How to become a great HR manager?

How to become a great HR manager?
3.8.2022

The development of knowledge and experience is an essential part of the career development of all employees, including HR professionals. Whether you are the only HR manager in your company or work in a large team, your career progression is closely tied to acquiring new knowledge and skills in the field.

To become a great HR manager, you need to master the day-to-day HR agenda, plus take the time to work with managers and executives to help you set and implement the right HR strategy. In the following article, we'll introduce you to the three main areas you need to focus on as an HR manager if you want to succeed in the industry. These are recruitment, onboarding or onboarding new employees into the company and employee satisfaction.

How great HR managers approach hiring

A great HR manager has a different approach to recruiting new colleagues than the average recruiter. While a recruiter pursues a single task, to find a new employee quickly, an HR manager should approach the task systematically and always consider the following parameters while searching for a suitable candidate:

Compensation: a great HR manager does not negotiate salary for each employee individually. He or she has already developed a detailed remuneration system for each position in advance, which takes into account its complexity, but also the skills and experience of the employee. A properly set remuneration system motivates employees and is one of the basic tools for retaining them in their first months on the job.

Responsibilities: great HR managers first research the needs of their team or department before they start looking for a new colleague, and then create a specific job description to put in the job ad. They avoid copying existing job descriptions and do not use generic job characteristics.

Values: great HR managers understand the importance of finding candidates who are aligned with the organization's mission, values and vision. This means that an HR manager's goal should be to find an employee who finds your organization's goals motivating and agrees with the methods your company uses to achieve those goals.

How great recruiters approach integrating a new colleague into the team

When a new employee joins, there are many small things to think about: preparing the workplace, setting up the computer, issuing documents, accessing internal networks. An ordinary HR manager can handle all these routine tasks without any problems, but a great HR manager prefers to entrust these routine operations to specialized HR software and focus more on the following measures:

Preparation: if you decide to hire a new employee, it's a good idea to show trust in them on their first day. Part of this positive impression must include providing everything he or she needs to be successful on the first day of work. A great HR manager will coordinate the onboarding of a new colleague with department managers, other HR and IT colleagues well in advance to ensure a smooth onboarding process for the newcomer.

Positive motivation: no matter how qualified the new employees are, each of them will have to learn the internal procedures first. Only then can they be well integrated into your team. A great HR manager therefore motivates each newcomer positively during the first few weeks, especially by organising regular meetings to find out how they are doing at work, what they need help with and where they feel strong. Positive motivation should be supplemented by offering specific benefits, such as the possibility of using the company's benefit system or contributing to the employee's life or pension savings.

Respect for the personality of the newcomer: every new employee changes the culture of the organisation with his or her personality. HR managers need to ensure that other team members welcome the newcomer warmly and take into account the personality and dynamics he or she will bring to the team.

How great HR managers work with employee satisfaction

HR usually knows how to respond to emergencies in the company to minimize any damage to the company culture. But great HR managers know better, taking a proactive approach to employee satisfaction and working to improve it through carefully chosen measures of satisfaction and company culture. Such measures may include:

Communication between managers and employees: a number of studies have shown that the attitude of managers is critical to employee performance, contributing up to 70% of employee performance. In other words, two employees in the same organisation with the same experience, knowledge and values can have completely different performance. Therefore, great HR professionals ensure that managers meet regularly with all their subordinates in face-to-face meetings and keep the lines of communication open.

Transparent communication of the purpose of tasks: today's employees often place more emphasis on interesting work that develops and gives them meaning than on salary or company benefits. Great HR professionals therefore communicate the company's mission, vision and values through practical tasks and activities. For each task assigned, they take care to define its purpose in relation to the organization's goals and mission.

Seeking feedback: even with the most transparent communication between manager and employee, there may be times when an employee finds it difficult to open up to their manager about a topic, typically a communication problem or dissatisfaction with their salary, for example. Great HR managers therefore offer employees a platform through which they can freely and anonymously express their concerns. At the same time, they get very useful feedback.

You can't do it without automation these days

It's clear that a great HR manager needs to free their hands to work strategically with human resources to achieve great results. The HR agenda contains many routine repetitive operations that can be entrusted to the right HR software these days. Great HR managers have already implemented HR software in their companies to automate processes and move their agenda into the digital age. Try Pinya HR software, which will take care of most of your regular HR operations for you, allowing you to focus on your team to the fullest. Pinya HR will enable you to become a great HR manager, try it out for free and no obligation via a demo. Request access credentials and take an important step to improve your HR work.

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