HR Strategy & Planning Excellence - July 2022

JULY 2022 • Vol. 10 • No.07 (ISSN 2564-1956)

THE EVOLVING ROLE OF HR IN THE SHIFT TO HYBRID WORK - Chase Garbarino,

Co-founder and CEO, HqO

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 Page 27-48

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HR Strategy & Planning Excellence JULY 2022

Vol.10

No.07

(ISSN 2564-1956)

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The Evolving Role Of HR In The Shift To Hybrid Work Organizations are turning to HR teams for strategies to attract and retain talent

On the Cover

- Chase Garbarino, Co-founder and CEO, HqO

Articles 24 How Data Will Shape The New Normal Here’s what organizations can do to make sure they succeed - Ray Bixler, President and CEO, SkillSurvey

53 Workforce Planning Is No Longer Regarded As Simply “An HR Task” Impactful workforce planning requires a collaborative effort across the organization, with HR playing a central role - Rupert Bader, Vice President, Human Capital Planning, Anaplan

60 How To Bring Flexibility To Your Workplace Beyond Work From Home It’s time to get creative - Jaclyn Chen, Co-founder and CEO, Benepass 67 The Power Of People Data Four reasons to adopt people analytics - Amy Mosher, Chief People Officer, isolved 70 Remote Working Strategy: 16 Key Elements To Consider Consider the employee side first while evaluating the business benefits of the same - Dr. Raman K. Attri, Performance Scientist, KLA Corporation

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 Page 27-48

Top Picks

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INDEX

Eleven Evolving Insights That Make Human Capability More Relevant The best is yet ahead - Dave Ulrich, Rensis Likert Professor,

Ross School of Business

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What Should Be On Every HR Exec’s Agenda NOW The Supreme Court is a good place to start - Carrie B. Cherveny, Esq., Chief

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Compliance Officer and Senior VP of Employment Solutions, Hub International

HR Departments Must Utilize Employee Data To Enhance Workplace Safety And Employee Productivity Better collaboration and intelligence are mandatory for a motivated workforce - Mike Steere, Co-Founder, SaferMe

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Three Ways Digital Transformation Is Driving A More Diverse, Future-Ready Workforce Change is a marathon, not a sprint - Ivori Johnson, Director, Diversity,

Equity,Inclusion and Belonging, ChartHop

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Hybrid Workforce and the Evolving Role of HR The world of work has changed forever.

Companies are rethinking their approach to the workplace, and with one of the most competitive labor markets in recent times, they’re turning to HR teams for strategies that can help them hold on to employees and attract new talent. What can HR leaders do differently? How can HR support the hybrid workforce?

This edition of HR Strategy & Planning Excellence includes informative articles that focus on strategies and tips for developing a future-ready workforce. Also included is an exclusive study, The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 by the HR Research Institute that takes a closer look at the state of both corporate culture and change management.

HR leaders are now laser-focused on the employee experience (EX). This has led to the creation of new HR roles, responsibilities, technologies, and tools as companies look for ways to effectively manage hybrid models in an employeedriven realm. In her article, The Evolving Role Of HR In The Shift To Hybrid Work, HqO’s Chase Garbarino lists out four tactics to consider when refocusing on the employee experience in your organization.

By building on the past, HR will create a better future, and the best is yet to come, says Dave Ulrich, (Rensis Likert Professor, Ross School of Business) in his article,

Eleven Evolving Insights That Make Human Capability More Relevant. Check out 11 evolving insights in human capability.

It has been some time since many HR professionals have had the opportunity to review their foundational documents such as employee handbooks and related SOPs. What should be top of mind as HR returns to office? Read Carrie B. Cherven's (Hub International's ) article, What Should Be On Every HR Exec’s Agenda NOW for more insights.

Also learn about three strategies that will help you use data analytics to design a recruitment and retention strategy to meet the challenges you’ll face in this new world of work in Ray Bixler's (SkillSurvey) article, How Data Will Shape The New Normal.

In brief, this edition of HR Strategy & Planning Excellence explores expert strategies for HR professionals to help make their job more impactful, efficient, and effective in order to thrive in the new era of work.

We hope you find the articles in this issue informative and helpful and, as always, we welcome your valuable feedback and suggestions.

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COVER ARTICLE

The Evolving Role Of HR In The Shift To Hybrid Work Organizations are turning to HR teams for strategies to attract and retain talent

By Chase Garbarino, HqO

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he pandemic has reinforced that necessity truly is the mother of invention. Overnight, activities of the business world moved from the workplace to the home front, and to the surprise of nearly everybody, the transition went quite smoothly. It didn’t take long before new practices were created and took hold — and soon after, employees were extolling the benefits of avoiding rush hour traffic, greater schedule flexibility, and working in sweatpants.

In fact, many employees now don’t want to return to the office — at least not under the same terms.

They’re seeking work environments that are less structured and more accommodating. The good thing is that both employer and employee recognize the value of returning to the office to enhance engagement and collaboration with colleagues, and employers are working toward implementing hybrid work arrangements that enable their teams to do their best work whether

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in the office or at home.

However, as of yet, research from Willis Towers Watson (WTS) reveals that employee expectations are not being met, with nearly half currently looking for a new position or planning to start doing so as the Great Resignation rages on.

In our own survey of businesses with tens of thousands of employees, flexibility was found to be a major motivating factor.

Over 75% of employers believe models that give employees a choice in how, when, and where they work are “significant” at the least and often “very significant.” That said, it’s no wonder that nearly 90% of the employers we surveyed have implemented flexible or hybrid working models.

Companies are rethinking their approach to the workplace, and with one of the most competitive labor markets in recent times, they’re turning to HR

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teams for strategies that help them hold on to employees and attract new talent.

What’s Your Experience?

Just as businesses have honed in on the customer experience, HR leaders are now laser-focused on the employee experience (EX). This has led to the creation of new HR roles, responsibilities, technologies, and tools as companies look for ways to effectively manage hybrid models in an employee-driven realm.

Proponents of getting employees back in the office support that working under the same roof produces stronger engagement, collaboration, and company culture.

These are all great things, but it’s really about the end results. After all, a company will enjoy little if a sizable contingent of employees doesn’t want to be there. Perhaps not surprisingly, WTW has further reported that nine out of 10 employers are now making it a priority to enhance their EX.

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The Evolving Role Of HR In The Shift To Hybrid Work

heard in a meeting or while collaborating with peers.

Being a people-centric company means making sure those subtle daily moments are happening.

While HR is playing a pivotal role, traditional candidate enticements that were once differentiators — compensation, advancement, work that matters, and a vibrant community of peers — have become table stakes. It’s HR’s job to create a unique EX for those who will be taking their companies to the next level.

Here are four tactics to consider when refocusing on the employee experience in your organization: ●● Create New Positions: Unilever, a household name with 400 brands and 150,000 employees, has a team of 1,500 focused entirely on EX. Their backgrounds include areas from HR, to facilities management, to technology.

You need to blend the best of physical and digital working environments and distill it into a single vision across your company. Don’t

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hold back on creating positions that will facilitate it. ●● Track the Journey: Follow the employee journey as you would the customer journey, beginning the moment a candidate comes into contact with your company through their final day of work. You want to be able to provide the same experience and opportunities uniformly. ●● Moments Matter: Today’s leaders realize the right EX means more than offering the occasional wellness seminar, company outing, or on-site gym.

More important are the moments that happen every day, such as feeling your voice is

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●● Cross Function, Not Dysfunction: Things like life flexibility, connecting with peers, leveraging central meeting spaces, and workplace technology is what it’s all about.

This requires HR, IT, and operations leaders to come together and form a cohesive EX strategy. Working together across functions wards off potential dysfunction.

Where Do We Start?

The first step to supporting hybrid workforces and spaces is as basic as it gets — figuring out what employees want. Talking to employees, listening to their concerns, and acting on the insights show you value their workplace experience and advocate for your people.

Compensation is key but the work environment and experience are just as important. Remember that remote employees have grown accustomed to working environments built solely around their needs. Your current design, however, likely has changed little since before the pandemic.

Therefore, if you’re moving to a hybrid environment, you need to know how your employees use their office space and make adjustments to bridge the gap.

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Calculate how many desks are needed to handle employees during in-office days and explore a booking system so nothing is left to chance. For that matter, rethink flex spaces, like conference rooms and lounges — you might find now that there are better locations or purposes for each.

Can Technology Help?

Re-entry can get rough if not handled right, but technology exists to help HR simplify and strengthen a new office environment. For starters, you can avoid turf wars with mobile apps that allow employees to book desks and conference rooms. Our survey shows that 76% of employers have already implemented such tools.

Technology can help deliver personal benefits, too. Savvy professional buildings utilize platforms with apps to provide

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concierge-like treatment such as on-demand food delivery, laundry services, wellness programs, and more. According to our survey, 74% of companies have such an EX mobile app.

What’s more, technology can enable usage data to be harvested; just make sure employees understand first that it’s being used only to get a better grasp on their needs.

Systems that provide data on how facilities are being used and when, can lead to the development of additional conveniences, greater employee satisfaction, and better cost efficiency.

Talent is scarce and skills are at a premium. The ability of HR to create, cultivate, and promote healthy, hybrid

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work environments is vital. The occasional perk, while appreciated, just doesn’t stack up to an EX that delivers satisfaction every day. Design your workplace with employees in mind, and not only will you keep them, you’ll have a better shot of attracting the best from the extensive pool of candidates now looking to be valued.

Chase Garbarino is the Co-founder and CEO of HqO, the leading workplace experience technology platform.

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TOP PICK

Eleven Evolving Insights That Make Human Capability More Relevant The best is yet ahead

By Dave Ulrich, Rensis Likert Professor, Ross School of Business

M

any thoughtful colleagues continue to evolve HR by building on the past to create a better future.

Much of this evolution comes from responding to the changing context of business (Covid, political toxicity, technology, ESQ, social patterns) and is captured with emerging insights based on innovative theory, research, and practice.

We have suggested and empirically shown (with three recent significant research projects: HR Competence and Capability Study (HRC2S) with 28,000 respondents, Organization Guidance System (OGS) with a thousand organizations, and Governance and Guidance for Growth (G3) with 5,700 organizations) that the vast array of “HR” related initiatives can be clustered into a “human capability” framework with four pathways. ●● Talent (often called “human capital”) deals with individual competence, people, workforce, and employees. ●● Leadership focuses on individual leaders at all levels as well as leadership capability throughout an organization. ●● Organization refers to organization capability, culture, workplace, teams, and systems. ●● Human resources (HR) defines the characteristics of the HR department, practice, and people.

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This framework itself is an evolution of “HR” thinking, which has historically focused on talent (or human capital) as the HR agenda. Our (and others’) work shows that organization has far more impact on results than talent and that HR can be the architect of creating organization capabilities.

