Stop, Start, Continue – A Guide for HR Transformers

We are officially in Spring and in this part of the Northern Hemisphere we have heard the sound of bleating lambs and seen the yellow blaze of cheery daffodils. It is also a traditional time to blow out the cobwebs, air the mattress and perhaps get round to doing an organisational spring-clean.

Over time every department picks up activities that were meant to be ‘temporary’, done as a ‘workaround’ or done as part of an agreement between people who left years ago. These tasks still get done but we overlook the original purpose and value to the organisation. This stops us from doing tasks that are more productive or useful.

Stop, Start, Continue Guide for HR Transformers

An exercise we find useful is a Stop, Start & Continue review.

- Simply list all the activities you do in a particular area, department or role.

- Decide which activities you will now STOP as they are no longer useful or add little value

- Determine which activities you just have to CONTINUE, as they keep the show on the road

- And then having created some spare capacity, ADD those activities that have been on the To Do list for much too long that you plan to START.

We have found this spring clean useful at an individual level, for a role e.g. HR Business Partner or for a function, e.g. Human Resources. In the context of HR Transformation, we often use this technique as a preliminary step before allocating HR activities to a part of the new organisation structure or in designing new roles. This exercise works well as a facilitated session with small groups. It sounds obvious but it is important to eliminate redundant activities before designing a new organisation.

Download our Stop, Start, Continue Worksheet below:

Here are some examples of Stop, Start, Continue activities that have come out of similar sessions with HR :-

Stop

Doing line managers work with employee performance issues

Organising the Christmas Party

Creating manual reports every month without automating

Renewing contracts without assessing the market

Manually entering data into a system because of that temporary system workaround from the upgrade in 2004

Continue

Delivering excellent employment advice

To work with business leaders to plan future scenarios

To coach teams on improving performance

Start

Investigate how social media tools can reduce the cost of recruitment

Determine and measure HR cost drivers

Find out what Managers really think about HR service

Develop a HR Monthly Dashboard

Reviewing contracts with HR suppliers

Let us know, what will you Stop, Start and Continue in 2010?

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This entry was posted on Monday, April 26th, 2010 at 10:08 pm and is filed under Change Management, Consulting, HR Blogs, HR Business Partner, HR Careers, HR Outsourcing, HR Project Management, HR Shared Services, HR Tools, HR Transformation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can trackback from your own site.

HR Transformers on Twitter

So you are no longer a HR Twitter Virgin, you have got yourself a Twitter username, added your appealing bio and uploaded your best photo. You may also have found your favourite celebrity tweeter, or your favourite magazines on Twitter.

Now it’s time to really dig a bit deeper into your particular ‘thing’. At Glass Bead Consulting , our particular ‘thing’ is HR Transformation , improving people management in organisations by applying various techniques and tools in technology, skills and solutions. This includes a broad group of people including HR professionals, writers, academics, consultants, vendors, technologists and various others who are interested in improving people management.

We have created different lists of ‘HR Transformers’ using a feature called Twitter Lists, primarily so we can read useful and relevant twitter streams. Many of these people have their own blogs and publications and we thought it might be useful to share these with you, so you can benefit from their views, resources and links. The lists are a starting point and new people are joining Twitter all the time – so please suggest others to follow and we will update.

HR Transformers on Twitter

1. HR Transformers-Bloggers Bloggers with a passion for HR transformation

2. HR Transformers-Analysts Industry analysts who have a focus on HR Technology, Human Capital Management or HR Outsourcing

3. HR Transformers-Writers HR Journalists or writers with an interest for HR Transformation

4. HR Transformers Techies HR Technology experts or suppliers

5. HR Transformers-Consultants HR consultants with a focus on HR Transformation

6. HR Transformers HR Outsourcing HR and BPO outsourcing vendors and commentators

7. HR Transformers Change Experts in managing change

8. HR Transformers OD Experts in Organisational Design

9. HR Publications HR Magazines and journals

10. Leadership Experts in leadership

11. Recruiters Those involved in recruitment with an interest in social media

We have also consolidated all of these lists to our own Listorious HR Transformers List which is a useful Twitter resource.

Please comment below on any other HR Transformers you recommend to follow on Twitter and we will add to the lists. Self-promotion is actively encouraged, especially for the shy and retiring Brits.

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This entry was posted on Monday, March 15th, 2010 at 10:13 am and is filed under Change Management, Consulting, HR Careers, HR News, HR Outsourcing, HR Strategy, HR Transformation, Latest News, Social Media, Twitter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can trackback from your own site.

HR Benchmarks – A Government Health Warning

In the UK Civil Service, there is 1 Human Resource professional for every 50 employees. In other sectors with some degree of standardisation, larger organisations should be achieving a ratio way beyond 1 HR professional to 100 employees. The report indicates that HR in the UK Public Sector is about half as efficient as it should be.

