As HR Professionals we spin so many plates, from managing recruitment and onboarding to handling employee relations and performance management. Sometimes, it can be hard to find time to take a step back and look at the bigger picture of how we impact the overall organisational success and culture.
This is where strategic HR planning comes in, serving as a consistent roadmap that guides us in aligning our activities with the organisation’s overarching goals and objectives.
In this blog, we are going to explore how you can decide what areas to focus on when creating your HR strategy that aligns with your company’s overall goals and objectives.
What is Strategic HR?
Strategic HR Management is a holistic approach to aligning HR initiatives with your overarching business strategy. It involves understanding your company’s mission, vision, and goals and then designing HR practices that directly contribute to achieving those objectives.
This proactive approach ensures that every HR decision—from hiring and training to performance management and beyond—is geared towards achieving your overall business objectives.
The Competitive Advantage of Strategic HR
In today’s dynamic business environment, competition is fierce. Customers have more choices, technology is rapidly evolving, and the global marketplace is constantly shifting. The key to success lies in your ability to adapt, innovate, and execute with agility.
Here’s are some Strategic HR areas that can empower your organisation to achieve this:
Future-Proofing Your Workforce
Strategic HR workforce planning is a systematic process to ensure you have the necessary employees, skills, and knowledge to meet current and future business goals.
It aligns with the organisation’s long-term strategy and must be flexible enough to accommodate unexpected changes. It aims to optimise costs by preventing overstaffing and mitigating the risk of understaffing, ensuring the organisation can consistently meet its business objectives. It’s important to consider not only the number of employees, but also the size, shape, cost, and agility in the workforce, encompassing aspects like competencies, skills gaps, talent pipeline, labour costs, and the ability to adapt to market changes.
Optimising Performance Management
Effective performance management is essential for maximising employee productivity and achieving business objectives. But is is far more complex than creating competencies, refreshing an appraisal form or setting objectives.
You need a clear performance framework aligned with your strategic goals. This includes setting measurable objectives, and providing regular feedback and coaching. Open communication channels help to identify and address any challenges or barriers that may hinder performance, allowing for timely interventions that support employee growth and engagement.
Remember to link these frameworks to your reward systems. The way you recognise employees might sit in the reward framework, but it overlaps with performance management optimisation too.
Career pathways are a crucial part of employee performance and productivity. Offering professional development opportunities is key to sustaining high levels of performance. By investing in training, mentorship, and career development programmes, organisations empower employees to enhance their skills and knowledge. This not only increases individual performance but also boosts overall organisational capability. When employees see a clear path for advancement and feel supported in their professional journey, they are more likely to stay motivated, engaged, and committed to delivering their best work.
Building a Strong Employer Brand
In the war for talent, attracting and retaining top performers requires a compelling employer brand.
Strategic HR helps you define your company culture, your company’s unique selling points (USP), and your employee value proposition (EVP). Using these insights helps you to build a positive reputation as a desirable workplace. This could involve implementing employee engagement initiatives, promoting diversity and inclusion programs, and leveraging social media to showcase your company’s unique culture.
A Tailored Approach to Strategic HR
There are many more areas to consider than those outlined above. And there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to Strategic HR. Every organisation has unique needs, goals, and challenges. If you aren’t sure where to start, there are ways I can help you to develop a bespoke HR strategy for your business.
Here are a few steps to consider:
Step 1 – Collaborative Needs Assessment
Typically you need to begin with a collaborative needs assessment involving in-depth discussions with your leadership team, key department heads, and a cross-section of employees. This comprehensive approach ensures you gain a deep understanding of your business goals, current workforce capabilities, and any talent gaps that may exist.
- Think about…. How does the business make money? What are the future plans? Growth, consolidation, diversification, retrenching etc. And do we have what we need to deliver these plans? Where are the gaps? These inputs are crucial to focusing your HR strategy in the right areas.
Step 2 – Data-Driven Insights
Data is an invaluable asset in crafting a strategic HR plan. Be sure to leverage HR analytics tools to gather data on employee demographics, performance metrics, learning and development activities, and employee engagement surveys. By analysing this data, we can identify trends, measure progress, and make data-driven decisions to optimise your HR strategies.
- Think about…. What is the data telling me? For example, a headline attrition number isn’t very informative on its own – we need to know trends, specific areas, specific grades, length of service etc. Apply this curiosity and scrutiny to all of your key metrics. And get very clear on why these metrics are so important.
Step 3 – Strategic Initiatives and Implementation
Based on this needs assessment and data analysis, you can then design a customised HR strategy. Depending on your priorities, this could cover a range of HR pillars, such as:
- Recruitment & Talent Acquisition: Building a talent pool of high-potential candidates through targeted recruitment strategies, employer branding initiatives, and talent pipeline programs.
- Retention and Productivity: From developing a comprehensive onboarding programme to help new hires quickly get up to speed, to supporting employees to perform and become productive members of their teams. This might be through clearly articulated career pathways, supported by targeted talent development, and linked to pay structures, to support skills-based pay progression.
- Learning & Development: Invest in talent development through training programmes, leadership development initiatives, and mentorship programmes to ensure your workforce possesses the skills and knowledge needed to achieve your business goals.
- Performance Management: Implementing a structured performance management system that provides employees with clear expectations, regular feedback, and opportunities for growth and development.
- Compensation & Benefits: Developing a competitive compensation and benefits package to attract and retain top talent, ensure employee satisfaction, and motivate high performance.
- Employee Engagement & Culture: How can you better understand the heartbeat of the organisation, the USP of the organisation, the employee sentiment, and nurture the behaviours you want. Maybe you have a hybrid work culture and need specific approaches to bring people together. Maybe you need to align different parts of the business under a more consistent culture framework. Any of these might (or might not) be important parrots of your strategy.
A Different Approach to HR Strategy with Gemma Bullivant
For me, it’s all about taking a holistic approach—a deep dive into understanding what makes your company unique and how we can leverage that uniqueness to drive your business strategy.
I strongly believe that your organisation’s leadership profile, company culture, and the talents of your people should be at the heart of your business strategy. By aligning these elements, you can not only enhance organisational performance but also create a roadmap for sustainable growth and competitive advantage. It’s about creating synergies where every HR initiative—from talent acquisition and development to engagement strategies—supports and drives your overarching goals.
Remember that they all overlap – a lot like a venn diagram. You need to consider how each initiative might affect other parts of the HR framework.
In addition to the usual strategic questions of ‘Where do we want to get to?’ and ‘How do we get there?’ it’s also important to consider some fundamental questions: What kind of company is this? Who are the people that make it tick? What sets us apart from the rest? These questions aren’t just about defining your business—they’re about uncovering the essence of your organisation, its USP and its potential.
If you want to learn more about strategic thinking, read my blog The Three Key Elements of Strategic Thinking.
Start Thinking Strategically Today!
If you’re ready to elevate your HR strategy and drive meaningful change within your organisation, I’m here to help. As an experienced HR coach and mentor, I specialise in guiding businesses like yours through the complexities of strategic HR planning.
Contact me today to explore how we can collaborate to strengthen your HR function and achieve long-term success.
Together, we can tailor solutions that align with your specific goals.