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Exciting and emerging ideas are occurring in each pathway. Let me offer an overview of some of the evolving ideas in each pathway, building on the superb work done by so many.

Talent Evolutions Talent refers to the people (individuals, employees, workforce) in an organization and how they are continually acquiring competence (knowledge, skills, ability) and developing sentiment (commitment, engagement, experience) to do their work.

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1. Accessing Competence to Accomplish Work Putting the right person in the right job at the right time with the right skills is the legacy of talent management. This delicate matching effort created workforce planning where full-time employees are matched to job assignments. Talent, or the resource to get work done, has since evolved to include contingent employees in a workforce ecosystem and a focus on work skills more than jobs. More recently, worktask planning has emerged, which includes getting work done without formal jobs but by delivering on tasks either with people or technology.

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2. Improving Employee Sentiment Employee sentiment (attitude, perception, response to, and so forth) about work continues to evolve, with emerging thinking about the employee experience that deals with emotional well-being and mental

health tied to being safe, believing, becoming, and belonging. Additionally, organizations around the world are increasingly framing their mission and their work in ways that makes it easier for employees to be safe, believe, become, and belong amidst global upheaval and challenges.

3. Sustaining Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) Both in practice and in our research, DEI has become a major agenda for business and HR. We found that HR professionals who championed DEI were able to have a higher business impact. We posit four phases of DEI work that have moved from tracking affirmative action numbers to action, to strategy, to implementing two sustainable DEI beliefs and actions: everyone has something to offer and leaders use their power to empower others. Implementing these beliefs moves DEI from an aspiration to a commitment.

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Organization Evolutions

4. Reinventing Organization Form

Organizations shape how people (employees, customers, suppliers, investors) think, act, and feel.

The study of how organizations operate has evolved both in defining the organization form and in creating an organizational culture.

The logic and design of organizations have evolved. Organizations were originally conceived as bureaucracies, with hierarchy being the dominant logic. They have evolved to where organization is not the structure of a firm but the capabilities, which are focused on building market value.

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5. Reimagining Organization Culture Culture is not a new concept: its beginnings focused on anthropology and sociology. And in the organizational setting, culture is accepted as a critical

Leadership Evolutions Leadership is one of the most studied topics in the human capability field (google leader and you will get six billion results; five billion for leadership). Individual leaders engage talent (people and workforce) and create organizations (culture and capabilities) through the competencies they possess. Collective leadership

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factor for long-term success. The evolution of culture goes from a focus on internal values and behaviors to an external identity in the marketplace made real to everyone in the workplace.

is when a leadership brand exists at all levels of the organization and the actions of all leaders throughout the organization are consistent. In our review of leadership, we identified five general leadership competence domains that characterize what we call the Leadership Code. This code has evolved with new leadership competencies required for changing business conditions.

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depending on the changing external context. Figure 8 lays out in some detail the emerging skills given the recent business context.

6. Defining Skills of Effective Leaders The five code domains are relatively constant over time and place, but the specific skills have evolved

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HR Evolutions

7. Redefining HR’s Agenda and Purpose

In the human capability logic, for talent, leadership, and organization to occur, HR work (the function of HR and the people of HR) needs to be continually upgraded. Let me highlight some of the evolutionary ideas that indicate HR’s progress.

Why does HR exist in a company? What value does HR create and contribute to business success?

The mindset and assumptions of HR’s agenda and purpose have evolved from the “administrative experts” to true “business partners” who deliver value through four waves of activity: administrative, function, strategy, and outside-in value.

8. Improving HR Information/Analytics When human capability issues are discussed with the management team, what information does the HR profession contribute as a member of the management team? Most HR professionals are aware of the need for analytics and evidence-based decisions, but the focus of the information that underlies analytics has evolved. HR often brings benchmarking (how do we compare) or best practice (who is good that we can learn from) information to business discussions. In our work, we have built on these legacies to offer guidance, which prioritizes and informs which HR initiatives will help each specific organization deliver the results they care about.

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9. Leveraging Technology for Digital HR In every list of future trends for business in general and HR in particular, technology is a (the) dominant agenda. At its simplest level, technology innovations (e.g., internet of things, machine learning, artificial intelligence, meta verse, robotics, and so forth) provide digital information to make better decisions.

HR clearly contributes to a strategic digital agenda

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for their organization, but HR should also deploy technology for better digital information and practice in human capability. In the four-phase model in figure 11, most of the HR digital innovations remain in wave 2 with thousands of new HR apps being released every year. Using technology to access information and shape the employee experience are likely emerging steps in the technology and digital HR space.

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10. Defining HR Competencies Ultimately, HR services are provided (or at least designed and facilitated) by HR professionals. The skills and quality of HR professionals have evolved dramatically over the last 35 years, as has the profile of an effective HR professional including the CHRO, generalists, and specialists. We have been directly involved in eight rounds of research over 35 years to evaluate not only the competencies of HR professionals but which competencies deliver personal effectiveness, business results, and stakeholder value.

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In the eighth round of data from over 28,000 respondents and in partnership with 19 HR associations, we saw a conceptual shift in defining the competencies of HR professionals. Legacy HR

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competencies were about a role described with an adjective and noun (trusted advisor, credible activist, change agent, strategy ally). In our latest research, we used verbs instead of nouns. Verbs denote action and what HR does to be effective more rather than what or where they play a role.

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11. Additional Areas I have also seen additional exciting evolutions in learning, career management, communication, performance management, total rewards, change/ agility, HR structure, and so forth. Add areas of evolution that you have seen in the comments.

In our work at RBL, we are committed to building on the past to create a better future. We know that other areas are evolving in the human capability field.

These eleven evolutions are based on insights (theory, research, and practice) and they are the foundation for HR’s continued value creation. By building on the past, HR will create a better future, and the best is yet to come.

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Dave Ulrich is the Rensis Likert Professor of Business at the Ross School, University of Michigan, and the Co-Founder & Principal at the RBL Group. He has helped generate award-winning databases that assess alignment between external business conditions, strategies, organization capabilities, HR practices, HR competencies, and customer and investor results

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How Data Will Shape The New Normal Here’s what organizations can do to make sure they succeed

By Ray Bixler, SkillSurvey

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he call to “get back to normal” has been a common refrain among HR professionals over the last year. But the fact is, advances in technology over the past decade, and the Covid-19 pandemic, have changed business so much that the way we work may never return to what we once thought of as “normal.”

To meet your people’s needs and to compete in today’s business environment, organizations must employ recruitment and retention strategies that are designed for this new reality.

You Need To Prioritize Retention By now, you’ve read a lot about the Great Resignation.

A lot of people characterize this phenomenon as an abrupt, unprecedented trend. Granted, after a significant decline in quit rates at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, there has been a sharp increase in the number of people quitting their jobs in the last two years. However, what’s not usually mentioned is the number of workers quitting their jobs in the U.S. has been steadily on the rise since the close of the Great Recession in 2010. Retention is not a new challenge. It is a problem that has been accelerating for some time.

Leaders are justifiably concerned about the historically high turnover rate. After all, when people quit their jobs, it costs a lot to replace them, making it harder for businesses to succeed. It’s no wonder retention is among the biggest concerns for HR and company leaders.

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With so many changes in the world of work, what can organizations do to make sure they succeed?

Use Data-Driven Processes and Tools to Attract and Retain Talent In this article, we’ll offer you three strategies that will help you use data analytics to design a recruitment and retention strategy that’s built to meet the challenges you’ll face in this new world of work.

Strategy No. 1: Use Technology Tools to Reach More Qualified Candidates In the past, few tools were available to organizations to help them recruit candidates. As a result, the number of prospects was also limited. What’s more,

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traditional recruiting processes tend to be slow, costly, and ineffective. With these strategies, organizations can sometimes get lucky and hire a high-quality candidate from time to time, but these recruiting methods don’t scale well, which means they fail to serve employers’ needs. Worse, they often result in a bad experience for the candidate, characterized by long wait times, infrequent communication, and lack of clarity.

The U.S. is experiencing a severe labor shortage, which means competition for talent is extreme.

To recruit the best candidates, organizations need access to a wide range of highly-qualified prospects, and they need tools to help them advance the hiring process in a way that’s fast and engaging.

Technology tools can help you recruit highly-qualified people by leveraging multiple touchpoints with potential candidates to gain more referrals, engaging

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and nurturing them throughout the process. One strategy is utilizing connections you make when reference checking to reach new contacts. For example, when someone applies for a job at your organization and provides references, you can invite those references, populating your pool of potential future candidates — they’re often from the same industry and perfect targets for your future openings.

The best part is, unlike traditional recruitment strategies, sourcing and job candidate management solutions make this process fast and effective. These technology tools not only increase the number of candidates you can reach but also track analytics and provide actionable data insights that help you prioritize applicants that are the best fit for your open positions. This allows you to save time and resources by identifying and connecting with the best candidates more quickly and doing it in a meaningful way.

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Strategy No. 2: To Get Top Talent, Streamline the Way You Recruit and Hire Multiple research studies find that, on average, it takes about a month to hire a new employee. In a tight labor market, that’s a problem, especially because top candidates are often hired in about ten days. In other words, organizations that take too long to fill positions risk losing out on candidates that are best suited for the job.

To succeed, organizations should find ways to streamline their recruiting and hiring processes by taking a data-driven approach. This is especially important when it comes to reference checking. With a digital technology solution for reference checking, you can get feedback on your candidates through a simple process that sends a job-specific survey to references. Your hiring managers typically receive detailed analytics in just over one business day.

Not only that, on the back end, you can streamline the recruiting and hiring process even further by integrating your software solution with CRM, ATS, and more.

Strategy No. 3: Use Post-Hire Data Insights to Engage and Retain Employees Retaining talent is just as important as hiring qualified candidates in the first place. Even if you save time and money using talent intelligence to hire top talent, you may still struggle without data-driven strategies to retain them.

Talent retention isn’t easy, as illustrated by the turnover rates we mentioned earlier. But with the right employee engagement software solution, you can identify and prioritize actions that will give your people a good post-hire experience. Specifically, with the help of technology tools, you can implement an automated process that allows you to collect employee feedback at every stage of their work experience, starting with hiring and onboarding, continuing through their first 90 days on the job, and, if necessary, concluding with their exit from your organization. You can also supplement that data

HR Strategy & Planning Excellence presented by HR.com

July 2022

26

with post-hire feedback from supervisors at similar touchpoints to understand if your hiring teams are identifying the best candidates and if expectations are being met. An automated confidential process across the employment lifecycle can help you get more useful, candid insights that you can track over time, and break down by division, job function, or demographic group.