The UK Government has presented its strategy for delivering efficiency savings in the Public Sector, Putting the Frontline First – Smarter Government and states that “This plan delivers better public services for lower cost”. The report refers to a range of tactics including strengthening the role of citizens and civic society, accelerating the move to digitalised public services, allowing local authorities to create further commercial opportunities and streamline central government for sharper delivery. The report also highlights the objective of improving back office processes to the standard of the best.

To make the proposed Public Sector changes, and make them stick, requires effective people management and HR has a key role to play in this. As “Next Generation HR” – the Civil Service wide employee framework recognises, it is key that performance improvement, engagement and wellbeing, competencies and skills and smarter workforce deployment are delivered more effectively. The key to “Putting the Frontline First” is “Putting employees first” – they ultimately will deliver these changes.

In the report Benchmarking the Back Office IT, Finance and HR metrics have been published for Government departments. The tactic of “Naming and Shaming” with benchmarks can be a useful and powerful technique when used appropriately. However benchmarking alone should never be used to size any function, it is a crude yard-stick. Sizing HR functions should be linked to the wider organisational goals. The question should not be “how do we achieve 1:77 or 1:150?”, rather “what are the goals of the organisation and what HR capability and resources do we need to deliver them?”

Armed with this benchmark data, Click here for spreadsheet with HR Benchmark Data (with Glass Bead Consulting Ranking), the HR Transformation Analyst team at Glass Bead Consulting were let loose for some initial number crunching. The data, at this stage, has too many questions and gaps to be analysed in a meaningful way, but here are some comments and observations.

Comments on HR Benchmarking Data

1. The data shows ‘% Cost of HR Function’ (against total running cost) and ‘Ratio of Employees (FTE) to HR Staff’, plus Average Working Days Lost to Sickness (AWDL).
2. Using Benchmarks is a minefield with many reasons for anomalies. It is often a more productive use of time to work out why there are differences within an organisation. The metrics chosen have their flaws, for example the Ratio of Employee (FTE) to HR Staff might show variations due to degree of outsourcing and definitions. ‘% of Cost of HR function’ will vary considerably depending on the type of expenditure i.e. running Embassies around World or calculating benefits payments.
3. In terms of HR metrics, we prefer the ‘Total Cost to Serve per employee’ metric as it reflects 3rd party spending and relative salary costs. E.g. the HR : Employee ratio might be very high because 50% of HR is outsourced, however the ‘Total Cost to Serve per employee’ allows a better comparison.
4. It would be useful if the report published “number of employees” and “number of HR Staff” – then the departments could be grouped into similar size. An organisation with 500 employees clearly has less options for economies of scale and skill, not to mention investments, than one with more than 20,000.
5. Why are there gaps in the data? These are the most basic data elements you would look to in a HR Assessment. How many employees do you have and how many HR staff? Why is this so difficult?
6. The document mentions, 1:77 (see graph below), as an private sector industry median performance. However, in a recent discussion in the CIPD LinkedIn community, there was general agreement that 1:100 is a sensible starting point. Larger Private Sector top performers are way beyond 1:100, with the use of shared service centres, Employee & Manager Self Service tools, effective use of 3rd parties, and re-allocation of people management responsibilities.
7. Why include Sickness (AWDL) as a metric here? Although there are correlations between effective HR and this is an important metric, it is one of many goals. Managing sickness is not solely HR’s job – it is also the mangers responsibility. However important Sickness is, it is a distraction in this context.
8. Where is the NHS data? The NHS should be much further ahead than other Government departments following the large investment in ESR (HR Oracle based system) which has now been implemented. Having a common HR System is a key building block for more efficient Shared Services. It is important that NHS data is included to get a baseline from which regional shared services can now start to be planned.
9. Our HR analysts had some issues with the data, but highlight some of the ‘HR : Employee ratios’ that stood out were as follows :-

21 – Northern Ireland Office

25 – Ministry of Defence

28 – Department for Transport

33 – HM Treasury

37 – Cabinet Office

38 – Department of Business, Innovation and Skills

Even with a target of 1:77, the figures above show there is a long way to go.

(For readers from the Private Sector, how does your organisation compare?)

As Rick, from Flip Chart Fairy Tales asks, in Government support functions: over-spending and over-staffed, what does this tell us about the efficiency of the Civil Service as a whole?
If an organisation is delivering at 1:20 or even 1:40, it is not delivering HR effectively. I would go as far as saying 1:100 has been the litmus test for organisations if we are going to use crude benchmarks. The scope of the report doesn’t tackle how well HR does in terms of helping organisations achieve their objectives (which is why HR exists). Better links need to be made between progress on ‘Next Generation HR’ and ongoing Benchmarking reporting.

