Formalizing your assessment procedures helps you take a strategic approach. HR assessment strategies have helped me, an HR professional for more than 25 years, to identify strategic objectives based on performance gaps. By setting goals and creating accountability, you can enable long-term success for your company. Start by determining your organization’s stage of development. Then, you can design programs to help your company meet competitive challenges. To develop an HR function at your company, you typically:
- Create awareness about HR functions. During a company’s start-up phase, HR functions usually involve hiring and firing staff members. As your company expands, the HR role evolves to include all facets of performance management, training and professional development.
- Structure your HR department to handle both service transactions, such as payroll, and strategic planning. Implement programs to meet your employees’ needs. HR professionals typically develop training courses that ensure personnel have the skills, knowledge, and experience to perform tasks well. As your company grows, create job descriptions that clearly define job competencies and provide support for employees to develop in their careers. This includes running workshops, offering coaching, and publishing self-paced training. Link employee performance to pay raises, promotions, and recognition.
- Move from using spreadsheets to using more sophisticated tools to track and monitor employee time sheets, training, and personal data.
- Hire specialized personnel to perform HR tasks, such as recruiting, interviewing, hiring, orienting, and training new employees.
- Link HR tasks to your company’s strategic plans. For example, if you plan to expand operations into other countries, create HR training programs that promote team building and cultural diversity to enhance productivity and collaboration.
To assess your HR department, determine how well you handle each of the tasks above. Develop an online survey. Ask participants to rate your HR department’s current level of activity from one to four, denoting a stage of development.
- At the first stage, your company forms and requires no HR administration.
- At the second stage, your company hires its first employees and requires minimal HR administration.
- At the third stage, your company grows and needs HR support in some areas of the company.
- At the fourth stage, your company requires HR support and strategic planning in all areas of the company.
Ask each member of your department to complete this analysis. If people don’t agree, it might mean that you need to discuss and set expectations about how your company interacts with the rest of the company and meets the company’s needs at every level.