Post-hire feedback provides insights that can help you identify challenges your people are facing before they lead to disengagement or a decision to leave the organization. As a result, you’ll take a proactive approach to increasing retention. You’ll also make data-driven decisions based on the authentic needs of your employees.

There Is a New Normal: Data The world of work has changed forever. With the right tools, your organization can be equipped to change with it. Take a data-driven approach to hiring and retaining talent, and you’ll build a more resilient, successful organization. By using technology tools to reach more qualified candidates, streamlining the way you recruit and hire, and by using post-hire data insights to engage and retain employees, your organization will be ready to adapt to the ever-changing world of work, no matter what happens next.

Ray Bixler is an expert within the human resources, talent acquisition, and management marketplace and has contributed to a number of HR and business publications providing advice and tips for job-seekers and employers. Ray is President and CEO of SkillSurvey, an HR technology provider with talent intelligence solutions for digital online reference checking, talent sourcing, and employee feedback.

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Special Research Supplement July 2022

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23

Manage change and build strong cultures for corporate success

INTERACTIVE

JULY 2022

Sponsored by:

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The Future of Talent Acquisition

The State of Today’s HR Tech Stack

The State of HR Skills and Education

Aug 24-25, 2022

Sep 7, 2022

Oct 19, 2022

Learn more at: hr.com/ FutureTalentAcquisition

Learn more at: hr.com/ techstackresearch

Learn more at: hr.com/ HRSkillsResearch

The Future of Employee Engagement

The State of Internal Mobility, Succession, and Career Development

The Future of Recruitment Technologies

Nov 2-3, 2022

Nov 15, 2022

Dec 7-8, 2022

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Learn more at: hr.com/Recruitment TechnologiesResearch

Learn more at: hr.com/ engagement

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INDEX RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

30

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 Survey conducted by:

Sponsored by:

ARTICLES

35

Simpplr Research: State of Employee Experience

By Simpplr Research

42

Three Cs to Improve Employee Retention: Compensation, Career Path, and Culture

By Brian Anderson, BambooHR

38

How to Connect Your People to Purpose and Why It’s Vital

By Zach Mercurio, Ph.D., Contributor,

Bonusly

29

The HR Research Institute, powered by HR.com, the world’s largest social network for Human Resources professionals, is a key part of our mandate to inform and educate today’s HR professionals. Over the past three years, the HR Research Institute has produced more than 85 exclusive primary research and state of the industry reports, along with corresponding infographics in many cases, based on the surveys of thousands of HR professionals. Each research report highlights current HR trends, benchmarks, and industry best practices. HR Research Institute Reports and Infographics are available online, and always free, at www.hr.com/featuredresearch STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 Manage change and build strong cultures for corporate success

Exclusive Study By The HR Research Institute

T

here are two critical business processes that stand above all others: purposefully building a strong corporate culture and the ability

to successfully manage change. Both processes are highly dependent on one another. A positive, adaptive culture is the foundation for successful change1 and the pace of change itself seems to keep getting faster.

An exclusive study of HR professionals conducted by the HR Research Institute takes a closer look at the state of both corporate culture and change management.

Key Findings

2. Most organizations struggle with change management.

3. While most respondents feel remote work has had an effect on organizational culture, very few measures it.

4. Exit/stay interviews are both a popular and successful way of measuring corporate culture.

5. Organizations aspire to boost employee and organizational performance through positive culture and effective change management.

6. While organizations focus on improving employee-centric practices to build a positive organizational culture, there is always room for improvement.

1. A minority of HR professionals report that their organization’s corporate culture is positive.

30

RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

How Many Organizations Have Positive Cultures?

When it comes to culture, the parts are greater

Thirty-nine percent indicate their organization has a

things going well with your culture. Negative issues

positive corporate culture

run the gamut from scarce investments in career

than the whole. A single and significant negative issue left to fester can easily undo all the other

development, poor communication, lack of DEI, While 38% rate their organization culture positively

unclear ethical standards, and a senior leadership

(that is, 8, 9, or 10) an almost equal percentage

team that simply does not model the values.

(39%) rate it negatively (1 to 6). About a quarter (23%) lies in the middle (7 on the ten-point scale).

These numbers indicate that the majority of organizations have much room for improvement.

Only a third of respondents are satisfied with their organization’s ability to handle negative issues with its corporate culture.

When asked about their organization’s ability to address negative cultural issues, 45% are very or slightly dissatisfied while only 33% are very satisfied or satisfied.

31

RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

How Many Organizations Have Aligned Cultures?

Forty-five percent of organizations align employee behaviors and procedures to the organizational core values to a high or very high extent.

A positive and strong culture serves as a framework that guides employee behaviors to match the organization’s values. This can be done through decisions regarding recruitment, performance, rewards, and through interpersonal interactions.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Survey Question: In your organization, to what extent are employee behaviors and procedures aligned with the core values?

13%

Very high extent

Fifteen percent say employee behaviors and procedures are aligned with core values to a low or very low extent

High extent

32% 40%

Moderate extent

12%

Small extent

3%

Very small extent 0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

Challenges to Successful Cultures Lack of leadership to create or maintain a strong positive culture is the biggest hindrance What gets in the way of building excellent corporate cultures? We asked respondents to choose the top three factors that hinder them from creating or maintaining an excellent corporate culture. The top three are: ●● lack of leadership (43%) ●● lack of communication (40%) ●● lack of clearly articulated culture (39%)

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RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

The Role of Remote or Hybrid Workforces

Fully 86% of respondents say that some portion

Most say that at least a quarter of their workforce

Moreover, 46% of respondents indicate that half

has moved to remote or hybrid work arrangements

or more of their workforce has moved to hybrid/

over the past two years

remote work options over the past two years.

of their workforce has moved to remote and/or hybrid work arrangements over the last two years.

Survey Question: What percentage of employees in your organization have moved to more remote or hybrid work arrangements over the last two years?

Nearly a third say that 75% or more of employees have moved to remote or hybrid work arrangements over the last two years

32%

75% to 100%

14%

50% to 74%

10%

25% to 49%

12%

10% to 24%

18%

1% to 9%

14%

None

0

5

10 15 20 25 30 35

The Impact of Positive Cultures and Effective Change Management

The greatest advantage of having a good change

Boosting employee and organizational performance

Nearly one-third (31%) say that it increases

is the greatest advantage of having a good change

organizational agility.

management process, chosen by 41%, is that it boosts employee and organizational performance.

management process

33

RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Survey Question: If you had to choose one, what is the greatest advantage of having a good change management process?

41%

Boosts employee and organizational performance

31%

Increases organizational agility Enhances the employee experience

9%

Ensures faster implementation of new strategies

9% 7%

Increases ability to outmaneuver competitors

3%

Allows technologies to be implemented effectively 0

Note 1

10

20

30

40

50

change now. MIT Sloan Management Review. Retrieved from

Hollister, R., Tecosky, K., Watkins, M., & Wolpert, C. (2021,

August 10). Why every executive should be focusing on culture

https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/why-every-executive-shouldbe-focusing-on-culture-change-now/

To learn more about The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23, we invite you to download and read the complete report today, including 8 key takeaways, to learn how these outcomes and insights may apply to your organization.

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23

Read the Research Report

34

RESEARCH REPORT SUMMARY

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Simpplr Research: State of Employee Experience Simpplr Research

F

or many desk workers, the employee experience in 2022 would be unrecognizable to our 2019 selves. Among those responsible

for driving EX — especially in human resources, internal communications, and IT — the global pandemic and an emerging new employeremployee social contract have left heads spinning.

It’s no longer enough to have a strategy and execute on it. Sudden shifts in how we work are compounding the difficulty of engaging employees and responding to a new strategic reality. Leaders who charge forward relying on old thinking are bound to stumble in the long run. Regardless of whether you are still fully remote, or hybrid, or fully back in the office, if you are operating like it’s 2019, you are risking everything.

We carried out the State of Employee Experience survey and report because we wanted to know what EX professionals are seeing at this point in time and how they’re changing their approaches.

State of Employee Experience summarizes: ●● The current EX landscape: the “where” of work, challenges, priorities, etc. ●● How the different relevant functions (Comms, HR, IT, EX) rate their own performance — and one another’s

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ARTICLE

●● Essential EX technologies and planned investments ●● Measurement frameworks for employee engagement

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Takeaways from State of Employee Experience:

●● Download the “State of Employee Experience” eBook

Here are some of the notable findings from the report:

●● Watch the “State of Employee Experience” webinar

●● Roughly three in five respondents’ organizations have a dedicated employee experience function. ●● “Compensation, benefits, and rewards” leads the perceived drivers of employee experience, but it is trailed closely by career development opportunities and flexible working arrangements. ●● Engagement surveys are the most popular form of employee experience measurement.

Only seven percent of respondents said they do not measure EX in any way.

About Simpplr Research Simpplr Research was created in 2018 to provide customers and intranet practitioners insights and benchmarks to get the most out of their internal communications programs. With a rigid, analytical approach we hope to use data and insights to guide the corporate intranet industry and Simpplr’s solution strategy. To learn more or to suggest research topics contact us at hello@simpplr.com

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ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Simpplr consistently outranks other leading employee intranet solutions Built to the highest user experience standards, Simpplr connects

(Avg 83%)

employees and reduces IT burden, (Avg 89%)

enabling improved productivity and decentralized management through

(Avg 87%)

rapid, no-code deployments.

G2 REPORT | FALL 2021

(Avg 88%)

(Avg 90%)

(Avg 86%)

(Avg 83%)

Ease of Doing Business With

Employee Intranet Software G2 REPORT SPRING 2022

Ease of Use

Read the G2 report for product & feature comparisons based on actual customer reviews.

Get the Report

Performance & Reliability

Quality of Support

How to Connect Your People to Purpose and Why It’s Vital Zach Mercurio, Ph.D., Contributor, Bonusly

Studies show that when people believe that their

may be the most important task of modern

work matters, they’re four times more likely to be

organizational leaders.

engaged, are more motivated, learn faster, and are more fulfilled.

What Purpose Is and How Purpose Works to Drive Employee Fulfillment

But do you know how to activate purpose and

Purpose generally means the reason for which

connect your people to it?

something is done or created, the reason for its Existence.

When applied to work, purpose is our usefulness and our contribution—the reason why what we’re doing exists in the world.

When people can clearly see how their work contributes to others and serves a greater reason for being, research shows they become better.

Why? First, when purpose is embedded into an

79% of leaders think that connecting their people to an inspiring purpose is critical to success, but just

organization’s culture, it constantly reorients people to focus on contribution.

34% consider it a central guidepost for decisionmaking.

This is powerful because neuroscientists find that human beings are hard-wired for altruism.

Closing the gap between the stimulating idea of purpose and its transformative practice to drive employee engagement, motivation, and fulfillment

Studies show that when we think about our impact on others or directly help someone else, we get a boost of the “happiness trifecta” of neurotransmitters: oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin.

