Creating People Advantage_How to address HR challenges worldwide through 2015

"Creating People Advantage_How to address HR challenges worldwide through 2015"
A comprehensive global study conducted jointly by The Boston Consulting Group (BCG), World Federation of Personnel Management Associations (WFPMA), and Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) surveyed 4,741 executives in 83 countries and markets.

Downloadable at http://www.bcg.com/impact_expertise/publications/publication_list.jsp?pubID=2638

Summary
(retrieved from EFMD http://www.efmd.org/component/efmd/?cmsid=080519sqlv&pub=080519pnhr)

Executives worldwide see talent gaps as top people challenge in every region and industry
Managing talent is the most critical HR challenge worldwide and will remain at or near the top of executive agendas in every region and industry for the foreseeable future. The ability to gain competitive advantage through people strategies - or people advantage - requires an overall HR approach. This report suggests that it is vital:

To understand the connections that link HR to metrics and strategy. A most effective way is to create a strategic workforce plan. For doing so, there are two steps

• Understand how strategy drives the demand for people (to provide long term guidance)
• Understand the four bridges that connect strategy and HR, namely: sourcing (recruiting, HR branding,), performance (metrics, incentives,), development and affiliation (compensation, motivation)

To deploy operational excellence to bring the HR function up to speed by focusing on three key areas:

• Strengthen capabilities : establish the HR function as a step on the career paths of high potentials , build the people management skills of line managers
• Establish accountability and efficiency by optimizing the HR delivery model by automating processes, sharing services and distinguishing between the various HR roles
• To increase cooperation by designing key HR processes (people reviews, mobility management) and by serving as experts on organizational issues

The future

This "Creating People Advantage" report furthermore analyses and ranks 17 HR challenges. The top 8 future challenges in HR fall into three strategic categories:

1. Developing and retaining the best employees
2. Anticipating change
3. Enabling the organisation

Developing and retaining the best employees

• Managing talent : attracting, developing and retaining all individuals with high potential and communicating the HR value proposition
• Improving leadership development : defining leadership models, assessing leaders and designing development programmes
• Managing work-life balance : dealing with new and non-traditional expectation about work

Anticipating change

• Managing demographics : namely the loss of capacity, knowledge and productivity with an ageing workforce
• Managing change an cultural transformation : by developing an integrated approach to operational and organisational change, focused on employee behaviour
• Managing globalisation by having the right people in the right location and by enabling effective and efficient cross-country and cross-cultural collaboration

Enabling the organisation to become a learning organisation and transform HR into a strategic partner

HR executives must also excel at the fundamentals of the HR function: restructuring the organisation, delivering on recruitment and staffing and mastering the HR processesThe remaining six HR topics are:

• Managing diversity
• Enhancing employee commitment
• Improving performance management and rewards
• Managing CSR
• Measuring HR and employee performance
• Providing shared services and outsourcing HR

The Boston Consulting Group, visit http://www.bcg.com
World Federation of Personnel Management Associations visit http://www.wfpma.com

Creating People Advantage: How to Address HR Challenges Worldwide Through 2015

BCG (Boston Consulting Group) Report

[PDF] Creating People Advantage: How to Address HR Challenges Worldwide Through 2015
by Jean-Michel Caye, Andrew Dyer, Michael Leicht, Anna Minto, Rainer Strack
April 14, 2008

People challenges are greater than ever before at companies, thanks to globalization, an aging workforce, and employee desires for work-life balance. This report, which is based on a worldwide survey of more than 4,700 executives, lays out a comprehensive approach to enable companies to understand the HR environment and how they can create a people advantage. When companies that understand how to measure the effectiveness of their people and harness their talents, they will achieve a lasting edge. This PDF is an executive summary.

It is pretty short and well summarized, available on line at BCG website

Article from SHRM summarizing this report as well:

Global HR Professionals Learn They Are More Alike than Different

By Adrienne Fox

LONDON—Despite diverse languages, cultures and geographies, human resource professionals around the world face similar challenges. That’s the finding of a new survey conducted by The Boston Consulting Group (BCG), a global management consulting firm based in Boston, and the World Federation of Personnel Management Associations (WFPMA). The results were previewed at the associations’12th Annual World Congress here on April 14, 2008. The full report, Creating People Advantage: How to Address HR Challenges Worldwide through 2015, was to be released May 5.

