The expectations of the future HR function

The effect of the Covid-19 pandemic has had a long-lasting impact on our day-to-day lives, including a shift in workplace expectations and culture. Despite the stress and challenges faced over the past couple of years, the job market is seeing a renewed energy, we are more flexible, we work more autonomously, and we are seeing a change in focus to wellbeing, new skills development, and digital transformation. It is therefore critical that people remain at the centre of the design as we look to new ways of working and develop strategic initiatives and solutions in a new post-pandemic landscape.

In particular, Universities need to start thinking about:

1. Future ways of working – embedding cultural changes, addressing the operational challenges of a hybrid workforce by ensuring staff understand what this looks and feels like.
2. Embracing technology – understanding how to exploit digital revolution, embracing new technologies and addressing the skills shortages this may create.
3. Improved focus on wellbeing, diversity, and inclusivity – we need workplaces which are safe, supportive, and inclusive. There needs to be less focus actions and initiatives and more on transformational, culture change as a key driver to long-term success.
4. Identifying and developing internal talent – the ‘Great Recession’ is giving an indication that we need to think more strategically to our workforce and talent. Workforce planning therefore needs to become an integrated feature of an institutional planning cycle.
5. Improving the employee experience – considering initiatives, interventions, and investments to respond to changing employee demands and needs.

Within the SUMS Group, we see how almost every single initiative we are involved in with our members involves people. From digital transformation, efficiencies and effectiveness, systems and process changes, the golden thread continues to be how Universities consider aspects such as culture, ways of working, wellbeing, inclusivity, and talent. And HR functions are key to this change; we have become experts at empathy, flexibility, empowerment, and health. We have learned how to find agile, responsive solutions, consider talent and leadership, and ensure people are the focus. As we look ahead, this effort must continue. We need to be continuously innovative in all people initiatives such as employee experience, recruitment, workforce, and reward.  We are embracing this challenge at SUMS. We have already advised members about what to consider from an employment law perspective in 2022, we have developed a toolkit on strategic workforce planning and we have engaged leaders to celebrate female empowerment as part of International Women’s Day 2022. Our Annual Review, due to be published shortly, highlights the transformational people-specific elements of our work across a range of focus areas.

All of this requires our own HR profession to transform and evolve. Considering HR Target Operating Model design, being clear about the strategy, operating structure and have a designed model to serve it will enable consideration of the technologies, governance, reporting, and management information needed to be effective and efficient.

We want to continue to work with our members to shape this further. We are passionate about sector leading innovation and proactive intervention. Our involvement with the UHR conference talks to this; we want to share sector best practice on co-creating staff and student wellbeing initiatives and we want to explore the future landscape for enabling impact and transformational change through inclusivity. The outputs of these discussions will be shared with our members as part of our mission to be objective insiders.

If you are interested in a further discussion with us about how we can support you with some of these key people initiatives, please do not hesitate to get in touch – e.l.ogden@reading.ac.uk