analysis skills that can measure impact – not just activity
2. The corporate ladder is dead – stop clinging to old career concepts
The logical, upward progression through a series of related positions is long gone. HR must now approach career development by identifying the employees it wants to retain and develop self-led career management skills for high-potential employees.
Here are some ways to accomplish this:
Determine what competencies are essential for success in your organization
Make employees aware of what’s available
Create job rotations and fellowships to build your people’s organizational agility
Actively prepare people for leadership roles even if just project leadership
Embed learning (not just training – see Resolution #3)
3. Know the difference between learning and training
Training is about procuring knowledge. Learning is about integrating that knowledge into best practices and positively impacting customer satisfaction.
Formal training is unquestionably necessary. However, it’s often sporadic and doesn’t give talent an opportunity to put the new knowledge into practice over the long term. The information is in our short-term memory, but we often forget most of what we’ve heard when we return to our desks.
Your people deserve more than that. They need a way to nurture their skills and develop continuously. We all learn in a variety of ways.
As you get started with learning initiatives, don’t forget these proven methods when helping your people develop:
Show, don’t tell. Human are often very visual beings –this is certainly true with Millennials. To show a new technique or best practice, consider filming and showing a 90-second video.
Find the best talent and make them teachers. Often times, the best teachers are the ones among us. Look inward to find employees that have desirable capabilities that can be used across a team or the entire workforce. Then, find a way that enables them to teach others what they know.
Go with what (the kids) know. We all like games – especially video games. By using purposeful gamification techniques, employees are most likely to stay engaged while meeting specific stage and/or company goals.
4. Integrate the HR organization into the entire business
Did you know that your workforce will be experiencing a demographic shift soon? If not, it’s time to wake up and start planning strategically – especially since, for the first time, there are now five generations in the workplace.
Here are some important ways to plan ahead now:
Build a five-year talent development plan. Make sure your business has the skills it needs now and for the future. This is especially important as employees with ten or more years of tenure give way to new hires with training but no relevant work experience, experience but no training, or a degree but neither experience nor training.
Give Millennials what they want – feedback. Create more checkpoints with employees and work with managers to create employee action plans to address feedback.
Coach the coaches with data. HR has more data than ever about talent, yet many of us don’t use it. Apply that data to prove your organization’s value and help managers develop people to become more productive and relevant.
5. Extend your reach beyond full-time employees
Increasingly, companies are relying on contract, freelance, project-based, and temporary employees. In fact, Accenture estimates that contingent workers make up between 20% and 33% of the workforce in the U.S. alone. And it’s quite possible, that this contingent workforce will one day outnumber your full-time equivalents.
By taking ownership and getting a better view of this contingent workforce, you can get a better understanding of the competition for talent and make proactive suggestions about workforce planning.
What’s on your New Year’s resolutions list for 2015?
How will this year be different for you and your HR organization? For more ideas on how you can transform the HR organization and prepare for the Future of Work, read the inquiry 5 Bad Habits HR Needs to Break in 2015.