Managing talent, improving leadership development and managing work/life balance are the top HR challenges in every region and industry, according to the survey of more than 4,700 HR and non-HR executives in 83 countries. The study was enhanced by in-depth interviews with 200 executives.

The survey asked respondents to rank 17 HR issues in order of their most critical future challenges and asked how they plan to address them through 2015. In North America, respondents reported that managing talent, managing demographics, improving leadership development, managing work/life balance and transforming HR into a strategic partner are most critical. Susan R. Meisinger, SPHR, president and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management and a WFPMA board member, said the transformation of HR could be helped by establishing two distinct career paths in the way finance and accounting have become separate, and sales and marketing have two different tracks. “Both functions are critical to HR,” she said, discussing the survey findings at the WFPMA Heads of Nations meeting here on April 13. “But one would handle compliance and administration while the other would be strategic.”

Common Challenges

The top future HR challenges in Latin America are managing talent and work/life balance. “We have a permanent mixture of business and personal lives,” said Horacio Quiros of Buenos Aires, president of the Interamerican Federation of People Management Associations. “We are facing a new confusion because there is no separation. It has to fall to the individual to balance work and life.”

Ernesto Espinosa of Manila, who becomes president of the WFPMA at the conclusion of the World Congress, said HR is stumped on how to address work/life balance because the phrase is a “misnomer. It should be called work/life harmony.”

Executives in China and India added becoming a learning organization to their list of top challenges. Respondents in other parts of Asia put managing globalization among their top three concerns. Pacific Region executives added managing change and cultural transformation to their top future HR challenges.

In Europe, demographics and managing talent were identified as the key challenges. Rudolf Thurner of Vienna, president of the European Association of Personnel Management, said HR needs to change its view of who is talented. “We reject the notion that only 5 percent of the working population is talented and the rest is disposable,” he said.

WFPMA board member Tiisetso Tsukudu of Cape Town, South Africa, agreed. “Talent is only seen at the top, and we in HR need to change this because we need long-term talent from lower levels. Talent is not the same as genius. Everyone is capable of being talented.” In Africa, the survey found, the most pressing concerns in addition to talent, work/life balance and leadership development are managing globalization and diversity.

Solutions

In response to the talent management challenge, 70 percent of North American respondents said they would need to develop tailored career paths for employees, even though only 41 percent are currently using that solution; 61 percent believed they would need to develop specific compensation schemes for top talent, a strategy only 38 percent are using today; and 48 percent said in the future they would source talent globally, with only 22 percent saying they cast the net globally now. In all other regions of the world, these three strategies were identified as the most effective solutions to managing talent in the future.

To better anticipate change in demographics, globalization and corporate change and cultures, the report advises HR to restructure its organization to be more nimble: “While restructuring is commonly viewed as a cost-reduction exercise, the topic also applies to growth scenarios.”

HR functions should assess and improve all HR processes systematically to enable the organization, the report states, starting by separating administrative services from strategic tasks in HR to increase efficiency and effectiveness.

Next Steps

The Creating People Advantage summary concludes with advice on how to use the findings in your organization. The first step is to understand the external environment by analyzing general industry and economic trends, business challenges and the corporate strategy. Then understand the internal environment by conducting an HR audit. “Ask your business executives how HR rates on the 17 HR topics and then select the top three most critical ones for your business,” Rainer Strack, partner and managing director at BCG in Düsseldorf, Germany, told the World Congress attendees. Once you identify the three challenges, initiate projects with dedicated teams to address them.

The study found that executives rated the performance of their company’s HR function 18 percent higher when dedicated teams of employees inside and outside of HR oversaw critical issues. Finally, secure top management support, which may be easier if teams are cross-functional.

“Maintain rigorous quality control on all 17 HR topics,” said Strack. “But reduce emphasis on existing HR topics that are not as critical to your company success” and steer resources accordingly.

Adrienne Fox, a freelance writer and editor in Alexandria, Va., is former managing editor of HR Magazine.

