In his book Work Rules! Laszlo Bock writes: “People with tight social networks, like those in a business unit or team, often have similar ideas and ways of looking at problems. Over time, creativity dies. But the handful of people who operate in the overlapping space between groups tend to come up with better ideas. And often, they are not even original. They are an application of an idea from one group to a new group.”
So how can you apply this to your HR strategy development process?
In November last year we developed with our HiiL team the organisation’s corporate strategy for the next 3 years; which in turn was split into yearly strategies to ensure this long-term goals’ achievement. Shortly after the development of the corporate strategy, we started developing the HR strategy for 2016.
Although unplanned, my colleague from one of our business units—Kavita Zieman—and I were responsible for the delivery of this HR strategy. Kavita is one of our top experts in measuring justice, and she volunteered to outline the HR strategy, and indicated that she would like me to support her as an HR expert.
This was a great exercise. Firstly, we co-produced a great HR strategy (which was slightly polished by some more team members). Kavita, who is actively involved in client acquisition and consultancy, brought to the table her perspectives (keeping in mind the support that our clients value and thus, what kind of support our team needed), approach, needs and focus. We have used our versatile experiences, competences and insights to the benefit of the HR strategy. Jointly, we ensured that nothing has been forgotten. Having somebody else, not coming from the HR field, also contributed to some crucial questions being asked.
Secondly, we have learned from each other. It does not happen often that HR people and people from business units work closely together (at least not extensively). In a lot of organisations it does not go further than HR just collecting the input from their business unit teams. This is what we tried as well. Kavita and I had fun learning from each other by digging into each other’s “world”. Kavita got a deeper insight into the HR matters and I benefited from Kavita’s commercial experiences and her reflections on my HR suggestions—which were a fresh perspective.
Finally, it was great for me to see that HiiL’ers continuously take active part in the organisational development and HR aspects. We would like HiiL’ers to take ownership and to jointly achieve organisational goals. We would like them to be engaged at different levels, stimulate and nurture innovation, get insights into different, but important aspects (such as HR). By volunteering in this, Kavita gave a great example for others. Moreover, I have asked Kavita and she confirmed that she had fun doing this.
In my opinion, this example reflects what Mr Bock has referred to. Different ideas and different ways of looking at things—this is a must, especially when it comes to the (HR) strategy development. You help each other stay sharp, ask critical questions, ensure that the needs at different organisational levels are covered and complement each other in knowledge, experiences and approaches.
Experiment and try different things out. Afterwards measure the result (the measurement part is crucial) and see what works for your organisation the best. Maybe this way of developing an HR strategy will also bring you further in your goals achievement.
Liubovi Bosenko