Oxytocin supports empathy and social bonding.

Dopamine plays a major role in motivation and movement. Serotonin regulates mood.

The results include individual and organizational outcomes like increased engagement, motivation, and fulfillment.

3 Ways to Connect Your People to Purpose One of the most influential functions of a leader is the ability to infuse purpose into people’s work and enable positive meaning.

But it’s not enough to “have purpose.” Leaders must create a culture that promotes being purposeful.

Here are some research-backed ways to do it:

1. Regularly show people how their work benefits others

As John F. Kennedy was about to give a speech to launch the Apollo missions, he walked past a janitor and asked, “What do you do here?”

The janitor replied, “I’m putting a man on the moon,” and went back to mopping the floor. This legendary and well-told story is inspiring, but how NASA’s leaders maintained a clear focus on this bigger purpose amongst a 300,000-person dispersed team is instructive for modern leaders.

In an archival study of organizational practices at NASA, researchers uncovered that each functional unit had a “ladder to the moon” – a tangible view of how each group’s tasks accomplished tangible objectives which would enable a moon landing.

Here are some key practices to connect people’s everyday tasks to the bigger purpose:

Connecting people to purpose starts regularly showing people how their work matters.

●● Ensure the organization has a clear, contribution-focused mission statement to harmonize energy.

Here are some key practices for showing people how their work benefits others:

●● Make sure each team has a “ladder to the purpose” and that every person and position can see how their core work tasks and processes meet measurable.

●● During onboarding, make sure people connect early and often to a beneficiary of the work – direct stories work best ●● When delegating or assigning anything, before you tell people what to do and how to do it, show them why it matters through a story

39

2. Help people tie their everyday tasks to a bigger purpose worth committing to

●● objectives that enable the purpose to be delivered. ●● Make the pathway to purpose a daily discussion.

●● When giving positive feedback and recognition, don’t tell someone they “did a good job,” specifically show them the difference they made

●● Regularly assess whether employees can articulate the bigger contribution their core tasks enable.

●● Invite employees to tell stories of their impact on others and incorporate these stories in regular team touchpoints

●● Provide the space for each individual to build their own purpose statement and provide a clear path for how it connects to delivering the organization’s purpose.

ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

3. Make contribution goals more important than achievement goals What a culture rewards is typically what a culture becomes. Most organizations unintentionally reward for self-serving behaviors.

Cultivating a purposeful workforce means rethinking both the nature of the goals people set and what goals people are rewarded for achieving.

Here are some key practices to make contribution goals more important than achievement goals: ●● Review the goals set for employees, are more of them achievement-oriented or contributionoriented? ●● Set organizational goals that are measured by their relative impact on others, not on organizational gain. ●● Encourage individual employees to set goals that result in a contribution to others. ●● Create a rewards structure – yes even financial – that reward for purposeful behavior.

Purpose in Work Isn’t A Trend, It’s an Expectation To summarize, the search for purpose isn’t a trend, it’s a uniting trait of our species. That search doesn’t stop when someone clocks in.

By regularly showing people how their work benefits others, helping people tie their everyday tasks to a bigger purpose worth committing to, and making contribution goals more important than achievement goals, you can help people experience positive meaning in work.

Psychiatrist and concentration camp survivor Viktor Frankl wrote that “Striving to find meaning in one’s life is the primary motivational force of man.”

Purposeful organizations unleash this force.

Zach Mercurio, Ph.D., (Contributor, Bonusly) is a purposeful leadership and meaningful work researcher, adjunct professor, and the bestselling author of The Invisible Leader: Transform Your Life, Work, and Organization with the Power of Authentic Purpose.

Organizations that enable the experience of purpose in work inspire their people to be more

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engaged, motivated, and fulfilled.

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ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Feeling a sense of purpose at work is essential to today's employees.

What can you actually do to support them in finding it?

Employee recognition

With Bonusly’s powerful employee recognition program you can:

that is timely,

• Make work more meaningful for your employees.

frequent, and specific

• Improve job satisfaction and retention at every level of your organization.

is the answer.

• Share recognition that ties directly to your company values.

learn more at bonus.ly

Three Cs to Improve Employee Retention: Compensation, Career Path, and Culture Brian Anderson, BambooHR

E

ven if your existing workforce isn’t composed

And yet, even though employers are familiar with

entirely of superstars, retaining your current

the costs of replacing employees, they’re still

employees is almost always preferable to

reluctant to give wage increases that rival the 14.8

searching for new candidates—after all, they know

percent increase in pay the average employee

how your business works, and you know them as

gets when job hopping. If your employees know

well. But staff retention can be one of the trickiest

they’ll make more money if they leave their current

parts of managing an organization.

position, why should they stay with you?

To help you build your business value and retain a team you can trust, we’ll dive into the three key components of retention: ●● Compensation

The strategy here is to give regular wage increases,

●● Career path

local job trends can set you behind the competition

bonuses, and equity. Changes in cost of living and without regular compensation review. While

●● Culture ●● Compensation

The Cost of Replacing Employees

keeping up with fair pay may lead to increased expenses, the cost of recruiting and re-training an employee tends to be much higher. Dollars spent to improve retention are dollars effectively spent

Finding and hiring the right employee is expensive

(and a great way to show how much you value your

not just in terms of money, but also in time—which

employees).

is, effectively, the same as money spent. In the U.S., it takes companies between 36 and 42 days to find the right candidate, and costs an average of 4,425 dollars per new hire. Then there’s the less

Consider, too, benefits on top of financial compensation that increase your employees’ bottom line. For example:

quantifiable cost of missed productivity during a

●● Childcare

new hire’s onboarding and training—it’s not unusual

●● Grocery stipends

for a new employee to take six months before they’re familiar with their new role.

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How Improving Compensation Improves Retention

ARTICLE

●● Coworking allowances

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

These are all factors that go into your employees considering whether or not to leave. Let’s look at an example in context: Perhaps a job at a different company pays 10,000 dollars more per year. However, this new job doesn’t offer the same childcare reimbursements that equate to far more than the wage increase. That difference could be a compelling reason for your employee to stay.

And then there are the psychological benefits of higher compensation, including: ●● Engagement: When your employees are paid well, they feel valued, which leads to greater job satisfaction and higher performance. ●● Financial stability: They have more disposable income to put towards housing and travel.

Career Path As humans, we need purpose and movement—in our careers, we want to feel like we’re contributing to something worthwhile and like we’re moving forward. Even if you’re giving regular wage increases to your employees, they’re more likely to job hop if they don’t feel like the organization is investing in their professional growth.

Investing in Your Employees’ Career Development Moving forward doesn’t have to mean climbing up the traditional corporate ladder. Think of more ways to develop your employees’ skills and give them opportunities to put them into practice.

●● Loyalty and trust: They trust you to keep increasing their salary, which keeps them ahead of inflation and other factors that could limit their financial stability.

The first step is to help each employee develop a

●● Brand ambassadorship: Happy, engaged, and loyal employees are also more likely to refer high-quality candidates to your business.

such as:

defined, individualized career path. This path should be determined in consultation with the employee and should incorporate several concrete markers, ●● OKRs ●● Training

Getting Compensation Right from the Get-Go Setting up this ongoing recognition of employee value requires starting with the right compensation offer. While outbidding competitors with higher salaries may help get a candidate in the door, it won’t improve staff retention long-term if your bid maxes out your budget and leaves no room for a raise. Compensation works best when the employer and the employee are aligned on the value of the employee’s contribution and their future potential—a process that starts with good hiring and continues through consistent conversations.

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ARTICLE

●● Performance milestones More than anything, fostering a culture of learning allows your employees to tell you what they need to grow. Here are some suggestions for supporting your employees’ growth: ●● Encourage them to attend conferences and trainings where they can meet peers outside of the organization. ●● Invite experts in the field to train or give presentations to relevant teams. ●● Provide tuition support for professional certifications, cross-disciplinary training, or further educational programs.

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Investing in the long-term success of your

Of the three pillars of employee retention, culture

employees proves to them that you value their work

is by far the most important factor. An employee

and are dedicated to advancing their careers. And

will stay for the company’s culture even if the

by deepening or broadening the skillsets of your

compensation isn’t over market rate, but someone

current employees, you’re also building business

qualified won’t stay long at a job with high

value while becoming more resilient to market

compensation if the culture is toxic.

shifts. When your employees aren’t stagnant, neither is your business.

If you want your retention efforts to truly be effective, what your organization says about supporting employees and what your employees’

“When your employees aren’t stagnant, neither is your business”

Why You Should Promote Internally Investing in your staff’s careers also means making a commitment to promote from within. While your internal hires may lack some experience that outside applicants have gained, promoting internally saves you the cost of having to search, vet, and hire an external candidate. Where experience is concerned, keep this in mind: any additional time and effort you spend bringing an existing employee up to speed in a new role is likely offset by the institutional and cultural knowledge they already have.

reexamining and refocusing on creating a peoplepositive culture.

Starting with the Right Definition of Company Culture It’s tempting to see defining culture as a one-time project—just find the perfect words to put on your office posters and company swag, and mission accomplished! Now you have a motto you can point to and use to rally the troops, right? Not so fast.

While it’s certainly important to define your company values, mission, and vision, all of which underpin company culture, culture involves more than what anyone in leadership or management says it is. At BambooHR, we think of culture as the sum total of all the experiences in an organization; in other words, defining culture is only effective if your culture defines your organization in turn.

On top of recruiting internally, you can also create more loyalty by showing that your organization is loyal to its employees. Recognize your employees as they advance in their careers. For every milestone or successful project completion, give public recognition. That loud acknowledgment of their success goes a long way towards making your employees feel seen and appreciated.

Culture

44

experience has to line up—and that comes down to

For example, it’s easy to say an organization values both work-life balance and a standard of excellence. But it takes more thought and planning to set up operations so employees can work at that standard and still feel comfortable leaving at the end of the day, whether they’re commuting home or stepping away from their home office. For both values to apply, a healthy sense of urgency can’t lead to daily emergencies.

ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

Mixed messages on values can lead employees to

As you assess and cultivate your culture, begin with

feel like your culture applies to some, but not to all,

the following aspects of your workplace:

setting the stage for unfavorable comparisons and dissatisfaction. Neither helps improve employee retention.

Finding the Culture Balance that’s Right for Your Organization Culture, at its core, needs to marry the human needs of your employees with the monetary and operational needs of your organization. This means, exploring the complexity of these interactions and course correcting when employer and employee values conflict. It means working with every department and team to define how your values

●● Communication: How open is your organization to feedback from managers to employees and from employees to the organization? Do your employees have an anonymous way to bring up criticism or suggestions? ●● Accountability: How does your organization hold people accountable for their performance? What are the consequences of great or mediocre performance? ●● Community: how do employees interact with each other? How does your organization affect your local community and beyond?

influence the specifics of day-to-day work.

