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As the director of HR strategy and compensation with Xerox
Canada, Nadia Cerisano is responsible for organization design
and strategic workforce planning.
“Without a business strategy, I can’t address either of those areas,”
said Cerisano.
So Cerisano collaborates with the other executives in her organization
to understand each area’s direction, goals and needs.
“I work with the VPs in defining their strategy to a level of clarity
where I can understand the workforce implications, and then
I consider what this materially means to our talent practices,” she
said. “As an HR leadership team, we then use these learnings to
determine how HR needs to evolve as a team so we can continue
to innovate and enable our business to thrive.”
The nature of HR means its reach, impact and responsibilities
are organization wide.
“HR is part of the business and it can enable the business to
grow,” said Marful. “It’s just like how you think about growing your
business through a marketing function. When you look at HR
that way, it can take on a totally different role.”
Business and HR strategy must be integrated to be effective.
“In the same way that business would collaborate with the financial
team and sit down with HR and ask what are the new
goals, growth plans such as capital and acquisitions, efficiencies or
synergies, we in HR should also look at those financial targets as
part of our strategy,” said Oldroyd. “You consider the goals of the
organization and what the people component should be, then you
have to take a look at the current state versus the future state and
identify the steps to get there.”
An HR leader also needs to consider the HR department or
team itself.
“As we’re working with the business groups to help build their
strategy, we need to build our strategy, too,” said Oldroyd. “Not
just in how we’re addressing how HR will respond to meeting the
businesses needs, but we need to look at our own department to
ensure that our direction supports the
business strategy and that we continue to
optimize our talent and our people practices.
We need to participate but then we
need to ensure that we’re growing ourselves
as well.”
KNOWING YOUR BUSINESS,
AND MORE
The work of developing strategy for HR
in collaboration with the rest of the executive
team requires deep business acumen
and credibility, earned though experience
and a track record of success.
“If you don’t have that, the organization
isn’t going to invite you to the executive table
in the first place, and they’re not going
to invest in a time-consuming and cerebral
project like developing strategy,” said
Cerisano. There’s no substitute for business
acumen and a deep understanding of
how your organization makes money. An
HR professional who can provide that kind of meaningful insight
is an invaluable resource to an organization.
STRATEGY INFLUENCERS
While the needs and priorities of each organization will differ, certain
hot-button issues are likely to impact strategy as it relates to
the HR function.
“As part of strategy development, you need to know what the
trends are and what’s emerging, externally,” said Olydroyd. “What’s
disruptive to your business and your workforce? What’s enabling?
What can make things easier and more efficient for your people to
run the overall business strategy?”
Understanding these trends and concerns, filtered through an
HR lens, means a human resources professional can contribute
proactively and strategically.
CULTURE KEEPER
One area that should figure prominently in strategic planning is
organizational culture. As the “keeper of culture,” HR is the first
to know if something is out of synch. When there’s misalignment
between a business strategy and an organization’s culture, it’s a
recipe for trouble. If an organization’s strategy emphasizes innovation,
for example, but the culture doesn’t encourage risk-taking
or positive dissent, that’s a potentially major roadblock to success.
This is where HR can offer insight and collaborate to get culture
and strategy in line.
SHAPE-SHIFTING WORKFORCE
HR is also likely to be more keenly aware of the shift towards a
more transient workforce, and how that can impact engagement,
culture and other key aspects of business.
A growing number of organizations now count an increasing
number of contractors, freelancers and remote workers into their
personnel mix. In a Deloitte’s Human Capital Trends 2015 report,
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HRPATODAY.CA ❚ MARCH/APRIL 2016 ❚ 21
