7.1 HR management skills
Working in human resources requires that you have a certain number of skills that will be used to help you achieve your work on a daily basis. As with any other important position within a company, you need to know the management skills you are going to need and you are going to have to work on these skills, ensuring that you succeed in making a difference to the company and enhancing the employees working experience.
Organisation
When working in HR, you are required to go about the entire process in an orderly fashion. From organising personnel files to excellent time management skills and from being efficient on a personal level to outstanding attendance, all of these are essential to how effective the human resources department is at any time. Remember you are dealing with real people and their careers, which is why you need to act fast, be organised, and ensure the entire department runs smoothly and effortlessly.
Multitasking
Being able to multi-task isn't something many people can do and yet you need to have this skill if you want to succeed in human resources. If you don't have excellent multitasking skills, then you will want to be flexible in your work, enabling you to easily change gears and focus on a different urgent task and then switch back to what you were doing without it affecting your own productivity. Business needs are constantly changing and you need to ensure you have what it takes to handlethese changes with efficiency and confidence.
Dealing with the unexpected
Working in HR, you are going to be expected to work in “grey' areas from time to time. Not everything is what it seems, not everything is black and white. This means that you are going to have to be able to work with incomplete information, working closely with employees and experts to identify exactly what you are working with, whether it is harassment, discrimination, unapproved leave, or more.
Negotiation
You need to be able to negotiate effectively. While human resources is not a sales position, you will often be faced with two opposing views and it is your responsibility to act as mediator and find that middle ground that both parties agree to.
Communication
It is essential in any human resource role that you have the ability to communicate with everyone on all levels. You will need to communicate with everyone from potential employees to cleaning staff to managers, owners, supervisors, and more. You will need to have the confidence to speak to people one on one and in large groups, and you will also need to communicate in writing from time to time while remaining caring, convincing, and believable. These are not easy shoes to fill.
Ethical and discreet
All HR professionals are expected to be confidential in their dealings, remaining ethical and discreet at all times. You are responsible for ensuring employees follow the regulations of the company. You need to help the company work in one direction and you need to have the ability to manage confidential information to the highest standard, never sharing what you learn with others.
Focus on two parties
One of the hardest things you may have to do as a HR professional is share your focus. You are responsible for ensuring the company works towards its goals, that policies and procedures are met, and that the company is seen in the best possible light. At the same time, you are responsible for looking after employees, protecting them, ensuring that they are comfortable in their positions and are working to be as productive as possible. What this means is that from time to time, you are going to have to make some hard decisions to ensure that fairness and confidentiality are met at all times.
Problem solving
Working with a volume of employees, it is understandable that not everyone is going to get on with everyone else. What this means is that in order to ensure high levels of productivity, you need to get everyone working together as a team. Having effective problem solving and conflict management skills will make a big difference to your success within the HR department.
7.2 Personal traits
Not everyone is cut out to be an effective member of a human resources department. Whether you have taken this course to help you with employment within your own company or you love working with people and feel you could contribute to an in-house HR team.
There are certain traits you are going to need in order to succeed:
-Be a decisive thinker with the ability to analyse information within the shortest period of time while making effective decisions.
-Be effective as an influencer and gain the commitment of various departments with the same end goal in mind, for the company to succeed moving forward.
-Be credible and be able to be professional in your approach when it comes to human resource and commercial issues on a daily basis.
-You need to be able to work with different people at all times, including people working within the company and those who work outside the company.
-You should have a passion for delivering results. You need to show your purpose, resourcefulness, and determination when it comes to achieving top results.
-Be willing to take the step and challenge those you feel are wrong. You need to have courage to speak up when you are faced with resistance when you know you are right or the circumstances are unfamiliar to you.
-You need to lead by example.
-You must have an open mind and be inquisitive in your daily duties. You should be constantly looking for new ways to support, motivate, and develop employees, helping them push the company forward.
7.3 Areas to work on
On a daily basis, you will need to work in various areas:
You will need to focus on managing the human resources information in a professional manner, ensuring the highest level of service delivery and information at all times. You need to pay close attention to organisational design on a daily basis to help the company achieve success. Talent planning is essential to ensure the company attracts the right people for the job. A successful company with a good HR department will be a company where people want to work
and will attract the best employees to meet the company's needs.
Working within the HR department, you will need to constantly focus on learning and development. It is the human resources department's responsibility to ensure that all employees have the knowledge and skills needed to be contributing members of the team that they can use to learn and grow, helping with the productivity within the company at all times.