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ARTICLE

STATE OF THE INDUSTRY RESEARCH

If you don’t have a clearly defined culture, start

fragmented teams. And it’s clear when a business

by understanding how your employees view it.

hasn’t committed itself to the three pillars because

Consider conducting an anonymous survey to ask

word spreads quickly on company review sites

questions about their experience, such as:

and social media—and nobody wants to stay in an

●● Do employees think you’re inclusive? ●● Do they feel supported in their roles? ●● Do they feel micromanaged?

By seeing your culture for what it is, you can better shape it to what you want it to be. Ultimately, to increase retention, you need to create and maintain a culture that’s healthy, supportive, and welcoming.

No single perk, poster, presentation, or bonus can make up for a failure in culture, because culture is the total experience.

unhealthy organization. In the current job market which favors applicants, it’s more important than ever to keep the valuable employees you already have.

The three Cs require work, but they’re worth the investment. When you’re fully committed to your employees’ overall success, they’ll be committed to yours. You’ll have employees that only get more valuable over time and who contribute to the healthy, supportive culture you want to foster.

By consistently offering higher wages and better benefits than those of your competitors, your

Determining Your Employee Retention Technique If committing your business to higher compensation, clearer career paths, and stronger culture is intimidating, consider the inverse: high

employees will have no reason to start looking for a new company. They’ll be happy, balanced, and overall satisfied with their role. And you’ll find improved employee retention as staffing worries become a thing of the past.

turnover, brain drain, disengaged employees, and

Brian Anderson expertly decodes all things HR, drawing on a decade of technical writing in the business organization industry to provide editorial support to internal and external learning programs at BambooHR. His writing explores the different motivations that shape the employee experience and the psychology of human resources.

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Special Research Supplement

The Future of HR’s Role in Managing Corporate Culture & Change 2022-23 HR Strategy & Planning Excellence • July 2022

For more information: 1.877.472.6648 sales@hr.com www.HR.com/epubs

The HR Research Institute tracks human resources trends and best practices.

Learn more at hr.com/featuredresearch

TOP PICK

What Should Be On Every HR Exec’s Agenda NOW The Supreme Court is a good place to start

By Carrie B. Cherveny, Esq., Hub International

H

uman Resources has a lot on its plate as employers and workplaces emerge from Covid remote work arrangements. It has been about two years since many offices were filled with employees milling around, having lunch, and talking shop.

Likewise, it has been some time since many HR professionals have had the opportunity to review many of their foundational documents such as employee handbooks and related SOPs. What should be top of mind as HR returns to office? The Supreme Court is a good place to start.

Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia 2020 The question in Bostock was whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VII) prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex orientation and transgender status under sex discrimination. The Supreme Court answered with a resounding “yes”.

The Court stated “An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender violates Title VII.” This finding has a far-reaching impact. Fundamentally, employers should be updating their employee handbooks to be sure that they prohibit harassment, discrimination, and retaliation on the basis of sexual orientation and transgender status (among other protected classes). Likewise, employers should be training their managers and employees regarding

HR Strategy & Planning Excellence presented by HR.com

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their rights and obligations under Title VII (among other employment laws). But this Court decision goes further than the employee handbook.

Title VII prohibits discrimination with respect to “compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” which includes employee benefits. It’s clear that Title VII prohibits discrimination in the offer of coverage. But were you aware that it may also apply to the actual plan design and coverages/exclusions in the insurance plan itself? On June 6th, a Middle District Court in Georgia found that an employer’s health plan that excluded coverage for transgender medical, surgical, and psychological services violated Title VII. In Lange v. Houston County Georgia, the employee sued her employer for the failure of the group health insurance to cover her transgender medical, surgical, and psychological services. The court found that [d]enying healthcare coverage “because of” sex unquestionably violates Title VII because those benefits are “compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” under the Act. This means that employers should not only update their employee handbook, but likewise should review their employee health insurance exclusions and consult with their broker and outside counsel.

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Federal Agency Activity In November 2021, the Department of Labor (DOL), the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), and the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) (collectively the Agencies) announced a joint information sharing effort to end retaliation in the workplace. Specifically, the Agencies stated: The initiative will include collaboration among these civil law enforcement agencies to protect workers on issues of unlawful retaliatory conduct, educate the public and engage with employers, business organizations, labor organizations and civil rights groups in the coming year.

The Agencies have developed a memorandum of understanding formalizing the cooperative effort to enforce related laws and protect workers’ rights. This means that it is possible for one agency (such as the DOL) to engage in an investigation and based on its findings, share information with another agency (such as the EEOC or NLRB) which may trigger a second investigation from the additional agency. The core focus of this collaboration is to combat retaliation in the workplace.

Therefore, as employers update their handbooks, they should also pay special attention to their complaint procedures and anti-retaliation policies. Employers may want to consider offering a hotline to employees providing a neutral avenue for complaints. Likewise, training is incredibly important. Ensuring that your managers and decision makers understand what may constitute retaliation and their obligations is an essential component of any retaliation prevention program.

Covid National Emergency and the EEOC Direct Threat Back in 2002 when WHO declared Covid-19 a pandemic and the EEOC declared it a “Direct Threat” employers’ Covid-19 medical inquires became subject to the ADA “direct threat” standard. During a pandemic, ADA-covered employers may ask

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employees if they are experiencing symptoms of the pandemic virus. Why was this allowed? Because employers may request information to determine whether an employee may perform his or her essential job functions without posing a direct threat. However, employers are also prohibited from asking employees about their Covid-19 symptoms if they are not coming into the workplace or attending live work-related meetings (such as a client lunch or attending a conference).

However, even in a pandemic and under a direct threat, employer inquiries remain limited to information regarding whether the employee poses a direct threat. This means, for example, an employer may not request an employee’s complete medical record because the records are likely to contain information unrelated to whether the employee can perform his or her essential functions without posing a direct threat.

Post-Pandemic It has been more than two years since the declaration of a “direct threat”. During this time, HR departments have updated technology, policies, protocols, and processes to include Covid-19 symptom questionnaires. When Covid19 is no longer a pandemic and the EEOC removes the “Direct Threat” declaration, HR professionals will have to unravel many of their Covidmedical screening processes.

Employers will no longer be able to engage in medical surveillance of Covid-19 for general health and safety purposes. For example, employers will no longer be able to screen employees for Covid-19 symptoms or take the temperatures of employees entering the workplace or attending workplace functions.

Likewise, employers will no longer be able to conduct Covid-19 testing or seek the results of Covid-19 tests as a condition of attending work.

In many cases, this also means retraining HR professionals who may have joined the profession during the Covid-19 pandemic and have not operated under the more traditional (non-Direct Threat) ADA medical inquiry rules.

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Multistate Challenges Marijuana State Laws The legalization of marijuana across the U.S. varies greatly by state. The differing rules and obligations across the U.S. create significant complexity for multi-state employers. For example, in some states, the failure to accommodate an employee who uses marijuana for medical purposes may be a violation of state disability laws. Conversely, in other states, employers have no obligation to accommodate employees who use medical marijuana and employees have no private right of action. For instance, on March 30, 2021, New York laws began prohibiting employers from taking any action against someone for using recreational marijuana when not working. Conversely, as of April 12, 2021, New Mexico passed a medical marijuana law that affords

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several protections to employers and does not provide employment protections to recreational users. This makes developing a “one size fits all” drug-free workplace policy virtually impossible.

The current labor shortage adds to the complexity.

HR and recruiters are under tremendous pressure to find and retain talent. Employers may be tempted to eliminate THC from their drug screening protocols.

However, in some states allowing the use of marijuana may jeopardize the employer’s workers compensation coverage – especially for safety-sensitive positions. Employers should speak with outside counsel, their broker, and their workers’ compensation carrier before making any changes to their drug testing programs (including those that are specifically designated as a Drug-Free Workplace).

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Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, Washington). Moreover, there are additional four states who have passed legislation with benefits effective in the future (Colorado (2024), Delaware (2026), Maryland (2025), Oregon (2023)).

Compounding this complexity, there are 18 states with Paid Sick or Earned Leave Time requirements and 23 Cities and Counties with Paid Sick Leave requirements.

Sick Leave and Paid Leave Another state-based complexity includes time off and paid leave rules. States (along with some counties and municipalities) have been actively engaged in passing mandatory paid time off laws.

For example, there are now eight states plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico with Paid Medical/Paid Family Leave benefits currently in effect (California, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Hawaii,

Multistate employers are constantly challenged to remain up to date in both their practices and their policies. Having solid multi-state compliance resources is imperative. There are a wide array of resources available to employers to assist with multistate compliance including law firms, consulting firms, and online subscription tools.

This article encompasses only some of the hottest topics for HR today – in addition to the ongoing foundational HR obligations including training, audits, and HR operations. The bottom line – the HR profession is increasingly complex and an essential role for every organization. If you see an HR person today, say thank you. It’s been a long few years.

Carrie B. Cherveny, Esq., is Chief Compliance Officer and Senior Vice President of Employment Solutions at global insurance brokerage, Hub International. She has 20 years of combined experience in employee relations working on the management side providing human resources, employment law, and employee benefits legal guidance. Carrie works closely with clients to identify compliance risks across the organization and develop responsive strategies and solutions that ensure compliance and further the overall organization’s goals. Carrie has been at the forefront of the Covid pandemic helping employers navigate the complex employment, health and safety laws while maintaining their operations. Part of Carrie’s focus is risk mitigation when it comes to various insurances such as health and welfare programs and employment practices liability.

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Workforce Planning Is No Longer Regarded As Simply “An HR Task” Impactful workforce planning requires a collaborative effort across the organization, with HR playing a central role

By Rupert Bader, Anaplan

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lasting lesson from the pandemic is that we can no longer let even a vigorous economy lull us into complacency about all that we produce and consume, or the intricate supply chains that enable us to do both. Everything seems more vulnerable, but once discovered, vulnerabilities can also reveal new opportunities.

Specifically, the pandemic exposed how dependent business organizations are on other organizations within their ecosystems, and how well business functions within the same organization are connected and how much they depend on one another. The need to rapidly adapt and respond in a uniquely volatile environment has forced managers to think beyond the narrow definition of their own business functions. They must now take a broader perspective about

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how they interact with other business functions to adopt new processes, make accurate forecasts, course-correct, and ultimately contribute to overall organizational agility.

