Roffey Park is starting a new research project specifically focusing on the role of the HR Business Partner
Roffey Park has been monitoring perceptions about the role and responsibility of HR for the last seven years through its annual Management Agenda survey. Throughout that time HR as a function has undergone an enormous amount of change. HR within many larger organisations has restructured in line with Dave Ulrich’s three-legged HR model of Shared Service Centres, Centres Of Expertise and HR Business Partners.
Roffey Park is starting a new research project specifically focusing on the role of the HR Business Partner. Increasingly, HR Professionals are being asked to adopt this role, which requires significantly changed working practices and a need to develop new skill-sets. Through interviews with Senior HR Business Partners and organisational case studies, the research will investigate:
- Why do organisations implement the HR Business Partner model?
- What are the learnings from implementation?
- What are the pitfalls that need to be avoided?
- What are the actual benefits of the HR Business Partner role?
Some general lessons about HR Business Partner skills and implementation can be drawn from existing literature.
Tailored to each organisation
Variation in the way the Ulrich Model is applied both within and across organisations is a good thing. As the CIPD concludes in it’s report on the first stage of a research study into the changing HR function, the idea that there is something called best practice, which if implemented will always result in superior performance, is flawed.
Business understanding
Some organisations are bridging the skills gap by appointing
HR professionals with experience of other business functions such as finance, sales or marketing. Others are providing mentoring and coaching to build HR professionals’ knowledge and skills. However this needs to be ongoing otherwise the business will change and HR will be left behind.
Personal credibility
HR Business Partners will only be respected by the business if they are personally credible and effective. They need to clearly understand the strategic issues affecting the business and be constructive in helping line managers to solve business issues. The MoD’s John Kirby, HR Director for Professional Development (cited in Arkin:2007) believes the most powerful business partners don’t wait for their customers to tell them what they want, but have the confidence to go out and look for ways to make a difference.
The HR Function
The effectiveness of a transformed HR function does not depend only on the skills and competencies of individual HR Business Partners. The whole function must be operating effectively. Unless the Shared Services part of the structure works properly, business partners can end up spending a lot of
their time on routine transactional work (Arkin: 2007).
Operating as a business partner requires a mind shift in approach and a new set of skills, built around a consultative approach with the ability to influence at a senior level and to think strategically. The expertise that Roffey Park has built about the HR business partner role has led to the development of a programme HR Business Partnering aimed at those in or about to begin a business partnership role where the demands of the role are changing from operational and maintenance of service provision to influencing the direction of the business and working in close partnership with key decision makers. Participants will come away with a framework and tools for effective business partnering which will give them the confidence to really make a difference.
References
The CIPD (2006) The Changing HR Function: The key questions www.cipd.co.uk
Anat Arkin (2007) Street Smart. People Management 5 April 2007
McCartney, Claire (2006) HR: what do managers really think? Roffey Park, Developing People Newsletter, Summer 2006
If you are interested in this research please contact Claire McCartney.