Any plans to transform UK Public Sector needs strong leadership, robust performance management, employee engagement and the right competencies and skills deployed at the right time. In other words a well functioning, modern HR department. Reporting the key HR Metrics is a fine idea and good starting point. However it is important that the right metrics are assessed and any decision-making framework includes a much broader set of a data so that meaningful targets are set and delivered.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 8th, 2009 at 3:00 pm and is filed under Change Management, HR Benchmarks, HR News, HR Operating Models, HR Strategy, HR Transformation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can trackback from your own site.

How to Lead Change by Example – 5 Tips for HR Professionals

This is a summary of an original article published by Strategic HR Review.

In an economic downturn and subsequent recovery, change is inevitable for every organization. Effective Change Management is often a mix of the strategic and the practical. It can encompass everything from ensuring strategies are aligned, to making sure your weekly bulletin goes out on time, on message and to the right people. From a HR perspective, it is important to provide leadership and guidance by example and the following actions can help HR executives to lead the way during the change process.

1. Define and deliver your HR strategy

Make sure that HR strategy is consistent with the overall business strategy, and where necessary provide input and ideas into the overall business strategy. Make sure you achieve buy-in from key stakeholders. This can be achieved by clearly outlining your proposed improvements and delivering on project ideas early on. Part of aligning HR strategy with the overall business strategy will be achieved by sharpening your HR operating model and asking how each HR role will support your organization in the next 12 months. You will be better able to respond quickly to organizational changes with better HR systems, more effective processes and better aligned capabilities in place. This allows HR to deal with the next new change more effectively.

2. Understand HR cost drivers

It is vital to know what drives HR costs. If you know your key performance metrics and what has an effect on them, you can quickly demonstrate that you understand the cost, service and risk implications of any proposed organizational changes on your own department. A good grasp of the cost implications of strategic decisions and the analysis to back it up – really helps when it comes to making changes. By conducting an assessment of the HR department, you get a better understanding of your internal benchmarks. A key metric for HR to understand is the HR “Cost to Serve”of each employee, including staff, systems and third parties. This can vary widely between businesses and geographies and it is important to know why.

3. Take a lead on sourcing options

Take the outsourcing decision to your board – do not let the board take it to you. Be proactive and do the research into how outsourcing could benefit your department (see article Top 5 Benefits of HR Outsourcing)and bring about positive change, as well as cost-savings. Show that you have been actively looking at alternative ways to provide better and more cost-effective HR services in payroll, IT, recruitment, training, HR administration and benefits. Develop your own “build or buy” criteria to help gradually improve HR services. Demonstrate that your business case takes into account the benefits of moving from fixed cost to a more variable cost (that will help in the downturn and the subsequent upturn).

4. Lead by example

There is a balancing act that good HR directors need to master. Often, HR directors are so outwardly focused on supporting the organization that they can neglect the day-to-day workings of their own department. When aligning HR strategy to the wider business strategy, HR directors need to focus on the internal working of the HR department, and most importantly, the people within the HR department. Show leadership through developing your talented team members, and use this as your core team to lead change. Retention strategies start at home, so show the board what you are doing to keep and develop your most talented team members. Be innovative. The organization will look to the HR department to lead on this – secondments, project roles and recognizing excellent service are all initiatives that can inspire people within the organization.

5. Implement change decisively and calmly

All executives in the organization must demonstrate leadership by managing change in a calm and decisive way. HR can stop the organization making “knee-jerk” reactions – more than ever, this is the time to make the right decisions for your organization. Implement changes calmly, effectively and consistently.

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This entry was posted on Monday, September 21st, 2009 at 10:37 am and is filed under Change Management, HR Outsourcing, HR Strategy, HR Transformation, Latest News, Leadership. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can trackback from your own site.

HR Survey Highlights Skills Gap in HR

The biggest barrier to transforming Human Resources is the lack of appropriate skills in HR, according to the 2008 Global HR Transformation Report (conducted by HROA in association with ADP). This is the 5th annual survey with 129 executives around the globe in varying stages of HR Transformation. DOWNLOAD 2008 GLOBAL HR TRANSFORMATION REPORT HERE

The survey defines HR Transformation as – “any concerted effort to change and improve HR operations, whether through outsourcing, shared services, internal reengineering, or a combination of these strategies”.

We use a broader definition. Successful HR Transformation needs to align all the components in the HR operating model including Business Partners, Service Centres, Centres of Excellence, HR Strategy, Managers and Employees. Sometimes there is too much emphasis on implementing Shared Services or HR Outsourcing at the expense of actually delivering the HR Strategy.
(see comments by Jason Geller “HRO does not equal HR Transformation”)

The survey points to some interesting trends in HR Transformation :-

“The biggest ‘chronic hurdle’ that impedes transformation is the skills of existing HR staff.”
This is cited by over 60% of respondents. The skills needed to manage HR are very different to the skills needed to transform HR. The survey doesn’t mention which skills, but experience is required in Change Management, Process Design, Organisation Design, Project Management, Business Case Management, and HR Technology. So what can you do? Consider these steps before starting your HR Transformation project, utilise transformation experience in other areas of your organisation and use HR professionals as ‘content’ owners.

