The results of Deloitte’s Global Human Capital Trends 2014 were just released.

The main finding is a significant gap between the talent and leadership challenges that organisations face and their readiness and ability to respond.

A majority (86%) of the 2500 business and HR leaders surveyed recognised the need to take action on critical issues including leadership, followed by retention and engagement (79%) and reskilling the HR function (77%).

Despite the appetite for improvement, many expressed reservations over their company’s ability to take action.

Just 13% believed they do an excellent job in leadership development, while 66% believed they are ‘weak’ in their ability to provide focused leadership programs for millennials. Over half (51%) had little confidence in their ability to maintain consistent succession programs.

A further 38% of leaders reported being ‘weak’ at integrating social, community and corporate programs and aligning employees and corporate goals. Four-in-ten (40%) said their organisation was ‘weak’ in helping employees balance their personal and professional lives.

HR playing catch-up

Over a third (34%) of respondents believed their HR and talent programs are just ‘getting by’ or ‘under-performing.’ Under 10% of HR leaders had confidence that their teams have the skills needed to meet the challenges of today’s global environment and consistently deliver innovative programs that drive business impact.

“There’s no doubt that human capital strategies are now a major factor in business growth,” said Brett Walsh, Global Human Capital leader at Deloitte.

“One of our biggest findings in this research is the fact that doing more is not enough. Today, companies have to manage people differently—creating an imperative to innovate, transform, and re-engineer human capital practices.

“When you add to this the rapidly changing landscape of HR technologies, such as cloud and big data, and their impact on attracting, retaining and developing talent, it becomes clear that reskilling HR teams is arguably the most critical mission for organizations today.”

The key trends identified in the Deloitte Global Human Capital Trends 2014 report fall into three major categories: attracting and engaging; leading and developing; and transforming and re-engineering the HR function. For more information on each of these, please visit the report page.

HRZone will be carrying the exclusive on the UK results, once they are published over the next week. These will go live on the home page.