A survey that aimed to discover the most important qualities for HR leaders to display has found that 42% of HR professionals believe the quality of leadership in HR is poor or satisfactory.

The survey, conducted by HR with Guts and Orion Partners, also found that over 40% of HR heads think that ‘taking a stand on what they believe’ is very important, yet only 15% of them ranked ‘taking a risk’ that highly. Also, 53% of HR business partners (HRBPs) think that ‘providing unquestioning service’ was important or very important, however 94% of them rated ‘has an opinion and challenges’ as either important or very important.

The survey also revealed that there is inconsistency between how senior people in HR see their leadership and how their employees see it, with 71% of heads of HR describing themselves as willing or very willing to take a risk, whereas only 3% of people who work in HR considered their boss, that same head of HR, as likely to take a risk.

Jan Hills, director of HR with Guts, commented that it is good to see how far HR has come in terms of understanding the change in behaviours needed, in order to become truly strategic business partners with their clients.

“But it is not enough for HR to begin to develop the new behaviours needed, they also need to liberate themselves from the legacies of HR’s past process and logistical functionality,” she added.

“Following the new generation HR is not rocket science, but it can be challenging and it can be hard work, there are a lot of new things to learn, and although there are many types of training and assistance that can help in this area, companies need to be willing to invest in their HR if real progress is to be made.”

Further findings highlighted that there has been some progress in how HR views its role – only 3% of HRBPs and 6% of heads of HR thought that ‘loves helping people’ was a very important quality, while 90% of heads of HR thought that ‘solving business problems’ was either important or very important.