Rewarding for good performance. Putting a reward programme in place will ensure that employees feel appreciated and are rewarded for outstanding performance and hard work. Engaging with employees is an area you will find yourself working in daily. It is your responsibility to ensure that employees have the support they need while maintaining a positive connection with their colleagues and focusing extensively on relationships between managers and staff. You will find yourself working on ensuring that the company and staff relationships are managed appropriately at all times with clear instructions and clear lines of communication.
7.4 Key skills
Recruitment and placement
In order to recruit, select, and place employees within the company, there are numerous skills you will need which include, but are not limited to:
-Self-confidence.
-Good judge of character.
-Ability to cold call.
-Ability to sell the company.
-Outstanding verbal and presentation skills.
-Ability to build up a network within the company and with other companies.
Development and training
In order to carry out the development and training portion of human resources, you are going to need the following skills:
-Excellent writing skills.
-Outstanding verbal skills.
-A good sense of humour.
-Understand training options.
-Know the future needs of the company.
-Superior interpersonal skills.
Compensation
Focusing on ensuring that all employees receive a fair wage and are paid on time is one thing, but
ensuring that the right benefits are deducted or added is a whole new ball game.
In order to manage the compensation side of HR effectively, you will need the following skills:
-Analytical skills.
-The ability to understand statistics.
-Communication skills.
-Know how the company works.
-Have an idea of the laws regulating employment.
-Know the wage averages for each position, along with industry minimums and standards.
Employee relations
Working closely with employees takes a certain amount of skill.
In order to fulfil this role effectively, you will need:
-A sense of fairness.
-Ability to communicate with people on all levels.
-Outstanding communication skills.
-Integrity.
-Superior negotiation skills.
Health and Safety
You may not know this but the human resources department is responsible for ensuring that health and safety is adhered to within the work place.
This means that in addition to the above skills, you will also need the following:
-Honesty.
-Communication skills.
-Attention to detail.
-Understanding of the laws and regulations regarding health and safety in the work place.
-Know what companies you should be dealing with to ensure all your health, safety, and fire regulations are met at all times.
Key skills requirements
The skills you need are determined in order of importance from high to low. Knowing what skills you need can help you work on these to ensure that you provide the company and employees with your highest level of attention:
-People skills - high
-Communication skills - high
-Technical skills - high
-Writing skills - high
-Leadership skills - medium
-Analytical skills - medium
-Creative skills medium
-Initiative - medium
-Sales skills - low
In the office
Human resources work is basically office work, so you need to be prepared to be office bound for days on end. While this may be an office based position, you will be in contact with different people from different backgrounds and you will need to communicate with them on different levels. You will be responsible for paperwork, collecting data, analysing information, and presenting your findings.
Across the board
The HR professional needs to have the unique ability to assist across the board within a company, from assisting managers get the most of employees to goal planning for the entire company. This position will require you to wear many hats throughout your day, from presenting policies and procedures to employees to gathering information to help you achieve your own work related goals. You will need to be able to communicate with all employees to help managers find the best applicants that will assist in pushing the business forward.
Confidentiality is key
The human resources department will be required to deal with sensitive information at all times from performance and productivity of employees to compensation to appraisals, problems, and so much more. It is essential that you ensure integrity at all times and remain discreet on a daily basis, protecting employee confidentiality throughout each and every day.
Dealing with changing issues
Regulations regarding changes within the company are something that you will find yourself struggling with on a daily basis. You will have to deal with minimum wage changes and how this will impact the company, for example. You will also be responsible for knowing the employment laws and dealing with changes as and when they happen.
Build relationships
It is essential that you have the ability to establish relationships throughout the company. While you can establish relationships, you must also have the ability to maintain them at all costs. Managers should be able to rely on you for support and assistance in the recruitment and retention of their teams. They need to know that they can trust you, and the only way to achieve this trust is to provide a relationship that has been worked on to prove you are a credible member of the team.
7.5 Skills in order of importance
Employee relationships
Employee relationships should be strengthened and worked on daily to help the company grow now and moving forward. You should have the unique ability to identify and resolve concerns that may develop. You, as a member of the HR team, will be required to provide a satisfactory working environment for the employee and the employer.
Recruitment
Recruitment is a major focus within the HR department. Finding new talent means you need to be able to gather information, communicate effectively, negotiate in terms of employment contracts, and have the ability to handle the entire recruitment process with ease and confidence.
