Today HR is at the centre of business performance. HR professionals have an important role to play in driving decisions that enable their organisations to thrive in both the short and the longer term. Where in the past the function delivered the fundamentals that underpinned the employee lifecycle (such as recruitment, induction and salary administration) supporting organisation performance is now the theme running through HR’s work.
Recognising that HR is a business discipline – and encouraging managers to view business as a ‘people’ discipline is crucial. This partnership approach is vital in order for HR professionals to be able to deliver maximum benefit to their organisations.
To ensure that HR professionals can deliver to this wider agenda, we’re seeing greater specialism. One example of this is in the area of organisation development. The increasing rate at which businesses re-invent and reorganise themselves mean HR’s role in making change happen is in demand. Another example is employee engagement. Specialists are using data to understand and make decisions based on what motivates their employees to perform at work.
We’re also seeing an increasing globalisation of the profession, with an increasing number of CIPD members with overseas responsibilities. CIPD’s research on Next Generation HR (conducted in both the UK and Asia), looks further forward and considers how HR will develop over the next five to ten years, and the implications of this for developing future HR Professionals and Leaders.