Every business function depends acutely on its workforce. Consequently, workforce planning is no longer regarded as simply “an HR task” but rather a collaborative effort across the organization, with HR playing a central role. A workforce planning initiative is an opportunity for HR to guide their peers in other business functions to go beyond the idea that workforce planning is primarily headcount planning, wherein only financial impacts are evaluated. It enables HR to involve leaders across the organization in strategic areas of people strategy, including

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workforce agility, workforce optimization, workforce visibility, organizational shape, skill management and diversity, equity & inclusion. Successfully bringing together numerous stakeholders in workforce planning results from HR conscientiously managing both processes and relationships.

Traditionally, every department, including HR, manages their own transactional systems, their own data collection, analysis, and reporting activities. But workforce planning requires several departments cooperating and making those connections can create friction that slows the planning process down and decreases organizational agility.

Three of the most common friction points HR encounters are with Finance, IT, and line-of-business managers.

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Workforce Planning Is No Longer Regarded As Simply “An HR Task”

HR and Finance: Two Distinct Notions of What It Means to Add Value Much of the friction between HR and Finance stems from historically dissimilar perspectives about how workers should be reckoned. For Finance, workers are primarily views as costs to be contained, while for HR, they are people to be nurtured, provided with opportunities and developed as future innovators and creators of customer delight. Because Finance is responsible for the organization’s money, it can have far more leverage regarding major workforce decisions and puts HR in the challenging position of having to quantify the value of the workforce in financial terms.

Finance and HR are now finding themselves having to address the same questions: How well do we really understand our customers and their behaviors? How much are we willing to bet on it? How do we create customer value and how does that translate into business value? Is our workforce in the best position to bring about both?

Additionally, Finance is increasingly preoccupied with boosting margins, driving growth, and managing risk holistically. The perils of not being able to deliver goods and services on time and of sufficient quality due to workforce deficiencies is no abstraction, especially in sectors hit hard by the pandemic.

HR and Finance must also contend with a workforce increasingly being asked to do more with less, requiring additional training and support. In an environment where

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HR and Finance collaborate in planning and budgeting for improved onboarding, engagement, and training, HR can provide Finance with greater insight into the total costs of recruitment and worker replacement and the range of organizational performance outcomes likely to affect critical financial metrics.

These can help better inform organizational change initiatives and assure that they are driven by a shared understanding of all cost dimensions. To achieve this nirvana of improved visibility to the financial impact of people decisions, Finance can do a lot to support HR’s evolution into a function that is known for excellence in planning & analytics.

HR and IT: Data Frenemies HR technology implementations, configurations, and integrations are infamous for

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being patchworks of enterprise, point solutions, and spreadsheets.

From a time-management perspective, it’s a hefty load for HR and IT teams to pull together data, usually of questionable quality and completeness, from disparate systems, cleanse and structure it into a usable format, and then distribute it all to managers in a way that maintains employee privacy and complies with data protection regulation.

The partnership that HR and IT have worked so hard to develop is delicate and easy to strain. No matter how many clever hacks anyone can call upon, the process is not easily repeatable, and mistakes in data require complete cycles to correct. The whole purpose of agile planning gets defeated by the lack of agility to stand up plans based on current and accurate data presented using the functional and geographic hierarchies that leaders are accustomed to seeing.

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Nonetheless, IT and HR have much in common. Both functions are passionate about the opportunity for their work to improve the experience of employees at work.

Both functions are on the receiving end of innumerable requests, suggestions and demands from leaders, managers and employees – only a fraction of which can be prioritized, funded and executed.

And, as was never more clearly demonstrated than during the pandemic, both functions are critical to the success, resilience and agility of every organization.

By supporting an agile workforce planning process through effective integrations, single-sign-on and excellent systems governance, IT can play a key role in delivering an integrated workforce planning experience in partnership with HR.

HR and Line-of-Business Managers: “Tell Me What I am Looking at Here”

to make sense of the data, verifying sources, and making judgment calls on which data is valid or relevant. Ultimately, they have to construct the whole picture for themselves, tell their own story, and drive for the best decisions based on that story and the data available.

Over the past several years, it has become easier for people data to be made available to managers directly without risking privacy or data breaches. However, just in the same way that the general ledger or the customer relationship management system data requires context and education for managers to effectively use it, so does data about attrition, time-to-fill, employee engagement or gender representation (to just pick 4 examples). Line-of-business managers are key players in effectively implementing the workforce plan, and they can also be valuable partners in building the workforce plan when they and HR work together to build simple, trusted, business-focused goals that can be achieved in partnership.

Line-of-business managers know their department’s operations inside out, and it’s often presumed that their line of sight extends just as keenly to their portion of the workforce. This can cause them to be dealt into the planning process well after the initial stage, given partially refined data and a list of tasks, but little context or guidance.

A Central Player

Nevertheless, they persevere.

Understanding workforce data well enough to discuss it confidently in meetings with peers poses a high cognitive load on managers. They can spend excessive time trying

No other business function touches more of the enterprise than HR and no one is an island in workforce planning. HR is in a unique position to drive faster decisions that are good for employees and exceptional for

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business agility by forming effective data-driven partnerships between planning leaders (Finance), data and system provisioners (IT), and key end-users (line-of-business managers). Whether acting in its own capacity or as a broker between business functions, HR has a huge opportunity to connect the goals of leaders across many teams, organizations, and divisions, and ultimately improve the agility of workforce planning and the entire organization.

The post was originally posted here.

Rupert Bader is the Vice President, Human Capital Planning at Anaplan, where he leads Anaplan’s workforce planning approach and solutions internally, as well as partnering with the Workforce Planning solutions team to connect Anaplan’s capabilities with customer, partner and prospect use cases. Building on his leadership roles in workforce planning and analytics at Expedia, Microsoft, Avaya and other global organizations, Rupert is driven by his mission to help all organizations create inclusive, productive and dynamic workforces through exceptional Connected Planning.

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HR Departments Must Utilize Employee Data To Enhance Workplace Safety And Employee Productivity Better collaboration and intelligence are mandatory for a motivated workforce

By Mike Steere, SaferMe

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usiness awareness about the importance of mental well-being has grown significantly in recent years. With this focus, a closer connection between HR departments and the issues of worker safety and productivity has developed.

While the improvements in understanding of mental well-being are positive, leading businesses are assessing a broader set of intelligence – personnel risk intelligence – for a more comprehensive approach.

Personnel risk intelligence includes the analysis of information obtained from multiple data points about workers. The goal is to help understand and interpret how they experience working at a

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business. This approach also facilitates the identification and quantification of issues that are impacting workers on a daily basis. These issues, if not identified early enough, can result in employee productivity problems, well-being issues, a negative perception of an employer, and, in a worst-case scenario, lead to a predisposition for on-the-job accidents.

Taking a forward-looking approach to the field of personnel risk enables HR departments and businesses to get ahead of these problems before they develop into a larger issue and become costly to fix.

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Optimizing WorkplaceSafety and Productivity The facts about worker risks and well-being paint a grim picture.

The “Stress in America January 2021 Snapshot” study from the American Psychological Association (APA) reported four in five people are showing signs of “prolonged stress.”

While there is a broad range of factors that contribute to this, these factors are often specific to each organization and the industry sectors in which they operate. This challenge of understanding unique circumstances drives companies to get access to better workplace data about their workers.

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HR Departments Must Utilize Employee Data To Enhance Workplace Safety And Employee Productivity

company has their best interests at heart. Measuring again at regular intervals will help assess the success of the actions and strategies implemented. This is key.

Non-Invasive Proximity Analysis of Employees

The type of data companies analyzes to understand what affects the safety and productivity of their workers begins with basic safety and well-being metrics. In addition, evaluations of workers’ engagement with their job, their perception of work relationships, workloads – both physical and mental – and other questions about how they perceive their job are all considered.

In many cases, this data is inconsistent and can carry internal biases – it is subjective data. To overcome this, high-performing organizations are looking to evidence-based frameworks for the collection and analysis of this data. Entrusting a trusted third party to perform this function provides several benefits. First, it enables the implementation of a standard, consistent framework for gathering and assessing objective data, negating internal biases.

Second, it opens the opportunity to add further context to intelligence through industry benchmarking.

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Finally, it can drive increased engagement because staff feels comfortable knowing their data sits with an expert third party and will not be manipulated by management internally.

Once companies have this data, analyzing it using a standard framework based on a sound statistical methodology is the best way to gain accurate, deep and actionable intelligence. Individual factors can point to issues that could be causing issues with workplace productivity, safety, well-being or workers’ opinion of their employer. Patterns of these factors operating in combination can give even stronger indications of elevated risk in these areas.

These insights should enable the organization to implement forward-looking actions and strategies to address the problems identified and reassure employees that the

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But whether businesses actually have the data with which to glean those insights is an open question.

In the last two years of Covid, many organizations struggled to accurately determine which employees had been in contact with each other, and who should be sent home to quarantine.

Productivity and workplace motivation was impacted. Contact tracing was indeed in its infancy and useful data was hard to come by.

As we have learned and understood more about Covid and pandemics, it has become clear that the non-invasive proximity analysis of employees holds significant value for businesses. The use of Bluetooth technology in a business setting helps gather data that, once interpreted, may be used to help defend the organization against continuity issues or productivity dips because of viral illnesses -particularly during pandemics.

Companies can slow or stop the spread of a virus by accurately identifying close contacts of workers who test positive for the virus. Insights from this technologydriven intelligence can also identify where a higher risk for infection exists within an organization while maintaining worker privacy.

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HR Departments Must Utilize Employee Data To Enhance Workplace Safety And Employee Productivity

Done the right way, proximity analysis and the intelligence it delivers not only slow or stop the spread of viral illnesses, but also boost workplace culture and employee confidence in coming to work during uncertain times.

Proximity analysis and intelligence provide a visible indication that the employer is doing all it can to protect its workers, and that the workplace is safe. This capability becomes a critical component in the HR armory of capabilities to ensure that the company has a motivated and productive workforce.

Safety and Health Strategies Impact Employee Productivity Those data analysis and intelligence efforts, however, must

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operate within the broader context of the challenges organizations face.

As noted earlier, the rising awareness of mental well-being issues and how they impact workers highlights the connection between employee productivity and the employer’s workplace safety and health strategy.

The issues of both absenteeism and presenteeism are where businesses often feel the impact of poor health and safety strategies. This is an enormous problem for American businesses, with one Harvard study estimating that absenteeism alone sucks

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$150 billion per year from the U.S. economy’s productivity.

Over and above absenteeism and presenteeism, there is a range of everyday threats businesses need to face including economic, geopolitical, and supply chain concerns. Add to this the fresh experience of the impact viral illnesses have had on the health, safety, well-being, and productivity of workers and it becomes very evident that employers and HR departments face many challenges.

It becomes clear that employers should be seeking to implement proactive, forward-looking intelligence programs to measure and analyze the personnel risk that exists in their organization.

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HR Departments Must Utilize Employee Data To Enhance Workplace Safety And Employee Productivity

between HR, safety and operational management functions.

