Four HR trends to future-proof your career as a human resource professional
The human resources landscape today looks vastly different from years gone by, and it continues to evolve at a rapid pace. While yesterday’s HR professionals were focused on challenges related to hiring, orientations, and company policies, today’s professionals are encountering a new era of HR trends.
Today, HR departments are positioned in the strategic centre of organisations and HR professionals find themselves with an expanded focus, additional responsibilities, and greater influence. Dr Andrew Dhaenens, Key Academic for UNSW Online Human Resource Management Programs, attests that HR professionals continue to be “core assets in the future and success of organisations today.”
What does future human resource management look like? What must HR professionals do to navigate the changes? In this article, we answer these questions by taking a deep dive into four key HR trends driving change across workplaces. We also consider how postgraduate education like the online Master of Human Resource Management from UNSW can help current and future HR managers stay ahead and make impactful change across the industry and their organisations.
Trend 1 – Improving analytics and continuing the digital transformation
Digital technologies, automation, cloud computing, analytics and data-driven decision-making are some of the innovations that have completely revolutionised how businesses operate and make decisions.
These developments have profoundly impacted the HR industry. To start with, HR’s digital transformation has automated payroll processing, employee data management and a range of other traditional administrative HR tasks. This, in turn, has given HR professionals the space to focus on strategy and focus their efforts on things that can drive more value.
The digital age has also empowered HR professionals when it comes to talent acquisition and management, while self-service portals, intranets and apps have empowered employees.
As digital HR platforms become integrated with finance, customer relations and other systems across organisations, the idea that HR is a separate part of the business has eroded – solidifying the central role HR plays in the overall success of any business.
While digital transformation and analytics are one of the most important workplace trends of the past few decades, the Harvard Business Review’s global leadership survey reveals a digital skills gap in HR.
The survey, which gauged nearly 28,000 business leaders across industries, found that HR leaders have tended to “lag behind other professionals in their ability to operate in a highly digital environment and use data to guide business decisions.”
Online programs, like the Master of Human Resource Management (Human Resource Analytics) from UNSW, can help professionals and organisations bridge the digital skills gap. With a focus on human resource analytics and information systems, HR professionals can enhance their credibility as leaders while understanding how to effectively apply people metrics to enrich organisational performance and solve business challenges.
But with gaps and challenges comes opportunity. The survey found that HR professionals who used advanced analytics significantly improve their chance of career success. Further, when data and analytics drive a talent strategy, companies are six times more likely to have a strong leadership team – and strong digital leadership was linked to a boost in earnings and revenue growth.
Trend 2 – Building diversity, equity and inclusion
Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) is described by McKinsey & Company as three intertwined principles held by many organisations that offer support to diverse groups including people of varying ethnicities, religions, races, religions, genders, abilities and sexual orientations.
As digital transformation places the focus firmly on machines, it simultaneously highlights the value of people in the workplace. Not surprisingly, the field of HR – which traditionally revolves around everything to do with the people in a business – is central to DEI:
Diversity: Covering gender, age, neuro and ethnic diversity, this element looks at range of voices represented in the workplace.
Equity: This ensures that decisions that affect individual opportunities and outcomes in the workplace are based on merit rather than identity.
Inclusion: This value relates to how people are embraced and heard in the workplace.
Three McKinsey reports show the significant impact of DEI, revealing a correlative relationship between business performance and diversity and an increasingly strong link between diversity on executive teams and the likelihood of financial outperformance. DEI also has the power to win and retain talent, improve the quality of decision making and drive employee motivation and satisfaction.
To help grow DEI across organisations, contemporary programs have provided HR leaders with frameworks to develop thriving, sustainable and people-focused initiatives that complement business strategy. The 100% online Master of Human Resource Management (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) from UNSW is one example of these programs.
DEI is more than just one of the many emerging HR trends. It’s a social revolution and HR professionals have the opportunity to ensure it’s embedded across organisational practices to not only make work a better place but also boost the performance and productivity integral to the all-important bottom-line.
Trend 3 – Balancing work arrangements in hybrid and flexible ways
Among all of the HR trends to emerge in recent years, alternative work arrangements (e.g., remote, hybrid, and flexible work) have perhaps most visibly changed our workplaces and how HR manages people within them.
Work-from-home arrangements have been increasing in popularity since the 1980s with figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showing that the percentage of employed people working from home on a regular basis has been growing by about one percentage point every two years.
However, the recent pandemic sudden and larger shift to remote working as organisations grappled with the realities of lockdowns and were forced to come up with new ideas about where and how to get work done. Data released by the ABS indicated more than 40 per cent of employed people regularly worked from home during 2021.
As we continue into our new norms, it is safe to say that hybrid working is here to stay – particularly in Australia. The Reinventing Work Report by Adaptavist showed that in 2022 we had the highest percentage of hybrid workers (34 per cent) compared with those in the US, UK and Canada (with an average of 29 per cent). Australian workplaces were also more likely to offer hybrid working options to staff (50 per cent compared with 44 per cent).
This trend adds another layer of complexity as HR professionals manage both on-site and remote workers and must understand the legal, business, financial and human impacts of hybrid work arrangements.
Programs like the online Master of Human Resource Management (Leadership and Organisational Development) from UNSW have been developed to help HR professionals manage transformation in the workplace. This UNSW program provides aspiring HR leaders with specialist skills in HR strategy to navigate challenges in an evolving industry. This knowledge provides the opportunity and sought-after expertise to drive change that benefits both employees and organisations.
Trend 4 – Championing wellbeing in the workplace
Rounding out our key HR trends is wellbeing. Like work arrangements, the topic of employee wellbeing was circulating well before it was brought sharply into focus in recent years. As human health and vulnerability became a global concern in 2020, wellbeing moved to the top of the priority list.
Arguably, it should stay there – studies consistently show that comprehensive wellbeing strategies and culture positively impact engagement, retention, and productivity, while higher wellbeing scores are positively correlated with more business-unit level profitability.
Employee wellbeing has been a major consideration for HR professionals in recent years. The value these can add on an individual and organisational level is at the core of why many people choose to move into or advance in the HR profession.
Dr Dhaenens says, “Many people come to realise the value and significance of managing human resources. They often grow to appreciate the role that these functions have on the success of employees and organisations. In HR, we are typically a bastion of support in terms of helping employees be successful and organisations accomplish their goals. The work is not easy, but the careers in HRM can be very fulfilling and rewarding.”
Get prepared for a future in HR
It’s an exciting time to enter the HR industry or take your HR career to a leadership level. It’s a career full of challenge and change, but also opportunities and rewards.
Dr Dhaenens says the Master of Human Resource Management at UNSW has been “designed to provide a unique and flexible opportunity for aspiring HR leaders to gain a comprehensive understanding of the topics at the forefront of HR”.
The program helps you build leadership capabilities and develop the analytical and digital skills to prepare for the future landscape of work. You’ll learn to shape workplace culture through data-driven approaches, innovation, inclusion and wellbeing practices.
Take the next step now
HR leaders, professionals and those looking at a career pivot into HR can learn how to leverage the latest and emerging trends in HR with the online Master of Human Resources Management program from UNSW. Download the brochure or get in touch with one of our Enrolment Advisors to learn more.
For a full list of UNSW's HR degrees, including undergraduate and postgraduate degrees delivered on campus, visit UNSW Business School.