The 2007-2008 Workplace Trends Lists

The 2007-2008 Workplace Trends Lists
_The Top Trends According to SHRM's Special Expertise Panels

It's a summary of the Society for Human Resource Management Special Expertise Panel 2007 Trend Reports. Come to learn what issues that HR subject matter experts believe will have biggest impact in workplace.

Key theme emerged:

• The importance of globalization and integrating markets
• Demographic change and its impact on diversity and labor availability
• The Implications of increased health care costs
• Immigration and global labor mobility
• Skills shortages and a greater emphasis on talent management
• The growing importance of demonstrated ethics and corporate social responsibility
• The influence of new technologies, especially social networking and HR technologies
• A greater reliance on metrics

You can see most of trends are related to the "globalization", including the implication of health care costs, skills shortages, and new technologies which to greater extent also contribute to the increasing importance of globalization.

Let's take one step further to look into the trends of Global HR in the order of importance:

1. Managing talent globally and having the “right” talent to achieve business strategy, particularly in high-growth countries.
2. Multiculturalism of global workforce.
3. Global teams that can manage distances effectively and balance a U.S.-centric view versus a global view.
4. Global leadership and the recognition of a need to cultivate specific global leadership competencies.
5. Demographics: Generational differences in work styles/preferences as well as workplace shifts as baby boomers retire.
6. HR communication and expertise across borders to leverage globally dispersed pockets of knowledge.
7. Demand for HR skill sets (strategic/international versus transactional).
8. Immigration reform and the staffing shortage (construction, engineering, output from universities).
9. Domestic is global and global is domestic.
10. Movement of people in Western multinational corporations (MNCs) to other economies and growth of emerging-market-based MNCs.

So, how would you or your company position yourself in the trends?

More quarterly and special report about "Workplace Trend and Forecasting" are available at SHRM website (http://www.shrm.org/trends/)

PERSONNEL TODAY

PERSONNEL TODAY
http://www.personneltoday.com/home/default.aspx

Cool stuff!
It contains lots of HR resources: HR news, feature articles/analysis, topic-based search engine, employment law, Hr career, forum/blog discussion, Hr statistics and benchmark, and publication/book reviews, etc.
(Worth your time! It really took me a while even just browsing it. :P)

More resources links are available in the sections of "Supplier", "Resources", and "Our Services". I think this website, along with their services, is UK-based.

Weekly podcast download at http://personneltoday.podomatic.com/

Engagement Factors Vary by Country, Business, Function

Engaging employees to drive global business success: insight from Mercer’s What’s Working research

Find the analysis of Mercer’s What’s Working studies (free download report) at http://www.mercer.com/summary.jhtml/dynamic/idContent/1142165

Additional reports are also available for each researched countries.

The report shows how much employees’ perceptions of their work environments and the drivers of engagement differ around the world. “Differences by countries” in the last couples of pages snapshot the important findings, revealing how employees perceive their work experiences differently. Pretty interesting.

Below is the news at SHRM summarizing this report, highlighting the key findings

----

Engagement Factors Vary by Country, Business, Function

By Kathy Gurchiek

(retrieved from SHRM newsletter at http://www.shrm.org/hrnews_published/articles/CMS_024345.asp)

The factors that drive employees to be engaged in their work and motivate them to go beyond stated expectations vary not only from country to country but also by industry sector and within companies, according to recent research conducted among 22 countries.

It’s important for organizations expanding globally to understand what engages its workforce, according to Mercer, which has conducted the national “What’s Working” studies over the past several years.

Even among organizations with global locations that share workplace characteristics, such as English as a first language, differences in national culture, market conditions and the state of economic development influence employee engagement, according to Mercer.

Workers in the United States and the United Kingdom, for example, share only one engagement driver—a sense of personal accomplishment—rated first and second in importance, respectively.

However, the top drivers in the United Kingdom “paralleled six of the top drivers in Asia’s top market, China,” the report noted.

“Even if business leaders of multinational companies know how to engage staff in their home country offices, they might not succeed in delivering the most value for their HR investments if they simply transfer HR policies and practices to other countries,” the report says.

In looking to engage employees, Mercer reports, employers must:

• View global HR decisions in the context of national culture.

• Use valid research—not stereotypes—to align HR practices for a local population with actual employee attitudes and perceptions.

