The HR department is often in charge of hiring employees, providing them with development opportunities and essentially helping to guide a portion of their career.
HR professionals’ vocational needs are no different. They, too, need training; chances for job advancement; chances to find new jobs; a sense of job security.
Although frequent information is published on general employee sentiment, human resource professionals aren’t often singled out from the mix.
How do human resource professionals feel about their industry—and their place in it? Several recent surveys have gleaned interesting information about their take on being in the field.
A few highlights include:
HR employees feel a strong sense of job security—particularly young professionals
85 percent of early-career human resource professionals feel confident their position is safe, according to a July Society for Human Resource Management survey. Seventy-five percent of all HR professionals weren’t concerned they were at risk of being eliminated.
However, young professionals aren’t completely confident they could find a new job
SHRM’s results also showed just 63 percent of early-career HR professionals felt they’d fare well on the job market, compared to 88 percent of overall human resource professionals.
Industry members are generally satisfied with the HR career development opportunities their employer provides
More than two-thirds of the HR and business executives who participated in Deloitte’s 2016 Global Human Capital Trends report said their organization offers solid HR career development programs for HR professionals, a higher percentage than in 2015.
HR professionals feel their employer is positioned to build a fully prepared HR team
Four out of ten executives—30 percent more than last year—say their company is prepared to address any HR department skills gaps, according to Deloitte’s report.
Succession planning and leadership training and development experience will be a key performance indicator
C-Level Fortune 1000 company human resource professionals (68 and 63 percent, respectively) ranked both as the top HR priorities for 2016 in Human Resources IQ’s report.
Most HR professionals aren’t looking for a new job
Roughly one in five (19 percent) say they were; the majority intend to stay at their current employer in their current position, according to SHRM’s survey.
Compared to 10 years ago, the majority of CEOs (65 percent) say HR opinions carry greater weight with senior management, according to 2015 CareerBuilder survey.
To obtain broader influence, 57 percent of business leaders suggest HR professionals provide actionable talent data and other research to help devise strategies to meet larger business goals and/or show ways to increase efficiencies or cut costs by better using the company’s human capital. (You can find a few ideas to get started in our blog posts on ways to cut HR costs and inexpensively improve your employee value proposition to increase engagement and productivity.)
For more tips on getting HR a seat at the table, make sure you’re well-versed in the four skills HR leaders will need in the next decade — and are successfully sharing the work your department is doing so leadership know just how effective your team can be.