An organization that strengthens this collaboration – and prioritizes the collection and analysis of relevant data in the cooperative work – can transition to a more data-driven, future-focused understanding of personnel risk. This collaboration will form the strategic basis for an improved understanding of what holds workers back, and what can unlock greater well-being and performance.

Understanding issues that are leading to elevated personnel risk, and proactively implementing strategies to address these issues, should be high on the priority list for human resources leaders as they look to improve productivity and maintain safety, well-being, and positive worker perception of their workplace.

A commitment to identifying the issues that are affecting employees, and addressing them, is an extremely positive message to disseminate to staff. But be warned, companies cannot say they ‘understand the risks and will be doing something about it’ and then do nothing.

To execute this, there must be an integrated approach that requires a strong collaboration between HR departments, health and safety leaders, operational risk managers, and operations managers. Executive engagement is vital as always, but there is plenty of value in gathering this type of forward-looking intelligence for both the C-level and boards can use data about personnel risk to increase their understanding of the organization and develop more future-focused decisions for the organizations.

Taking the First Steps

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The next data-driven evolution for HR departments? Build stronger intelligence about the factors impacting personnel risk in their organizations.

This transition is, arguably, already underway with mental well-being programs and some of the collaborative innovation that has occurred because of Covid-19 and its impacts on how we work. This shift is driving greater collaboration

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Ultimately, better collaboration and intelligence will lead to enhanced productivity in a safer and healthier work environment within a company that takes the initiative to proactively manage the risks impacting its human capital assets.

Mike Steere is a co-founder of SaferMe, one of the world’s leading contact tracing and safety software companies, with products used across more than 30 countries. Through the pandemic, he has worked with Fortune 500 businesses and other well-known international organizations, helping them to maintain productivity and continuity of operations.

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How To Bring Flexibility To Your Workplace Beyond Work From Home It’s time to get creative

By Jaclyn Chen, Benepass

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t’s almost impossible to talk about work today without the topic of remote work entering the conversation. According to one study, 97% of employees would like to work remotely, at least some of the time, for the rest of their careers, and 86% want either fully remote or remote-first work environments.

Some companies have even had to tweak or scrap their return-to-office plans for fear of losing talent.

for remote work, it might be time to look at the very positive data around its benefits.

But remote work is not always possible in certain industries such as healthcare, construction, or education. Leaders at these organizations may feel incredibly stressed when they hear about the importance of retaining top talent through remote work and flexible benefits. However, flexibility does not solely equate to remote work. There are other options you can explore to make your employees feel just as cared for as the entirely remote startup down the street.

Outside of increased productivity, remote work offers employers a broader talent pool to hire from.

There are also cost savings for the employer such as reduced real estate, utilities, and supplies. Employees often report feeling empowered by working remotely.

It allows them the time to handle personal obligations, invest in professional development, and even cut down on extraneous costs and commuting time.

Why Flexibility Is Important In some industries, increased flexibility (including remote work) is possible but has not been implemented due to a dated culture. One of the few benefits of COVID-19 was the ushering of change in this arena. If your organization has the potential

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For example, a recent survey by Global Workplace Analytics found that at AT&T, remote workers worked an average of five more hours than those in the office.

Best Buy, British Telecom, and Dow Chemical reported that remote workers are 35-40% more productive.

Remote work isn’t an option in every industry, and some employees have even reported that they don’t enjoy remote work. Many individuals enjoy the social environment of the office, and others feel that remote work causes them to always be “on” even when the workday has ended. Organizations need to carefully examine their workforces to determine if remote work is really what people want, or if there are other unique paths.

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schedule flexibility, you can still create a positive culture by offering flexible and easy-to-use benefit programs. For example, Lifestyle Spending Accounts (LSAs) are essentially non-salaried allowances that employees can use according to their personal preferences. Unlike Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs) and Health Savings Accounts (HSAs), LSAs are fully funded by the employer and considered taxable income when spent.

What Flexibility Means (Hint: It’s Not Just Remote Work) Job Sharing Job sharing is an underutilized option that allows great flexibility. As the name suggests, job sharing is when two individuals share the same role.

Organizations have implemented this strategy with employees who are caring for a young child or elderly relative. The employees can either split the role equally or take certain responsibilities. This option allows two highly qualified employees to manage a role. Salary may be slightly lower as the role is split, but employees often report that they are open to it as other costs (like childcare, commuting, etc.) are heavily reduced.

Flexible Scheduling Flexible scheduling allows employees to work outside of the traditional 9 to 5 Monday through Friday. This could mean that an employee works four longer days per week and has a three-day weekend or maybe starts their day early and leaves early to have time with their children after school. It can also mean having a choice in work shifts, unlimited time off, or opportunities for sabbaticals.

A Benefits Boost Organizations may have certain limits on how much flexibility they can offer due to the nature of their business, the security of highly confidential data, or the safety of workers. Even when there are limits to

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You can design programs to fit the unique needs of your workforce, which can include stipends for services that streamline home life after a long workday (like grocery delivery), lunch allowances for in-office workers, and mental health resources.

A survey by PWC found that financial challenges contribute the most stress to employees’ daily lives. A small additional financial contribution by the employer may reduce this stress, leading to a happier and more productive workforce. Employees have used their LSAs to help repay student debt, adopt a pet, make monthly charitable donations, take personal or professional development courses, cover the cost of extracurricular activities for children, offset childcare costs, and more.

It’s Time to Get Creative The bottom line is that to win and retain talent today, all employers must get creative with the way they take care of their employees. There’s been a giant shift in the way we think about and approach what were long thought to be work norms. Instead of pretending they don’t exist, companies need to embrace those attitudes and search for out-of-the-box ways to bring flexibility to their workplace.

Jaclyn Chen is the Co-founder and CEO of Benepass, a leading next-generation mobile and web-based benefits administrator dedicated to making benefits flexible and delightful for companies and their employees

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Three Ways Digital Transformation Is Driving A More Diverse, Future-Ready Workforce Change is a marathon, not a sprint

By Ivori Johnson, ChartHop

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n an effort to attract and retain top talent and encourage greater transparency, a growing number of businesses are prioritizing diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) in the workplace. Just this past year, a Gartner survey revealed that DEIB ranks in human resource leaders’ top five priorities this year.

It’s no surprise that a more diverse workforce leads to a more future-ready workforce, which drives increased innovation and productivity, as well as better decision-making and problem-solving.

When it comes to HR, people leaders have been stuck using legacy tools and technology.

With more than 70 percent of organizations investing in people analytics tools to make data-driven decisions, people analytics adoption must be central to HR

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leaders’ digital transformation strategy.

What many leaders have yet to realize is that this data-driven approach extends to DEIB. When companies use people analytics to understand their DEIB data, they can make powerful strides to improve retention, engagement, and belonging. This information can then be shared across the organization, fostering greater transparency and, ultimately, stronger accountability to create more diverse and empowered organizations.

Here are top three ways to harness your digital transformation strategy to create a more diverse and inclusive workforce.

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1. Aggregating Your DEIB Data Digital transformation helps to inform a diverse and future-ready workforce by bringing DEIB data to life. A people analytics platform helps HR and business leaders gather information like representation, compensation, and performance to analyze your workforce. This holistic perspective enables leaders to identify gaps across their organization and turn this into actionable data.

Representation data is critical to knowing your team. With this information, leaders can make informed decisions surrounding employee experiences such as bolstering employee resources and benefits. This data also enables managers to better support their employees, fostering trust and connectedness.

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Three Ways Digital Transformation Is Driving A More Diverse, Future-Ready Workforce

Compensation differences represent a significant driver of workplace racial inequities. For example, Latina women earn 49 cents for every dollar a white man earns. People analytics platforms can quickly identify this significant inequity by pulling in payroll data viewed alongside demographic and identity data. People leaders should look at base, variable, equity, and total compensation, along with other benefits like PTO. In order to fully understand your data, you need to take a step back and examine it within context. For example, if your first

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discovery uncovers disparities in entry-level pay among one group, you’ll need to dig deeper.

Is the issue a diversity gap in hiring or promotions, or specific to one new hire group skewing your data, or something else entirely? You need to see all the pieces of data in one place to find the problem before you can tackle the solution.

Further, performance platforms allow managers to view both how an employee performs and how an organization performs in supporting its employees. Keep an eye on data to ensure performance

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ratings and promotions aren’t biased. You should analyze downward, upward, peer, and self-reviews, as well as average time to promotion and number of promotions. When biases leak into the workplace, they can severely impact both culture and performance. Among many other things, discrimination can deplete an employee’s will to engage in their work. And disengagement is costly. Gallup estimates the global economy loses $7 trillion a year to disengagement.

Once you’ve collected the data you want to focus on, it’s time to analyze it.

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Three Ways Digital Transformation Is Driving A More Diverse, Future-Ready Workforce

2. Understanding Your People and DE&I Data A digital solution, like a people analytics platform, helps companies understand and visualize their people and DEIB data. Visual data paints a true picture of the health of an organization so that HR and people leaders can easily see what’s working and where there’s room for improvement.

Remote work can make it challenging to feel connected to your teammates. Org charts and employee directories not only help leaders identify where people are located, but managers can easily see how people prefer to be managed, their time zone, employee survey results, and even their hobbies. Not only is this information valuable for managers to help cultivate relationships with their team, but it empowers other teammates to access this information and foster a greater sense of company-wide belonging.

You can also track your data over time to see if you are making

progress toward people and DEIB goals and motivate your organization to take action. Visualization reaches beyond the confines of an HR department to help leaders and employees begin the work of shifting behaviors.

3. Sharing Your DEIB Data to Drive Change When it comes to driving change and taking action, it’s important to share your DEIB data with your entire organization. The robust visualizations you’ve built to understand your data can be shared with your executive team and employees, who can support your strategy to advocate for change.

When sharing data with all employees, company leaders must take responsibility for the representation and compensation numbers.

Leaders should come prepared with the goals the company is hoping to achieve and the steps

they are willing to take. This looks like identifying how to connect DEIB to the employee experience.

Consider mapping employee journeys to visually see how employees engage with milestones along the employee experience. For example, comparing onboarding experiences is a good place to start. Additionally, developing programmatic ERGs can boost employee engagement and create a sense of belonging.

By sharing your data within your organization, leaders can promote transparency and, in turn, hold the entire organization accountable to change.

While undergoing digital transformation won’t fix every problem at an organization, it helps bring data and obstacles to the forefront. The work that comes after building transparency is significant. Leverage people data to keep an eye on your DE&I data, and remember that change is a marathon, not a sprint.

