Future of HR: Be lean, seen and green

Some common green human resource initiatives in the west include, using Web or teleconferencing to reduce travel, promoting the reduction of paper use and implementing wellness programs to foster employees’ proper nutrition, fitness and healthy living.

Human Resource has always been an evolving function. It not only focuses on the most precious resource in any organisation but also engages in actions to ensure the presence of competencies for competitive advantage.

As much as it had in the past, and in the present, the function of HR will have many challenges in the future. Today’s column discusses three global trends with respect to future HR. I call them the challenge to be lean, seen and green.

Be lean

There is a wave of becoming faster, cheaper, better in an increasingly competitive global scene. HR cannot avoid its influence. Stemming from the Japanese concept of creating value by eliminating waste, lean management has spread its wings to cover manufacturing and service sectors.

Gone are the days that HR was ‘humanly rich’ as a department with all sorts of people, mostly dumped by the seniors. Efficiency with regard to optimising cadre, in clearly identifying the needs and the specific roles associated is of utmost importance.

Lean management is in fact a philosophy derived mostly from the Toyota Production System (TPS). Some management authors have already coined the term Toyotism to describe this pioneering approach. TPS is renowned for its focus on reduction of the original Toyota seven wastes to improve overall customer value, but there are varying perspectives on how this is best achieved.

Toyota grew steadily from a small company to the world’s largest automaker. As Toyoda Sakichi (1876-1930) firmly advocated, “quality must be built in during the manufacturing process”.

One important thing to remember is that HR has to work hand in hand with other functional departments in being lean. There is no room for silo mentality.

Be seen

We are increasingly moving towards a virtual world of work. There are a variety of flexible work technologically connected but geographically separated.

A global virtual team might have members based in New York, New Delhi and New South Wales. Telecommuting is an arrangement where a person can work from home by connecting through technology without physically coming to work. What could be the possible HR challenges? Based on my research with two US-based colleagues, it was evident that one major challenge in a virtual team arrangement is trust.

If they have worked with someone physically in the same office at least for some time, they found it easier to work as a virtual team.

The challenge was to interact with relatively unfamiliar members of the team in a distant location.

It is an interesting HR scenario in this context. Each member of the virtual team based in different locations has to be governed by their local labour laws and other local HR practices.

At the same time, there is a global HR strategy. Hence, it is a case of think globally and act locally with regard to HR practices pertaining to virtual team arrangements.

Be green

We are living in a world where nature has begun to strike back. Chaotic weather patterns across the globe are a grim reminder that eco-friendly practices of work need a lot more attention.

What matters is not only profits and people, but the planet as well.Obviously, it impacts HR.

Some common green human resource initiatives in the west include, using Web or teleconferencing to reduce travel, promoting the reduction of paper use and implementing wellness programs to foster employees’ proper nutrition, fitness and healthy living.

The important point here is the need to integrate green initiatives with lean and seen initiatives. In other words, they are not three isolated sets of actions but one holistic path.

Take paper reduction for example. Instead of having piles of personnel files in a storeroom, a well-designed HR information system (HRIS) will do the needful in a much more effective manner. It is a case of being lean and green at the same time.

By being green, HR has to foster SHE, meaning safety, health and environment.

A healthy workforce which performs their duties with safety in mind, without polluting the environment is the growing need of our workplaces.

The world of HR is full of jargon. My attempt is not to complicate it by adding more terms. As Shakespeare vividly wrote in Romeo and Juliet,“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name would smell as sweet.” Whether we call it triple challenges of HR or the GCL phenomena of HR or by any other name, the reality is the need to act promptly.

That is where HR professionals have to act as ‘thinking performers’, in taking the profession forward. The call is simply crucial. Be lean, seen and green.

The writer is the Director of the Postgraduate Institute of Management. He also serves as an Adjunct Professor in the Division of Management and Entrepreneurship, Price College of Business,University of Oklahoma, USA.