According to the San Francisco Chronicle, every time an employee is hired, trained or supervised, human resources is involved. Some companies have dedicated human resources departments, while smaller businesses may not have such departments or dedicated employees. Regardless, the human resources function within an enterprise must support the higher goals of the business.
How that function is being handled within companies has changed in recent years.
In order to find out more about how human resources supports the goals of a company and how that is changing today, we spoke with Corey F Crapella. Crapella is an experienced human resources professional that has led and supported HR initiatives within companies such as Sherwin-Williams and Ilera Healthcare. He has experience in employee relations, leadership development and training. Corey Crapella received his bachelor’s degree at the University of Pennsylvania and his graduate degree at Villanova University. He is a SHRM-certified professional.
The Role of HR
According to Inc.com, the primary responsibilities of a human resources department include:
- Analyzing jobs and staffing
- Organizing the employee workforce
- Measuring and appraising employee performance
- Implementing reward systems for workers
- Creating and administering professional development and training
New Trends in HR and How They Support Business Management
1. Less Siloing
According to Inc., one of the biggest changes to business management is that organizations are not siloing their departments. Instead, the trend is for departments to work together on teams to find ways to support the bottom line of the business and organizational goals. How this relates to HR is that this requires HR professionals to change job descriptions and take a fresh look at performance evaluation. Also, the change towards teams of employees from different department solving issues helps to get HR a seat at the table to be more pro-active in creating means of improving the culture within a business and aiding management in better supervision, training and retention of employees.
2. New Means of Hiring and Staffing
There are some new trends in hiring that are supported by technology, such as using tailored and personalized analytical testing to determine the best candidate for a targeted job classification. These new tests can be created to find candidates with the desired mix of dispositions and experience to fill highly targeted roles in your organization. The best of these tests can point out interview questions that help solidify information about the candidate’s capabilities.
Also, behavioral-based interview questions help HR departments identify candidates who will actually rise to the demands of the job in the line of fire.
3. Data Analytics
According to Business News Daily, improvements in technology that support data analytics are helping HR departments advise management about the best course when issues come up like outsourcing, how to contain the costs of employee benefits and how to best replace retiring employees.
4. Telecommuting
HR departments today are increasingly being tasked to create guidelines for work done via telecommuting.
5. Training
Also, HR departments are finding that they have a wider variety of tools for training and professional development, due to new technologies that are increasingly within a click of the employee’s computer that provide real-time information and training as it is needed as well as repositories for on-going training.
Crapella explains that getting the information from veteran and highly prized employees into such training systems means that when the employee leader has left the company or is on vacation, other employees still have the benefit of their wisdom and expertise.
6. Implementing Change in Organizations
According to Business News Daily, this shift to less departmentalizing of companies has led to HR taking more of a lead in company change policies. By using their knowledge of organizational and industrial psychology, HR professionals can work in teams with management and help organizational change campaigns succeed, rather than fail and create worker dissatisfaction and resentment.
Corey F Crapella and other HR professionals are riding a sea of change in businesses today that – through the use of technology, psychology, data analytics – are helping HR departments be more directly helpful in supporting organizational and management goals as well as with a wider variety of issues that relate to employee relations and performance.
