HRDs Shift of Focus

HR leaders are in the process of shifted the focus of their function significantly according to new data from Circal the people who bring you working futures The change is placing a much higher focus on Diversity and inclusion and Workforce planning in their people plans than in comparison to last year. This seems to have been done at the expense of investment in leadership development, employee experience and even culture change whilst these are still seen as important they seem to have been surpassed in their level of importance.

The data was Collected from HRDs, CPOs and CHROs by Circal over the past few weeks as part of the preparation for Working Futures The Big Reset on 17th November.

It showed that 53% of HR leaders were going to make D&I a top priority for investment in the year ahead. This is an increase of 56% from 2019 and almost double what HR Directors said in 2018. Clearly D&I moving up the HR agenda has been influenced by the Black lives Matters campaign and perhaps a general recognition that our organisations having paying lip service to this issue over the last few years. I think there is a genuine desire from people perhaps influenced by the health crisis for their organisation to be a force for good in society. There is a shared belief that progress should be purely based on merit and that no one should be directly or indirectly discriminated against. I am delighted that HR and business leaders are responding to the issue and hope we start to see real change over the next couple of years.

The second shift was a much greater focus on Workforce planning and management. This was 50% higher than last year. This surely relates to organisations looking at the composition of there workforce in light of the pandemic. Nearly every business has had to reevaluate their people plan in light of changing customer demands and seek to create the right balance between the number of employees and customer demand. It also reflects that organisations are perhaps taking the opportunity to take a deeper look at the skills and capabilities they will need to be successful in the medium to longer term. I’ve always felt that workforce planning Is often ignored in most businesses

people plans. This resurgence is an reminder that it’s a critical building block and if done well enables businesses to be more effective at resource and succession planning these are also often low level priorities in HR functions but they are at the heart of defining how the business can secure the talent it needs to have a competitive advantage.

Also as surprising were the areas that while they are seen as important seem to have been overtaken by D&I and Workforce planning. These included health and wellbeing and data & analytics both are still in the top 10 priority areas for investment but are lower priorities than in 2019 which was not what we have expected. Perhaps more predictable was the decline of Employer branding, learning tech and upskilling as businesses respond more to the immediate challenges than the longer term impact of upgrading their brand or investing in learning and development. Clearly this is an opportunity for suppliers in these areas to make the case for investment more visible and tangible.

We’re keen to see as many HR leaders at the HRs best Virtual event Working Futures the Big Rest on 17th November if you want to book your free place here is the link https://workingfutures.co/the-big-reset-working-futures-virtual-2020/attendees/