Transparent is the new black. From open office floor plans to glass walls and public calendars, companies are pushing to be more authentic with their clients and employees. Increasing collaboration in the workplace not only helps develop better ideas and strategies, but it also creates a more social work environment that fosters increased employee satisfaction . This transition takes effort from everyone involved, from c-suite employees all the way to the interns. Here are some strategies trending in human resources that will help promote a seamless transition to more open communication and a transparent workplace as you look towards 2018:
Corporate Social Responsibility
As millennials are moving into the workforce, becoming the decision makers in their households, and representing the largest age group in the United States, it is important to understand what is meaningful to them. One topic trending among millennials is an increase in the corporate social responsibility movement. Now more than ever, people are choosing brands and companies based on their corporate values. Consider Pepsi’s TV spot featuring Kendall Jenner as a prime example of how important it is to consumers to be a genuinely moral company. So where does HR fit in with this growing movement? Human resources will be under more scrutiny than ever when it comes to recruiting and hiring new talent, and it is crucial to create fairness by tracking pay differentials and horizontal and lateral movements in your company. Start the new year off right by creating open communication in your company and seek a corporate mission with strong elements of philanthropy.
Employee Retention Strategies
Employee mobility is on the rise. In the past, human resources tried to solve this dilemma after the fact by assessing why people left the company rather than predicting potential reasons they might leave and then addressing those issues. It is important to understand what your current and potential employees are looking for in a company and consider what would encourage them to stay or push them to leave in the future. As exit surveys are usually biased, one new way to better gather this information is to run clustering algorithms that create a profile specific to each employee with 40-50 attributes. Then, by grouping those who leave and comparing their attributes, HR can get better insight as to why these employees left. Similarly, this same strategy can be used to predict those who might want to leave prematurely in the future, so you can meet with them individually. This method is more proactive, personalized, and direct, and will show your employees their worth to your company and healthier communication practices overall.
Continuous Learning
Today, careers are lasting longer than ever before; Most people starting their careers today will work for almost 60 years. Over the course of a person’s career, technology will continue to increase exponentially, meaning it is crucial for everyone in your company to constantly learn and adapt to changing technology, in order to stay relevant in your field. Human resource departments have begun implementing learning management software (LMS) to track progress and productivity. Also, these programs allow for cross-departmental collaboration, because everyone contributes different learning content. On top of continuous technical learning, regular feedback to your employees is important to growing a company and developing careers. The New York Times recently stated that one of the reasons women are not ascending to higher level jobs is because their superiors, both men and women, are afraid to give critical feedback to women. Many learning management softwares have a performance management side that can help supervisors keep track of reports and encourage people to ask for feedback regularly. A developed feedback loop between junior and senior employees will ensure that your company does not lose talent or skills as newer employees begin to take over management positions.
Leadership Development
More collaborative work spaces are bringing managers out of their secluded offices and onto the floor to be accessible members of their teams. Project managers are moving away from a “command and control” style and towards collaborative team efforts. Instead of giving more orders and setting deadlines, team leaders can encourage collaboration by asking more questions that start with sharing an idea and letting it evolve through dialogue with their teams. To better collaborate and keep up with project timelines, companies are using a workflow visualization tool online called a Kanban board, like Trello. This tool is used to show a backlog of tasks that need to be completed, tasks in process, and completed deliverables. Kanban boards are great for visualizing every piece that goes into a completed project and ensuring everyone is held accountable for his assignment. Since everyone on a team can watch the progression of a project, it is easy to check-in with your team to see what obstacles people might be facing and where your team leader can help. These online project management boards allow team leaders to assign tasks and enable the team to see work progress on the backend, creating transparency and accountability.
Set the tone for 2018 in your company by staying up-to-date on HR trends that are changing company culture everywhere. Determining what might work for your company, and implementing it early in the year could set you up for improved staff retention, increased employee job satisfaction, and healthier workplace communication.
