Employee engagement the 'top challenge'

The report “Global Human Capital Trends 2015: Leading in the New World of Work” explores the 10 major trends that came out from the consulting firm’s research: leadership, learning and development, culture and engagement, performance management, workforce on demand, reinventing HR, HR and people analytics, simplification of work, people data everywhere, and machines as talent.
“Culture and engagement emerged as the top trends in terms of importance, with 50 per cent of the respondents [in the survey] saying those issues are ‘very important’, doubling last year’s number,” said Kessara Sakmaneevongsa, Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Jaiyos Advisory partner for consulting services.
Leadership came up as the No 2 challenge. This appears to be a perennial issue, as firms continue to struggle to develop their leaders at all levels.
Notably, learning and development soared from No 8 in last year’s survey to become a top-three issue as firms realised skill shortages were holding back their strategic execution.
Engagement should be the core issue that human-resources leaders have to bear in mind when they are considering any HR programme, she said.
The survey also highlighted the need for organisations to “reinvent” their learning and development schemes, to prepare their leaders at all levels, and for HR departments to implement “an extreme makeover”.
“The survey found that the gap between growing business needs and HR capabilities is becoming wider. Many organisations cannot keep up,” Kessara said.
She said HR departments must upgrade their capabilities, improve their business understanding, and reinvent their procedures to deliver greater business impacts and efficiencies. A growing number of companies have adopted shared service centres to centralise and streamline their HR and other back-office operations, such as through utilising data analytics and social-media tools to gain better insights about their workforces.
“Some organisations have staff databases which are not as up to date as what can be found from LinkedIn or Facebook,” she said.
To improve staff engagement, Kessara suggested organisations focus more on employee development, giving workers more career and development opportunities, and listening more to their feedback.
On performance management, the trend is against grading or evaluating staff outright, but puts more emphasis on coaching, and setting “agile” goals that are tailored to individuals’ needs, she said.
HR managers have to adjust their role from being a “service provider” to become a “business partner” to employees, obtain consulting and HR analytical skills, and rethink their methods.
“Some organisations have simply brought in business leaders to take on the HR function, since it takes time to develop [native] HR managers who understand business issues.
“On the other hand, few organisations have given the same importance to HR [as to other departments]. Very few Thai firms give their HR people the same dignity as other business leaders,” allowing them to contribute to their organisations’ business plans, she said.
More than 3,300 businesses and HR leaders from 106 countries took part in the Deloitte survey, making it one of the largest human-capital surveys of its kind.