Meeting the Growth Challenge

Last week, I was talking to an HR veteran who had left a company after her company experienced a merger, and she had gone on the interviewing track. I asked her what the most common theme was that she was encountering. She said that everyone was talking growth. They have cut and continue to cut expenses. They have merged and acquired until there are few good targets left. Now they have to figure out how to grow organically, from within.

That conversation got me to thinking, "What can HR do to drive growth?" One could say, "Hire and develop talent." But that is not driving growth; it is merely supporting it. How can we shift gears from an after-the-decision responsive mode into a more proactive, assertive role? What could we do to show top management opportunities for growth? Isn't that what we would want a strategic business partner to do; be in front of rather than behind the curve?

Linear Perspective
All HR departments have access to computing, calculating and analytic power. We have automated employee hire and development processes. We have measured and benchmarked activities and results. In some cases, we have applied analytic tools to uncover and solve problems. These are all good and helpful. They reflect the structure of the HR function: acquire, support, develop and retain talent. Paradoxically, therein lies the opportunity. We could be more effective if we would move away from the siloed, linear approach and begin to look at human capital management from a holistic and three-dimensional viewpoint.

The 3-D View of HR Activities
Imagine a cube, in which HR's siloed activities (acquire, support, develop and retain talent) are cross referenced with their contributon to the functions of building and selling of products, as well as supporting administrative units of the company. In the third dimension are the basic measures of performance: productivity, quality and service. This is the holistic, three-dimensional picture of the workplace as viewed from a human capital perspective. It represents the way we look at HR's activities; one block at a time. We are more effective when we consider all lines to be intermittent and all cells in the cube to be interactive; because that is reality.

Platform for Growth
I suggest that if HR wants to make a profound difference in an organization and earn a respected seat at the executive table, it needs a new holistic platform from which to operate. In opening this column, I said that growth is the prime issue in business today. Now I submit that growth can best be accomplished and sustained over long periods amidst varying circumstances and complex pressures by operating from a three-dimensional growth platform.

The platform is enabled through a workforce intelligence approach that rides on analytic software and metrics. The software is capable of simultaneously collecting, sorting and connecting all organizational and external activities for the purpose of determining driving factors. This software exists today. In practice, the platform approach shows that for a given market condition there may be one or more causal factors with varying degrees of influence for every corporate problem or growth opportunity. Metrics put a value on the emerging factors.

If this idea intrigues you, please send your comments or questions to source@netgate.net. If I receive enough interest, early next month, I will publish them with my responses and further elaboration on the "What's New" page on my Web site, humancapitalsource.com.

Let's see if anyone cares about a new nonlinear way to look at HR's contribution to organizational growth.

Dr. Jac Fitz-enz is the father of human capital benchmarking and workforce analysis. As the founder and chairman of Saratoga Institute, Fitz-enz led the development of the world's most comprehensive human capital benchmark database.