Human resource management (HRM) is an essential process of workforce management. It is the practice of recruiting, hiring, deploying, and managing employees to ensure smooth functioning. HRM is also responsible for creating and overseeing the policies governing the organization’s and its employees’ relationships.
As HRM is closely related to employees and the employment protocols within an organization, it has to keep up with the changes in the domain. The economic slowdowns, globalization, workforce diversity, changing skills requirements, need for downsizing, decentralized work culture, and many more factors make it necessary to keep up with HR trends.
Let’s look at the important HRM trends in 2023 that you must keep track of.
1. Focusing on workers' health
A recent study by the McKinsey Health Institute found that every one in four employees are experiencing burnout symptoms. The study further found a 22% gap between employers and employees in the perception of well-being at work. The startling difference in opinion leads to toxic work cultures and burnout in workers.
So how can HRM help?
Human resources can work on setting up healthy organizations. One of the increasing trends in HRM is to take a holistic and more inclusive enterprise-wide approach to workers’ well-being. The concept of a healthy organization goes beyond the physical health of the workers and aims at facilitating flexibility and more opportunities for training and empowerment.
For instance, offering unskilled workers development programs help them move up the socio-economic level.
2. Introducing diversity in the workforce
HRM was considerably more straightforward in the past as the workforce was highly homogeneous. But today, a typical workforce comprises people of different ages, gender, social class, values, cultures, and ethnicities. Diversity in the workforce is even required because it boosts creativity and innovation, which helps an organization’s competitiveness.
Diversity inclusion will be one of the top HR trends in the coming years. A fun way for human resources to achieve this is through changes in the benefits package offered by the company. If you can provide family-friendly benefits, which include flexible work schedules and employer benefits such as childcare, you will attract talent from diverse backgrounds.
HRM must also be mindful of the age difference among workers to effectively train people from different age groups to work together and respect diversity.
3. Training employees
Continuous improvement programs provide human resources the much-needed advantage they require for a competitive edge. Training employees continuously is essential for organizations focusing on quality and building a better foundation for the workforce.
It also helps with employee retention as workers grow in their position through learning. HRM must strive to improve existing training programs and introduce necessary changes to facilitate continuous training and learning. Also, amendments must be made to include specific requirements or facilities depending on the diversity of the workforce, such as translators and content in the native language.
4. Facilitating hybrid culture
Since the pandemic, there has been a shift in workplace culture, and employees are looking for flexible work hours with the ability to work remotely. Most companies have adopted a hybrid work model, becoming one of the top trends in human resource management.
A flexible work model includes a mix of in-office and remote work. Amazon, Infosys, Microsoft, and Siemens are some large corporations that have adopted the hybrid work culture. The question arises if the hybrid work model is enough to provide the much-needed flexibility.
The end goal of this approach is to provide a psychologically safe environment for people to work in. It facilitates a better work/life balance, making them more productive and stress-free. Given the success of this work model, 74% of US companies are using or planning to implement a permanent hybrid work model.
5. Rise of MNCs and globalization
The profitability and growth of businesses today depend on the local and international markets. This is evident from the rise of multinational corporations. To operate such corporations, human resource managers must make new requirements. Such businesses require a mix of employees in terms of skills, knowledge, diversity, and cultural adaptability.
Another HR trend to keep a tab on is to create training and development programs to meet the challenges of globalization. HRM must develop mechanisms that support a multicultural workforce and allow individuals to work together.
As the differences in background and language increase, the risk of employee conflict also increases. Human resource management’s responsibility is to train managers to be more flexible in these practices to minimize conflicts and have open conversations.
6. Automation of everyday tasks
In 2023, organizations cannot become profitable and have a competitive advantage if they keep up with the traditional way of handling work processes. High-value and productive workings require leveraging the power of automation and AI-powered solutions that can accelerate the execution the daily tasks.
From screening and sourcing talent to tracking employee time and attendance, adopting AI tools is one of the recent trends in HRM.
Truein is an AI-powered, cloud-based, and hardware-less employee time and attendance management solution. It is a highly efficient tool for tracking work hours, attendance, performance, leave, overtime, and the real-time location of the workers. It also helps HRM be more productive by automating employee attendance and easily integrating with payroll software.
Conclusion
By anticipating and implementing the trends in human resource management listed here, numerous companies sailed unscathed during the economic slowdowns, pandemic effects, and changing employee demands. This is why you must learn about HR trends in 2023 to rapidly transform your organization for high-quality employee experience and business profitability.