• Remember that the norm for engagement varies widely from country to country, making it critical to have data on national norms to interpret employee surveys correctly.

• Realize the elements that create engagement also create the employment brand.

• Understand that how the organization conducts its work reflects its organizational culture. How employees are treated reflects how they treat customers or clients.

Employers want workers who are “truly engaged in their work and the success of the organization,” said Patrick Gilbert, a principal and employee research expert at Mercer, in a January 2008 press release.

An engaged employee has a vested interest in the employer’s success and whose performance level exceeds his or her job requirements. These are employees, says Gilbert, who help their organization establish a competitive advantage and drive business performance.

However, “the drivers of engagement vary from country to country and from company to company. Even within companies, the drivers will vary across different businesses and functional areas,” he said.

“That’s why it’s important for employers to identify and manage the unique drivers of engagement within their own organizations. This way they can achieve maximum return on investment for their HR spending,” Patrick added.

There are four drivers of engagement that are consistent among employees around the world—the work itself, including opportunities for development; confidence and trust in leadership; recognition and rewards; and organizational communication that is delivered timely and in an orderly way.

The top factors by country, according to the findings:

• Australia: Quality of workplace relationships, including coaching.

• Brazil: Sense of personal accomplishment, confidence in senior management, training opportunities, fair pay based on performance, good reputation for customer service, comparable benefits to industry.

• Canada: Being treated respectfully, good work/life balance, feeling they can provide good service to the clients or customers.

• China: Sense of personal accomplishment, fair pay based on performance, good reputation for customer service, comparable benefits to industry, confidence in senior management, IT systems support business needs, training opportunities, regular performance feedback.

• France: Work/life balance, providing good customer service, being treated respectfully.

• India: Type of work, promotion opportunities.

• Japan: Base and incentive pay.

• Sweden: Respectful treatment, type of work they are involved with, sense of personal accomplishment.

• United Kingdom: Sense of personal accomplishment, confidence in senior management, training opportunities, fair pay based on performance, good reputation for customer service, comparable benefits to industry.

• United States: Confidence that career objectives can be met, sense of personal accomplishment, confident in organization’s success, quality is a high priority, opportunity for growth and development, information and assistance to manage career; flexibility to provide good customer service.

Companies typically can get a sense of what engages their employees by conducting employee surveys; ideally any issues that are identified are followed by some kind of action, Mercer notes.

Be wary of misinterpreting results, though.

“When an organization looks at its own employee survey data, it needs to take these [cultural] differences into account,” Gilbert said.

Not doing so could cause an organization’s leaders to assume that there are significant issues among its Japanese workforce and fewer issues with its Mexican workforce when, Gilbert said, “employee survey scores simply tend to be lower in Japan and higher in Mexico” when those workers rate employer performance.

It would be helpful for the employer to know if a broad cross-section of employers in that country also receives a low performance rating, Mercer points out in its paper.

Mercer’s most recent findings are based on 130 questions to working adults on a dozen topics: work processes; ethics and integrity; quality and customer focus; immediate manager; communication; performance management; work/life balance; compensation, benefits and recognition; job security and career growth; leadership and direction; teamwork and cooperation; and training and development.

Its latest findings are highlighted in the Mercer paper Engaging employees to drive global business success.

Merger and Acquisition_Human Capital Factors

In the last couples of months, I have worked on the process mapping for the HR aspects of Merger and Acquisition. It has been a very COOL job to codify the integration process for consistency and efficiency with the creation of the long term value and impact.
The complexity of M&A couldn't be stressed even more, especially from Human Capital and Org Culture Integration perspectives.
Just found several reports from the MMC, and belows are two Mercer reports nice done to give you quick snapshots:

M&A in Emerging Markets: The Human Capital Challenge (BRIC)

M&A in Asia Pacific: The Human Capital Factor

International HR

Consulting resources:
http://www.eca-international.com/

International Pay Rate

http://culpepper.com/eBulletin/2007/DecemberCompensation.asp

If interested in more survey findings about compensation and beneftis, check out
The Culpepper eBulletin Newsletter
http://culpepper.com/ebulletin/default.asp

Global Human Capital Study 2008 (IBM)

Global Human Capital Study 2008
(from IBM consulting, free download with registration at the website
http://www-935.ibm.com/services/us/gbs/bus/html/2008ghcs.html)

IBM researchers asked more than 400 human resources executives worldwide, "what are the most significant capability-building challenge facing your organization today?" their responses showed:
76% on "building leadership talent" followed by 39% on "fostering a culture that supports e-learning and development" and by 36% on "rotating leadership talent across business units and geography".

