Top HR Goals to Reach for in 2022

Just as important as it is to be on top of the latest trends in HR, it’s just as important to set out long-term goals that you can work towards over time. By setting these goals and keeping them visible, you ensure that your company will stay focused on key tasks and ultimately reach those long-term HR goals.

Top 5 HR Company Goals You Should Reach

The following are just some of the top HR goals that companies should keep their eyes on in 2022 and beyond if they want to be successful.

1) Onboarding Remotely

The world of work has changed dramatically over the last two years. Covid has brought about a remote working revolution where most (non-frontline workers) are now working remotely in some capacity. If you’re planning on working with a remote team, you’ll need to set up some form of professional onboarding so new hires can get themselves acquainted with your culture and processes. Introducing them to other team members and setting up training will help your new workers feel comfortable in their environment. You’ll be amazed at how much more productive employees are when they feel like part of the company!

These days, a company’s culture is a key competitive advantage, so it’s worth going out of your way to welcome new employees. According to research from Deloitte University Press, only 32% of employees strongly agree that their organisation has a positive culture. Encouraging engagement and making workers feel like they’re important can go a long way toward changing that number! Training doesn’t have to be a capital-intensive process either; a good management system makes training accessible from any device with an internet connection—and not just those located on-site. This flexibility allows businesses to scale up as demand requires, without having to invest in office space or training facilities up front.

2) Employee Development

The future of employee development isn’t limited to high-performing or high-potential employees; all employees should be given access to some sort of learning and development program. These programs help employees build their skills and competencies and stay up-to-date on business trends and technologies.

Moreover, when done right, these programs offer opportunities for junior employees to tap into different aspects of your business—skills they can take with them as they move up through your organisation. The simplest way to deliver a successful employee development strategy is through onboarding—making sure new hires have everything they need to do their job well from day one, including guidance from experienced mentors and ongoing support throughout their first year. Allowing every employee access to development programs is essential to cultivating a cultural fit within your company.

If your company doesn’t already provide some kind of structure around developing its employees, I strongly recommend creating it now! As people management becomes an increasingly important aspect of success at work (particularly because everyone expects work-life balance), having effective systems in place will become even more critical.

3) People Management

A report from Bersin by Deloitte found that effective people management was a key driver of business outcomes and that managers who were able to execute all four core elements of people management were more likely to deliver business results. The four components included talent acquisition, talent development, talent utilisation and talent optimisation. Talent acquisition pertains to recruiting, which is getting new employees on board, while talent development focuses on training existing employees so they can do their jobs better. Talent utilisation pertains to aligning people with roles so there is no overlap or redundancy of duties; it also involves keeping track of whether staff members are putting their best work forward. Finally, human resources analytics helps companies figure out what strategies will best help them achieve employee growth—not just regarding individuals but regarding larger populations within their company or even across multiple companies. This is particularly important when evaluating turnover, absence rates and other factors that may be affecting performance. It’s not enough for businesses to improve individual performance levels through learning and development initiatives—they must also ensure that employees have opportunities for advancement over time.

4) Flexibility & Employee Wellbeing

The entire premise of flexible and remote working is all about improving employee well-being and productivity. And we’re likely to see many more companies offering flexible work arrangements, such as staggered start times or a 4-day week because employees’ health and happiness will improve. Studies have shown that greater flexibility can increase employee satisfaction by 10% or even up to 22% while reducing stress levels by 32%. All good things from an employer’s perspective!

We can expect employers to invest in their team’s well-being through training programs focused on mental and physical wellness, effective leadership strategies and ongoing learning & development that will help equip people with the life skills they need for future careers. So how much will employers be investing in these initiatives over the next five years?

Here’s what one survey predicts: 66% of organisations plan to prioritise an excellent onboarding experience as a key component of retaining new hires into their organisation, coming up fast behind both onboarding and learning & development with 48%, is ‘people management tools including performance reviews’ in third place with regards to anticipated priority areas in 2022.

5) Emphasising Employee Experience

Beyond job titles and pay grades, employee experience is one of today’s hottest topics. The human element of an organisation is more important than ever; it’s what makes companies successful or not. It doesn’t matter how good your products or services are if you can’t deliver them with positive energy and attitude.

What employees want most is the experience that brings meaning to their work life, according to Accenture’s 2020 Workforce Study. And while millennials may be pushing change on some fronts, don’t expect things to get easier any time soon. There will continue to be pressure on employers to meet increasingly demanding expectations—and that means thinking about adult development as a key part of organisational strategy.

If you haven’t already, now is the time to come up with a process and place all roles at your company in context: What skills do they need? How do we develop those skills sustainably throughout their working years? How does your work culture map onto that view of where we want people to go? If you can answer these questions—which will vary from role to role depending on level and seniority—you have a starting point.

Conclusion

Employee development is one of, if not THE most critical goal for any organisation. Companies that invest heavily in their people see higher productivity, retention rates, team cohesion and more. The key to development is ensuring that you’re doing it right. Make sure you’re training your employees with real-world applications that will help them perform better on the job, both now and in their future careers. Don’t be afraid to re-evaluate how you provide development opportunities; we might think we know what works best today, but ten years from now we could look back and realise how wrong we were.

Be prepared: plan your employee development efforts well in advance and don’t get stuck relying on past methods that no longer work or scale. Be open-minded when considering new technologies, platforms and techniques—as they all bring something different to the table!

Onward and upward in 2022!