HR a business Partner : Need & Required elements

Whenever I think of an organization I am reminded of “Symphony”. In a symphony there are several singers singing and several musicians playing different kinds of instruments to produce desired music.  You would all agree  that the success of the symphony  lies not in individual brilliance of any single musician but  in the combined effect that their playing together leads to . It lies in the understanding of the Composer to use which instrument , which note, which musician to  “play what” and  “play when” to produce the magic of music, the success lies in the co-ordinated efforts of 100s of individual musicians playing individually but  in a co-ordinated  unison.  The difference between music and noise is because of the fine art of  coordinated actions of these individual fine musicians . If each of these musicians were to play what they wished and when they wished  to, all it would create is noise even if you had all the  star musicians  performing together .

An organization is one such Symphony , one such well oiled machine where the success of the organization depends on the efforts of various departments and  various individuals working towards a  preconceived objective . The better the Top Management ( Composer ) understands the   interplay between various elements  like  Objective, operations , Strategy , Processes , HR  , Sales , Finance , Marketing, Competencies etc and the better they are able to align all these elements , the better the organization  will perform . Some thinkers like Mckinsey created a framework called the 7 S framework  to understand and depict this interplay.

It is quite evident from the  model  that we are talking about aligning the 7s’s and fine tuning them to produce the desired results and the custodian of as many as 3 S’s ( structure , Staff  & skills) is the HR function .

I guess keeping this in view of and  the fact that Human Resource is one of the major resources required for a business to succeed apart from the Financial and other resources , Dave Ulrich popularised the Concept of HR Business partner

 

The Idea was that as we  move from ‘day to day’ focus on ‘ Processes and People’ to” future / Strategic” focus on “Processes and People’ the role of HR will also need to evolve from “Admin and Employee championing”  to “Change agent and  Strategic Partner “. What it meant is that organizations  actually need active participation of HR function as much as of any other function like  Sales & Marketing , Operations and /or Finance in setting the blue Print / direction of the Company .  It will not auger well for an organization if the HR is seen only as a service Function .

Typically , a business usually writes a business plan where it envisages the revenue and the costs based on its understanding of the Industry , the Business, the markets, its specific strategy , its target customers , it various Processes  etc . The biggest variable in the business Plan is the effort envisaged  ( read structure, staff , sales & Marketing effort etc ) and the result envisaged ( read revenue, Objective etc ) . In my own experience of more than two decades of working with several organizations , I find the inability to model the correct structure , correct people , correct effort to get the desired results,  as the single largest cause .which leads to underperformance and / or failure.

Hence the strong need for a HR  to act as a business partner . While the need has got established ,  I still find  gaping holes in many cases in the use of HR function both from a Top Management structure perspective ( read what does the Top management think of the role of HR ) and from the practitioners own Competence perspective ( what all does the practitioner need to know to be able to contribute as an Business partner ) . In most cases the Practitioners unknowingly are stuck in the mindset of an administrator or at most of an “ Employee Champion “  ( keeping in mind the needs of the employees to keep them motivated , engaged etc ) or that of a “change agent” ( read helping organization to change through trainings , organization development etc ) .

Mindset of a strategic HR business partner is to think about how the interplay of HR , the structure , the people etc.  can help in the organization achieving its “Shared Objective” . Mindset is that can I bring differentiation in the Organization and its deliverable products / services by organizing , aligning , hiring and structuring the Human Resource of the organization to improve Top line , Positioning ,  EBIDTA , PAT etc .

This is not an easy task and it is then no more just a fashionable statement to make  “HR as Business partner “. It is a huge responsibility and the success and failure of the organization, then depends as much on the decisions of HR ,as it depends on any other function, if not more .

My feeling is that the gap in expectation from HR to act is a business Partner to what it actually does,  is that our training in HR is still stuck in  the past era . Maybe the HR Professional are also themselves to blame since their assumption about their own role has to evolve further .

The critical elements for all young HR practitioners to focus on in case they wish to be seen as serious contenders for Business Partner role  are as follows ;

1.       Clear understanding of the industry that they operate in , its macro/ micro  parameters, the external environment ,  etc

2.       Clear understanding of the business  that they operate including its customers , its USP , it operational aspects, it’s marketing / Sales dynamics,  etc

3.       Clear understanding of all  financial aspects of the concerned business. Knowing various financial ratios / parameters .

4.       Clear view on how the interplay of structure , Staff, Competencies etc can have an impact on the Business, its USPs , its products/ services, its services, Quality etc .

The journey of HR as a service function to that of becoming a business Partner is thus dependent on the ability of HR professional  to understand all business dynamics and the ability to influence the outcomes of an organization by the interplay of various HR elements to create unique / profitable and sustainable businesses .