Global HR

Global Human Resources

— Nina Segal

This article originally appeared on Monster.com. http://learning.monster.com/learning/resources/article/110185?id=d31235ff5f69cede6c9ca3e918bc537d

With business and the economy becoming globally focused, many companies are sending their employees overseas, and approximately 45 percent plan to increase their number of expatriates, according to a recent study from the Center for Global Assignments, reported in the New York Times. This "global workforce" has created new career opportunities for job seekers interested in the human resources field.

What does a global human resources professional do? A little bit of everything. Individuals being sent abroad by their companies have many questions, and need a variety of services coordinated, from getting the correct visas and figuring out salary and tax status, to obtaining settling-in services, housing assistance and cross-cultural training. HR professionals are responsible for pulling all of this information together, and making sure that all of the necessary hurdles (like visas, for example) are taken care of so that expats have a smooth transition into their new work and living environments.

Some organizations use their internal human resources staff to provide such services, but many contract these services out to global relocation firms, which are usually based in the US. But whether you are working for a specific company that provides information and support to its own employees, or are working for an organization that specializes in global relocation, you need a certain core skill set that is slightly different from that of a human resources generalist.

Here's a brief overview of the most important qualities a global human resources professional must have:

Strong Attention to Detail

You will be dealing with paperwork and legal documents like visas and leases that are often in different languages, and subject to different conditions and laws. Thousands of dollars are at stake, so you'll need to be organized and detail oriented enough to deal with the challenges that unfamiliar bureaucracies and languages may present.

Patience, Perseverance and Interpersonal Skills

There is often a great deal of anxiety associated with going abroad, and you must handle the concerns of expatriates and their families with care and concern. In most human resources jobs that don't involve issues like relocation, you tend to work mostly with the employee. In this case, relocation is a family affair, so patience is critical when dealing with cultural issues in countries and cultures different than your own. It's not always easy to navigate an unfamiliar system when assisting employees with finding housing, schools and other services, so perseverance and strong interpersonal skills can make all the difference in making sure that everything gets done, and that everyone is comfortable with what lies ahead.

Good Time Management Skills

Sometimes individuals are sent abroad quickly, so time management skills and the ability to work well under pressure are crucial. You never know when you might have to drop everything to assist a senior-level executive who must be sent abroad -- tomorrow. The challenge here is dealing with different time zones and cultures where "urgency" has a much different connotation than in America.

Global relocation specialists traditionally have a background in human resources, and many have some international experience. While the job can offer many rewards, it can be very stressful and frustrating, especially when you're dealing with red tape or a demanding employee. But as many global HR professionals will tell you, the chance to work in an international setting far outweighs the challenges and frustrations.

Learn More

If you're interested in learning more about a career in international human resources, the following Web sites may be of interest:

Check out Monster.com job listings for the following job titles: account manager, global relocation specialist, international human resources professional.

The Society for Human Resource Management has an International Institute of Human Resources site, which offers information on global HR positions, a member directory and country-by-country research on HR issues.

The Employee Relocation Council focuses mainly on domestic and international employee relocation; check out their Center for International Assignment Management, where you'll find State Department travel advisories, bulletin boards on relocation and publications on living and working abroad.

GMAC Global Relocation Services features resources for spouses of expats, career development programs for global HR professionals, and tax, labor law and cost of living information.

other resources:
http://www.mindexchange.com/international-hr.htm

The Global Competitiveness Report

Take a look at The Global Competitiveness Report 2007-2008. Check the "ranking", and the different pillars under the menu "GCI 2007-2008" http://www.gcr.weforum.org/

Highlights also availabe at World Economic Forum
http://www.weforum.org/en/initiatives/gcp/Global%20Competitiveness%20Report/Highlights2008/index.htm

For business news in countries,
http://www.time.com/time/global_business
has more stories