New research is not good news for the finance department — but the blame seems to fall mostly on HR.
The Hackett Group, a global strategic business advisory and operations improvement consulting firm, conducted a study which asked leaders in business service areas — finance, IT, procurement, and other areas — how HR was at doing when it came to talent management and getting support.
According to the study, most leaders are reporting high levels of dissatisfaction with HR’s support and, as a result, there are growing deficits in talent and skills. Organizations say they’re receiving talent management support from HR on average less than 35% of the time, and only 13% of companies said HR is providing a full range of services.
Hackett’s study looked at six key areas that comprised talent management:
- workforce planning and succession
- collaboration and knowledge sharing
- retention
- managing performance
- learning and development, and
- recruiting and staffing.
Can’t get no satisfaction…
Of the participating organizations, 79% were dissatisfied with collaboration and knowledge-sharing between HR and their own department, with 48% being “very dissatisfied.”
The lowest level of dissatisfaction came with recruiting and staffing — 65% reported being dissatisfied with HR’s efforts.
So why all this negativity? The study offers one key explanation: HR’s difficulty at “adapting to its changing mission of enabling business performance.”
The study says that HR budget and staff cuts during the recent recession have impacted talent management, training, career development, and retention programs.
The study also said that there are few HR organizations with a dedicated person who is responsible for communicating with finance, IT and others when it comes to talent management.
Time to flip the switch
Obviously, the only question remains: How does this get fixed?
The Hackett Group study offers some tips for both HR and the departments it works with on improving each of the six areas associated with talent management, including:
- having departments define and prioritize the essential skills and traits candidates should have
- having HR focus on alternative approaches to recruiting, like permission-based recruiting and finding candidates with less experience but more development potential, and
- focusing more on relationship-management during the application process with applicants and candidates.
