By Diana Dima-Balea
Product owner Harp
At the beginning of 2023, Gartner for HR published a report called ‘Top 5 Priorities for HR Leaders’ (*E-book: Gartner for HR, ‘Top 5 Priorities for HR Leaders in 2023. Actionable and objective advice to tackle top HR challenges.’). This report for future organizational and HR trends emphasized the importance of individuality, customization, and people-first experiences in HR processes, particularly employee relations.
As to the reasons that support this, Gartner says that, among other things, leadership plays an important role. On the one side, ’leaders need a new approach - as today’s work environment changes, leadership must also change. The three environmental shifts of social and political turbulence, work-life fusion, and flexible work arrangements redefine the leader-employee dynamic into a human-to-human relationship.’ This new approach can be a more ’human-centric leader: The human-to-human dynamic in the workplace pushes leaders to display human-centric leadership, defined as leading with authenticity, empathy, and adaptivity. These traits have been listed for some time among the key qualities of great leaders — but they were considered nice to have. Employees today demand them.’
Employees are not only demanding changes from their leaders but also from the way of working, careers, work environment, organizational relations, and more. Personalized processes can reflect these demands. Personalized processes in Human Resources play a crucial role in fostering employee engagement, satisfaction, and overall organizational success. Essentially, we believe an HR philosophy prioritizes culture and the organizational environment is key to driving organizational performance and success.
We strongly believe in the power of culture within organizational environments. Our philosophy is centered around balancing trust, transparency, and flexibility. We trust that people can make the right decisions if they are well-informed, and our transparency produces positive outcomes. Our flexibility helps to generate trust and loyalty.
In line with our philosophy, we developed Harp to meet our high standards in people management. Initially focused on performance management, Harp has helped us to:
Redefine efficiency. We no longer rely on manual paperwork and spreadsheets. It helped us automate routine tasks and free up our HR team to focus on strategic initiatives that drive growth.
Act on data-driven insights. We now make informed decisions with actionable insights as Harp provides real-time analytics and customizable reports, so we were able to fine-tune our strategies for a more engaged and productive workforce.
·Unify collaboration in performance management. Harp fostered seamless communication and collaboration across the organization, ensuring everyone was on the same page.
Focus on growth-oriented performance as Harp facilitated goal setting, continuous feedback, and skill development, nurturing a culture of excellence and growth.
Then, our focus on leave management has helped us achieve a balanced approach that prioritizes trust, transparency, and flexibility, resulting in several benefits:
Employee satisfaction: by trusting employees to manage their leave responsibly and providing clear communication and transparent policies, we have helped them feel valued and respected, leading to higher employee satisfaction.
Reduced conflict: transparent policies and clear procedures have helped reduce misunderstandings and conflicts that can arise due to confusion or misinformation.
Higher morale and productivity: our flexible leave policies demonstrate our support for employees' work-life balance needs, leading to higher morale and increased productivity.
Talent attraction and retention: our emphasis on trust, transparency, and flexibility in leave management has made us more attractive to potential hires and helped us retain our current talent.
Gaining access to information about others' time off proved incredibly valuable in self-planning vacation time and adjusting workload accordingly. It was truly refreshing to witness project managers being mindful of team members' absences, and even more so to see managers actively encouraging individuals to take well-deserved rest days. The outcome? A remarkable improvement in work-life balance and overall productivity. We firmly believe that trust, transparency, and flexibility are the driving forces behind our successful leave management processes. As a result, we are now able to effectively manage time off without encountering any major obstacles.
Lastly, we defined a strategic approach to employee benefits that considers individual employees' unique needs and preferences. By acknowledging and accommodating the diverse needs of the workforce, organizations can create a more inclusive and supportive workplace, ultimately contributing to the company's overall success.
Every tool, process, or system is built based on a vision, philosophy, or belief. We hope you resonate with ours and that you find helpful ideas that you can use in your work environment. Thank you for reading.
If you want to explore how Harp can help you transition to more purposeful management, let’s talk.
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