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HR recruitment - October 2009
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16/10/2009
The HR battle lines have been drawn for some time. The recession has brought with it unfamiliar challenges in unprecedented quantities. Pay cuts, redundancies and fears about unfair dismissal are just a few of the problems people in HR jobs have had to deal with in recent months. Now it seems they have something else to worry about - the prospect of disgruntled workers. Of course, most people will know someone who works in a job they would rather leave and the recession will have only made this situation more common. However, the issue must be addressed or firms could lose key members of staff to their competitors, something that could spell disaster when the recovery comes.
Carolyn Jones, director of the Institute of Employment Rights, explained that falling levels of engagement are a direct result of the policies many firms have introduced in order to help them through the recession. She called on HR staff to rise to the challenge of re-engaging workers with the limited resources they have to hand, as this will help ensure a company can retain its most talented employees.
"Everybody knows, you get the best out of workers when they are treated fairly, treated with respect and made to feel a part of the organisation," she said.
Although retaining the best talent is an increasingly familiar part of the HR role, the stakes might turn out to be higher than professionals think. According to Aaron Alburey, a director in the Deloitte's human capital consulting practice, HR departments will increasingly be called upon to advise firms on how to re-size while ensuring key workers want to stay.
"If [HR] fails to do this, its functions will be handed over to individual businesses within the organisation to manage for themselves and corporate strategy will continue to be determined without any significant input from HR," he said.
According to Mr Alburey, in order to meet the challenges that face them, HR professionals will have to ensure they have first class business and financial acumen and the capability to join in with board-level discussions.
With the latest Ashdown Group Job Index revealing a 4.26 per cent fall in the number of HR jobs on offer, conditions in the sector are clearly still tough. However, candidates who are able to demonstrate a proven track record on the issues highlighted by Deloitte should be able to set themselves apart from their rivals. On the other hand, businesses might need to take a more long-term view and start to look at HR recruitment as an investment in the future of their workforce as a whole.
Posted by Jon Aspinell.
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