What Is Strategic Human Capital Management?

Your employees are your best investment. They are your partners in achieving your business goals. Outdated human resources approaches can impact performance and leave employees stagnating and create obstacles to goal attainment. Strategic Human Capital Management (HCM) is an innovative approach to managing and developing your workforce. With strategic human capital management, your human resources plan and your strategic business plan are aligned.

With HCM, your business will analyze, forecast, and plan out its future staffing needs and assess your teams’ current skills. Using the data of your current team as a baseline, you identify the skills needed to meet your business growth goals. Most organizations will identify skill gaps. With HCM, you establish clear, measurable targets that tie organizational milestones to individual employee performance.

 

Steps to Creating an Effective HCM System in the New Year

Employees and supervisors are empowered in this data-driven process and your business is positioned for growth. The key to strategic capital management is to understand the skills and experience of the roster of your existing employees and to identify the gaps. Here are some steps you can take in the new year to implement an HCM system in your organization.

  • Create employee profiles and align them with your organizational chart and position. Many human resources information systems (HRIS) can provide you with most of the details. Also, engage with supervisors and managers to find out what’s not in the system. Your management team knows who to go to when a job has tight deadlines and who is willing to tackle new tasks with enthusiasm even if it means stepping out of their comfort zone. This information doesn’t always make its way into your HRIS, but these are important soft skills to know about.
  • Map out your vision for growth and understand what the talent requirements are to meet that growth. Align your human capital plan with your organization’s strategic plan in a workforce demand forecast. Assess your current team. Do you have adequate resources (staff numbers) to meet your business goals? Do your employees have the skill sets and training they need to meet the requirements? Make sure your job descriptions and human resources planning documents capture the required skill sets, education, and staffing levels.
  • Match your workforce with your workforce demand forecast. Where gaps exist, explore multiple approaches to closing those gaps. Is there the opportunity to train and or develop staff to develop the required skills? Are your salaries and benefits packages competitive and will bring in the talent you are looking for?
  • Ensure that you are advertising for the positions you truly need. Rework job descriptions and ads. Consider targeted strategies to identify the right fit for vacancies. More candidates are not necessarily better. Professional membership organizations can sometimes draw in highly specialized talent. Make sure that you use technology to support your recruitment efforts. AI-assisted candidate screening can reduce the drudgery of sorting through resumes and applications for candidates that do not have the necessary skills.
  • Performance management software should include key human capital management indicators so that you and your leadership team can track progress toward meeting your human capital plan targets.
  • Implement programs to reward, develop and retain your best employees.
  • Once your HCM plan is in place, remember it is a living document. You will be monitoring the metrics and progress against your plan. You will continue external scanning. And if the unexpected comes up, you will have an excellent foundation to make adjustments to your plan whether it be training existing staff, hiring more employees, or shifting to a different employment model.

A Human Capital Management system has the potential to both improve your current operations and set the foundation for meeting your future business goals.

 

Contact Us Today

TANDIUM is your partner in employment. With innovative technology, a knowledgeable staff, and personalized attention, TANDIUM Corporation can help you determine if a Human Capital Management system is right for your business. TANDIUM Corporation specializes in serving the Human Resources, Payroll, and Benefits needs of small and medium-sized businesses and non-profit organizations. Contact us today to schedule a free initial consultation.