“Most organisations are meeting or exceeding their cost savings targets.”
Sounds impressive, but of course this depends on what the cost savings targets are. Some projects aim to break even, but allocate a larger proportion of their cost to strategic objectives rather than administration.

“Past HR Transformation lessons don’t appear to filtering out.”
Each organisation will have different goals, a different workforce and different starting points. But there are themes and lessons learned – so why aren’t they being shared in this digital age of collaboration? Joining networks such as the HROA help. Conferences are dominated by vendor/sponsors rather than providing HR transformers with real ‘independent’ lessons learned. With more sharing and online networking things should improve, see for example initiatives such as our own HR Transformer Blog and DiscussHR.

“Only 48% engage consultants or sourcing advisors.”
Some organisations are getting external support which is an obvious solution to the skills gap. On business cases which involve large IT transformation and cost savings, a review from an experienced, independent consultant can be money well spent. There are still objections to using consultants who are perceived to push ‘pyramids’ of junior consultants and lack independence. Do advisors need to up their game or do they need to market their benefits more effectively?

“66% plan to outsource some HR processes.”
Payroll is outsourced in nearly 90% of cases. End-to-end HR Outsouricng contracts are being signed (see recent IBM Unilever deal) , and buyers do see the benefits of HR Outsourcing, however buyers are even more careful in this environment. With major economic change there is less appetite for 10 year contracts and more examples of tactical sourcing.

“Price is most significant in provider selection.”
It is interesting that Financial stability has risen up from 12th most important factor in 2006, to 6th in 2008. This will be Top 5 next year with much more detailed financial checking of potential vendors.

The ADP/HROA survey has provided a useful barometer of HR Transformation, it will be interesting to see whether more progress has been made on the barriers next year.

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This entry was posted on Monday, June 1st, 2009 at 6:31 pm and is filed under Change Management, HR Careers, HR Operating Models, HR Outsourcing, HR Project Management, HR Strategy, HR Transformation, Latest News, Leadership. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can trackback from your own site.

Top 5 Reasons HR Projects Fail

HR Project failure usually means increased cost to implement, reduced quality of final outcome, time delays and often leaves a huge dent in morale.

The list below are reasons why HR projects fail based on the number of sleepless nights they have caused HR Execs, and the more scientific approach of research and surveys. The good news is that they are all preventable – by following tried and tested methodologies such as Prince 2, brushing up on your Change Management skills and mixing all of this with a huge dose of common sense.

Typical HR projects can include change programmes, implementation of shared services, HR transformation projects, outsourcing and IT projects.

Top five reasons why HR projects fail include:

1. Lack of clear executive leadership. Any HR project needs a sponsor to help ensure that it is set up to succeed with the right resources. Having executive leadership comes into its own when the project has to traverse choppy waters. HR projects that have business (non-HR) sponsorship tend do well. Lack of leadership can lead to a lack of vision and people quickly forget why they are working so hard in the first place.

2. Skills of staff. It sounds obvious, but the key skill that is usually lacking is project management. There are simply not enough skilled project managers in HR with experience in successfully delivering complex projects. Many project management problems stem from inexperience, a common example is not breaking up the project into manageable pieces. Another key skill that is required for HR Project Managers is Change Management and unfortunately Project Management methodologies and courses do not emphasise this enough.

3. Governance not set-up properly. If the governance hasn’t been agreed formally at the beginning, it is amazing how initial enthusiasm can disappear when the going gets tough. This comes from not agreeing up-front how decisions will be made during the project. It is well worth investing time early on to establishing project governance. This helps ensure that issues are resolved quickly when they arise.

4. Not managing stakeholders effectively. For most projects, you will need to persuade human beings to change how they do things. This is very difficult and will require diplomatic and sometimes innovative methods to succeed. Not managing stakeholders can lead directly to other classic PM problems like not gaining employee buy-in, dealing with resource cuts, other projects getting priority and not dealing with genuine cultural differences. The key is to identify your stakeholders up front, work out how the project impacts them and what they will need to make the project work. Then ensure that you prioritise your time so you can work through any issues they may have.

5. Project complexity across multiple businesses and geographies. Complexity can be caused by working across different business units and geographies, each with potentially different drivers and cultures. To overcome potential problems, set up the project to gather all requirements, take time to understand your stakeholders and design your Governance to help resolve those tricky issues. Finally, use your sponsor to provide you with guidance where appropriate and watch out for barriers that are perceived rather than real.

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