Human resource management
Human resource management requires you have different skills to help you complete your tasks to the highest standards. These skills include leadership, critical thinking, general management, communications, and more. Your employer needs to see that you have the experience needed to put together a management solution that will help the company grow in terms of employees and productivity.
Scheduling
You need to have outstanding scheduling skills, as a position within human resources requires the ability to juggle various tasks from managing the calendar to the team and more. You will need to create an effective plan which enables everyone within the company to achieve their goals moving forward.
Admin support
If you work for a large company, then your position within the HR department may be fixed, but when it comes to working within smaller concerns, you may find yourself managing a host of duties within the department, which include the need to provide administrative assistance and support from time to time. You may also be required to assess employment activities, record data, make essential arrangements for certain employees, and update shift priorities based on someone phoning in sick.
Business administration
As a professional in the human resources department or industry, you will need some basic business administration knowledge and skills which can include everything from the operations and principles of the business to the fundamentals of the company. It is important you have a full understanding of how human resources will impact the company as a whole. Increasing productivity is just one way that HR is an essential element to any company.
Labour relations
The skill you need when it comes to labour relations is to ensure that you focus extensively on the team's success while ensuring that transparency is met across the board at all times. Communication skills are a valuable skill at this point, exchanging and interacting between two parties to achieve one positive end result.
Organisational development
It is the HR department's duty to source, attract, hire, train, and develop the best of the best when it comes to fulfilling a position. This duty doesn't end here; it also includes the retention of that employee, ensuring that any efforts pay off in the long run. You will need to be able to communicate, negotiate, and influence to ensure the best performance is achieved daily and to make all employees valuable assets within the company moving forward.
Basic accounting knowledge
In order to have a successful career in human resources, you do not need to complete an accounting degree, but some idea of the basic accounting principles will definitely go a long way and help you succeed in your chosen career.
Your skills should include everything from knowing how to budget to creating an effective employment proposal to managing performance to helping the company on a daily basis in terms of staying within budget, wage increases, benefit arrangements, and more.
Understanding spreadsheets
In order to succeed in your position, you will need to have basic computer knowledge, along with the ability to use spreadsheets. Spreadsheets enable you to enter data and work with basic formulas which are critical in keeping up to date information on employees, such as their contact details, any employment applications, and performance reviews. This will speed up your organisation when it comes to gathering information on one particular employee to identify if they are due an increase or to see how their performance is improving.
7.6 Key interview skills
If you are looking to boost your HR career then in addition to the above, you will also need to know how to interview effectively. You need to have the knowledge and experience in using your skills to attract employees, combined with the confidence to hold an interview, which gives both parties a chance to learn as much as they can about each other.
Public speaking
In order to conduct an effective interview, you need to be able to speak in front of a crowd. This is one of the skills that you may be hesitant about, but you need to come across as confident and be able to speak with authority. You will need to put a great presentation together which attracts the right applicant and keeps their interest to a point where they want the job more than anything and they want to be part of a great team.
Reading others
If you have the skill to read others, then you have one skill that can really help you in your chosen career. Having the ability to sense when someone is lying can go a long way during an interview. Body language, speech, and more can be used to identify when someone is steering away from the truth. Learn about postures, expressions, and wording to help you identify if someone is speaking honestly at their interview or if they are avoiding the truth at all costs.
Be strong
Another key trait when it comes to interviewing is to have a backbone and eliminate any risk of being intimidated. You will develop your backbone as you gain knowledge of your position and duties. The more knowledge you have, the more confident you will be, which eliminates any risk of you backing down when you know you are right. Your knowledge will become your strength and that will ensure you are and remain strong moving forward.
Be empathetic
One of the soft skills you are going to need when it comes to the interview process is empathy. You need to be able to understand all points of view and understand how this affects the situation. This will also ensure you make the right decision for the company.
Ability to listen
An interview is all about listening. You need to gain as much information as possible and then use that information to make the best decision for the company. Listening isn't something that comes naturally and is something that does require work. Focus on what the applicant has to say, make sure you understand what they want to say, and that they are heard. You will need to have the ability to remain focused to achieve effective listening skills.
Module summary
This module has provided you with the management skills you need to achieve a position within the human resources industry. You have learned what personal traits you are going to need and what areas you should work on daily. You also learned to identify key skill areas, what skills you need in order of importance, and what skills you are going to need to interview effectively.
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