Dear HR, Have a seat at the table !

The topic of the need for HR leaders to step up has been discussed in numerous articles and seminars by academics, consultants and CEOs alike.

I believe most far sighted CEOs who want to leverage on their HR leaders as trusted partners have the following key expectations of them.

1. To get the operational basics right (recruitment, talent development, retention, payroll etc) while being more efficient through the use of automation and analytics.

2. To play a more strategic* role in the organisation

In the July-August 2014 issue of ‘The Harvard Business Review’, Ram Charan, a renowned business author and advisor to a great deal of business leaders, wrote an article titled ‘It’s Time to Split HR’ with a radical proposal to split HR into two strands. One would primarily manage the operational aspects of HR and report to the CFO and the other would focus on improving the people capabilities of the business and would report to the CEO.

Before we take those drastic steps, CEOs must do their part to address the challenge. In my mind, there are only two ways for CEOs to move forward

1. Take personal responsibility to coach an existing HR leader with potential to move up to the level that you desire. This will be no different from coaching any of your other direct reports.

2. Hire a leader who is not from a traditional HR role. Charan writes in his article : 

“Among the few CHROs who do know (and understand the strategic side of business), I almost always find a common distinguishing quality: They have worked in line operations—such as sales, services, or manufacturing—or in finance.”

These line leaders have experience in improving processes and creating efficiencies (the operational side of HR) and more importantly translating strategies to deliver business results (the strategic side of HR). They would then act as catalysts to develop the next generation of HR leaders.

So, to those CEOs who gripe about HR leaders not being able to step up, the solution to get HR 'a seat at the table' is in your hands. Coach a high potential HR leader upwards or be bold enough to hire an ’outsider’ to lead HR.

END

#strategic_hr

* The term ‘strategic’ is often tossed about without the proper context. In the context of describing the strategic HR leader, we use Charan’s thoughts of what is expected :-

“..... relate HR to real-world business needs. ....know how key decisions are made, .... analyze why people—or whole parts of the organization—aren’t meeting the business’s performance goals. .. gain the business acumen needed to help organizations perform at their best."

Read Ram Charan’s HBR article here.

Sekar Shanmugam is the MD of ProfitAbility in SE Asia. ProfitAbility based near Oxford in the UK designs and delivers fully blended and customised business simulation programmes to some of the world’s leading organisations, such as Siemens, Nestlé, Roche, Volkswagen and GKN.