talent management
Reframing HR for the
Future of Work
PRIORITIZING PEOPLE AT ALL LEVELS IS THE
KEY TO AN ORGANIZATION’S SUCCESS
By Justin Fragapane
By now, we’re all hopefully aware that the shift toward
employee engagement is here to stay.
Millennials continue to flood the job market, surpassing
Gen Xers as the largest slice of the workforce, bringing
with them an evolving set of expectations of employers. For companies
looking to gain an edge in the coming years, there’s literally
never been a better time than now to adopt a people-first mentality.
For many organizations who have already taken that plunge, it
begins with a shift at the most fundamental level – the language
used to consider their employees. Labelling humans as “resources”
is rapidly becoming antiquated nomenclature, and forward-thinking
companies like Google reframing their HR department as
“people operations” is proof positive.
Former human rights lawyer Kahina Ouerdane spearheaded a
similar change when she took over HR at the Canadian company
ESTABLISHING AN INFRASTRUCTURE
OF EMPLOYEE SATISFACTION
CREATES A RIPPLE EFFECT THAT
IMPACTS EVERY LEVEL OF AN
ORGANIZATION’S IDENTITY.
GSOFT, rebranding her new team under the banner of “culture
and organization”.
“Calling departments responsible for people operations ‘human
capital’ is very dehumanizing,” said Ouerdane. “That vocabulary
is dangerous. I think words are extremely powerful in a world
where that’s how we communicate. Now every time I hear someone
pronounce the term ‘HR,’ I say something and explain why
the mind-shift to putting people, not resources, at our centre is so
important.”
Prioritizing people, not just in terminology but at all levels of an
organization, is what makes these initiatives stick. In other words,
simply updating your department name won’t get you far if you’re
not committed to walking the walk. The good news is that choosing
to lead the charge towards this shift in culture may actually provide
companies with a competitive advantage when it comes to recruitment.
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HRPROFESSIONALNOW.CA ❚ APRIL 2018 ❚ 33