Former Hampton University and Penn State alum, Ivori Johnson (she/her) is recognized for her work in the diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging space. She identifies as a masculine presenting Black queer woman and a bonus mom. Ivori advocates for equity, fairness and representation in the tech industry. She breaks down barriers that do not support inclusive hiring, retention, inclusion, fairness and equity. Ivori, originally from New Jersey, is the Director of Diversity, Equity,Inclusion and Belonging at ChartHop and has worked for organizations such as Google, Twitter, DuPont, and Capital One.

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The Power Of People Data Four reasons to adopt people analytics

By Amy Mosher, isolved

T

here is no more precious data than people data. We must anonymize it. We must protect it.

And, well, we must use it.

Today’s predictive people analytics solutions – particularly when part of an intelligently connected human capital management (HCM) platform can do all three. Using people data is not exclusive to anonymizing it and protecting it – all three can happen at once to ensure proper use of people data.

When this happens, we can dig into the data to reveal our organization’s diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging (DEI&B) story. So often, and through no fault of their own, HR leaders do not know what they do not know.

Here are four ways to uncover that information for the betterment of DEI&B for that it never is an excuse again.

1. Candidate Trends The employee journey starts before a person’s first day on the job – so do your company’s DEI&B efforts.

Candidate experience is an often

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overlooked, yet fundamental way, to improve diversity from the way the job descriptions are written to the sources from which HR recruits.

When it comes to using people data, it is critical for organizations to understand candidate trends. While this is often self-identified information, HR leaders can analyze candidate trends, such as if there are under-represented groups applying for their open positions. If an HR leader sees that 75 percent of candidates for one position are of a certain group, for example, they can work with managers to optimize job descriptions for all groups.

Perhaps the language or requirements included is not inclusive or recruiting efforts are not reaching more diverse candidates. Knowing these gaps is half the challenge and people data can help.

2. Churn Patterns Once an employee, people need to have a sense of belonging – that the work they do matters, that people around them care

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and that they have people they can connect with. This can be difficult if you’re an “only” or a “double only” as in the only female or maybe the only female and the only person of color.

But how can HR leaders use data to measure a sense of belonging?

It is tough but churn patterns can reveal a company’s DEI&B story. If certain groups – be it those with neurodiversity, those of a certain gender or race, you name it – have higher churn rates than others, there could be a problem. What about the culture not helping people equally? Predictive people analytics can help uncover this story based on churn rates and demographics.

What is important, however, is someone with experience in understanding data and culture being the one to read and analyze it. The beauty of analytics platforms today is it does not take a data scientist to gather data and see predictions and suggestions. The challenge is how people react to what they see. Data training is critical when people data is unlocked and decisions are based on it.

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The Power Of People Data

3. Diversity Density Is a business diverse? This question is the fundamental DEI&B question to ask but many HR leaders do not really know the answer. People analytics can more accurately define diversity in a business to identify gaps where companies may not be equal or fair. While this may sound basic, sometimes it is the basic data that companies do not have access to. Some systems leverage conversational virtual assistants to help as well: Hey, how many female VPs do I have compared to males? Well, that is just an audible ask away.

4. Salary Discrepancies A hot topic, rightfully, is that of pay equality. Whether it is the commonly stated men make more per dollar than women or the less-commonly stated stats around people of color earning less, it is an issue that should be rectified. Even those with the best of intentions, however, may not realize they are offering people less because it is

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based on what they asked for, their previous salary history, or other challenges that have kept people back in the past.

Predictive people analytics can give HR leaders a more automated way of looking at salary discrepancies. Does a female VP make less than a male VP in the same role?

Are those with neurodiversity making less? Being able to surface this data with a few clicks or even ask a virtual assistant, is available now.

Predictive people analytics can also take it a step further: if I rectified gender pay gap by 5% what does that do to retention rates? These are questions systems have answers for.

While there is a lot that data can not tell us, a company’s DEI&B practices are a story that data can tell. Investing in people analytics that can do good for a company, for communities

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and for people, is something worth investing in and a story to be told.

Amy Mosher is the Chief People Officer at isolved. With more than 20 years of global human resources experience, Amy has contributed to the success of multiple public and private companies across various industries, including software, biotechnology and hardware.

For the last decade, she has served as the Head of Human Resources with Accel-KKR SaaS software portfolio companies, including HighWire Press, Inc., KANA Software, Inc. and, now, isolved – enhancing cultures and building positive employee experiences at each.

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Best-in-Class Education For All Your Learning And Training Needs HR.com prepares HR leaders to be strategic business leaders by curating and delivering best-in-class products and services so you don’t have to waste time seeking out content on your own. We leverage technology and experience to provide you with customized solutions to best meet your professional development needs at every stage of your career.

From on-demand to cohort-based offerings, below is a listing of virtual courses that will challenge and empower you by giving you the tools to drive innovation and success in your organization.

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Learn practical coaching skills and tools you can put to work in your organization right away with the first part of the Shift Corporate Coach Program™ on HR.com! This 2-part program provides business leaders with the right coaching toolset for ultimate coaching success through an independent online learning program and live virtual coaching clinics and circles.

Become a more data driven HR Professional. This course will arm you with the skills to create data-driven interventions that solve real problems and provide you with the skills you need to present your findings back to the business and make a convincing case.

Quality Management Basics This course provides a firm foundation for anyone looking to understand quality management practices and techniques.

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ABCs of HXM Introduction to Human Experience Management (HXM).

This virtual course will give you an introduction to HXM through an interactive learning experience. Learn about HXM, its components, and how to apply it to optimize the employee journey, and to create inspired more fulfilling work environments and interactions with all stakeholders that lead to better business results.

Data Analysis for Improving Organizational Performance When using data analysis to improve organizational performance, it’s vital to employ the tools that bring the data to life and keep people engaged in the process.

Organizations in both the public and private sectors often use tools and frameworks to deliver the data, and the information the data might suggest, to its staff. This intermediate-level course will explain some of these measures and tools, describe some specific measurements, and explain the relationship between assessment and strategy.

Gain access to more expert-led courses.

At HR.com, we are committed to educating and inspiring HR professionals and helping them build meaningful and impactful careers. With products and resources rooted in education, research, and leveraging cutting-edge technology, we help at every career stage - and over 1.92 million HR pros agree! (How could that many people be wrong?) By delivering best-in-class learning products, 250+ annual webcasts and 30+ world-class events, and innovative and thought-provoking research through the HR Research Institute, HR.com strives to inspire and strengthen workforces to change the world. HR.com also offers the most comprehensive HR certification exam preparation and guarantees a passing score on all SHRM and HRCI certification exams. Technology and experience drive our customized solutions that will help you become the best and most successful version of yourself.

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Remote Working Strategy: 16 Key Elements To Consider Consider the employee side first while evaluating the business benefits of the same

By Dr. Raman K. Attri, KLA Corporation

A

ll employees and leaders understood the need for remote working during the pandemic and adapted to changing scenarios. However, most of them deemed it a stop-gap arrangement for a limited period. The way businesses have ripped the benefits of remote working in terms of improved productivity, it is not an understatement to say that it is here to stay.

A well-drafted remote work strategy must include clear guidelines on expense claims, insurance coverage, benefits, incentives, allowances, and flexibilities awarded or taken away. It should also outline performance measures, compliance restrictions, and other expectations.

It comes with tons of confusion among employees and policymakers on where to draw lines. Handling issues case by case on an ad hoc basis is not sustainable. A long-term strategy is a must-have for businesses to drive accountability in the company, project transparent and fair practices and drive compliance with legal and ethical requirements.

If you are embarking on shaping up your remote work strategy, the checklist below comprising 16 questions will help you drive the right kind of discussions among your functional groups.

Human Resources

The Value of a Well-Drafted Remote Work Strategy Over the last two years, I have been engaged with stakeholders at different forums, conferences, and advisory positions within various industry segments.

We have been debating what a good remote work strategy should look like if it must sustain the current pandemic and persist beyond it. Remote work strategy cuts across various disciplines and functions in any organization. Thus, it is essential to pay attention to all critical considerations in a balanced manner.

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16 Key Elements to Consider

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1. What roles, positions, or jobs will be listed for preferred or mandatory remote working?

2. Will any role-specific restrictions prohibit or encourage flexibility among various modes like working remotely, anywhere, working, and working from home?

3. How rigid will a remote working arrangement be? How easily can one switch between remote working to onsite or vice versa?

4. What are the incentives one gets if one chooses to work remotely? Or what incentives does someone lose?

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Remote Working Strategy: 16 Key Elements To Consider

additional allowances like internet, phone, etc.?

Performance 5. Are the employees expected to consume their time otherwise used in commuting for work-related activities?

6. How are remote workers’ productivity and performance tracked, measured, and awarded compared to onsite employees?

7. What are the general expectations to avoid family interferences, distractions, noises, and other nuisances of working remotely?

Legal

Financial 8.

9.

What are the general expectations to avoid family interferences, distractions, noises, and other nuisances of working remotely?

What kinds of home-related expenses (like the internet, aircon, electricity, facilities, furniture) can, or cannot, be claimed?

10. Do remote employees lose allowances like transport and overtime, or do they get

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July 2022

11. Do remote workers get a pay cut compared to onsite workers, given they enjoy more flexibility and work-life balance? Or do they get a remote-working bonus for generating savings for the company for not using office infrastructure and facilities?

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12. How do the remote working clauses comply with the government, legal, and labor requirements of various countries where the company operates?

13. What is the new definition of what makes up workplace injury or accident for remote workers?

14. How do the insurance claims, accident coverage, and protections differ for remote workers?

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Remote Working Strategy: 16 Key Elements To Consider

IT and Security 15. How are internet security, data encryption, data safety, and usage compliance monitored on employee laptops for complete transparency between employers and employees?

16. How do you track the ownership of assets assigned to the employee to work remotely?

How will the asset depreciation be impacted or reported?

While the checklist above can gear your thinking to consider important elements for sustainable business support, a lot more needs to be done by breaking high-level remote work strategy into functional strategies in terms of IT, finance, facility, customer support, and employee benefits.

Given the rapid changes in technology to do remote work more productively and the market shift towards remote work preference among the new generation of employees, you may have to adjust this strategy more often than you change others.

However, HR leaders and executives should be extra careful that employees work for a physical entity that is identified for its space and existence. When you cut

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the sense of belonging by making a job role remote, you risk losing loyalty, connection, and motivation.

Therefore, you must assess what specific job role trends look like in the prospective employees. A remote strategy should consider the employee side first while evaluating the business benefits of the same.

Dr. Raman K. Attri is a performance scientist, author of multiple books, professional conference speaker, and global learning business leader. He has authored about 20 multi-genre books and holds two doctorates and over 100 international educational credentials.

He has been featured in more than 100 media features, articles, interviews, and shows. His recent book ‘Speed Matters’ shows how businesses can stay ahead @ the speed of business.

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