HR Business Partner – fact, fiction and adding value

So what do we mean by ‘adding value’?

Whole books have been written on how HR can add value (didn’t we love ‘em?) but essentially it comes down to two things; doing things that help the organisation achieve its goals that no else can or wants to do (i.e.be effective); or doing things better than anyone else to help the organisation achieve its goals (i.e. be efficient).

Simple really. Unfortunately we often beat ourselves up about doing this because we make a couple of classic mistakes – we don’t realise that there are two distinct ways of adding value (effective and efficient); we don’t link what we do to the organisational goals; and we don’t recognise that ‘value’ is in the eye of the beholder and therefore talk about what we do in a language that our line managers can relate to.

Our research, experience and that of many of the professionals we’ve spoken to suggests that in addition to organisation specifics, most HR functions can ‘add value’ in four distinct areas. These are a) deliver the HR fundamentals or core processes effectively and efficiently; b) create powerful synergistic partnerships with the business; c) bring about and manage change; and d) co-deliver the People strategies of the organisation and each business.

Unfortunately, HR often finds itself in a vicious cycle where it perceives that it is unable to gain the skills and knowledge to deliver ‘value’ and therefore loses further credibility and has less opportunity to demonstrate it worth.

There is good news however; there are many ways of breaking this cycle. The bad news is that it takes time, involves using a number of techniques and critically, an attitude of being prepared to feel uncomfortable in order to achieve it.

Are you up for the challenge?

Want to know more? Take this link Business Value Chain.