Last week one of our international HR clients challenged us with a very interesting question: How can HR help our country grow? ‘Wow’, was our first reaction.

We like this kind of question, because it forces us HR Professionals to reset and to put everything we do to the test –our philosophy, our purpose, our passion, our processes, our models and tools, briefly our entire “raison d’être”.
Similarly, it’s an open challenge to HR to aspire to something greater from its own transformation to the transformation of the organisation as a whole and why not even right through to the transformation of a whole country… ?! HR has the power!

‘How so?’, you might ask. We racked our HR Consultants’ brains and we’ve come up with the following ideas and 3 concrete suggestions on how HR can achieve that. It is obvious, that this high aspiration can’t be achieved by just doing ‘same old same old’, or by just doing the same things in a slightly different or improved way. It requires a “radical” paradigm shift. It requires HR to break the mould and to take a brave new approach in order to help its organisation achieve its business goals.

First of all, as well as its own strategic growth goals, an organisation needs to develop the commitment to becoming a company that is considered by both its internal and external customers as the best company representing their voice and addressing their needs from an ethical, commercial, social and customer focussed point of view.
HR can support its organisation in this process by identifying change and improvement opportunities within and without the organisation, by being relentlessly focussed on the alignment to this vision and by being the change engineer and a living role model.

So, to make this happen, what does HR need to do? :

1) adopt new skills and tools to engage with the business in different (more commercial) ways
2) have a clear line of sight between HR projects and business objectives including a measurable and demonstrable impact (on the business)
3) change its leadership style and becoming a role model in driving change proactively and forging the strategic business alignment

The end result is a great story to tell, a story about a different HR with a different emphasis. A different brand which demonstrates high value to the business through the shift from common-or-garden projects to a different work helping create a pipeline of valued customers… the rest is history, a great model for the transformation of an entire society…

Let us know what you think and join the discussion.