The changing people profession

Published: 24 October 2024 | Damien Williams

In the first of a new series, we ask Damien Williams, Lead HR Business Partner at KPMG, to reflect on his experience of the people profession and how it is evolving.

My background

I’ve been working in HR for 20 years — I don’t look old enough, I know! I’ve worked for large multinationals as part of big HR teams in specialist roles including employee relations, recruitment and L&D, as well as in more generalist HRBP positions. I’ve also worked in small companies where I’ve overseen all aspects of HR, from payroll and HR systems to OD initiatives and recruitment, either on my own or with a small team. This has meant dealing with budgets from a few thousand to a few million pounds.

No role is ever the same and I have taken from each both the good, in terms of what I’d do again in the same way, and the bad — it’s important to learn from mistakes so that when you meet scenarios again you can deal with them in a different way in the future.

What has changed?

There is now far more focus on the “softer side” of HR than there was in my early years.

In many sectors this includes a greater focus on diversity and inclusion, wellbeing, work-life balance and — linked to this — flexible working, which has been turbocharged by COVID-19. The genie is very much out of the bottle!

This new emphasis has had a positive impact for many people. It is certainly easier now to “bring your whole self to work”. I have seen workforces across several different organisations, both big and small, look at their practices in order to support these priorities, with varying degrees of success and motivation.

Everyone agrees that these things are important for organisational success.

But the debate that I am starting to see in businesses and among HR teams is: Has this gone too far in some areas? Is there a core business need to see greater productivity as an output of these initiatives?

And has the flexible approach to working from home created by COVID encouraged a new set of challenges in relation to team dynamics/culture and the training of a new generation of talent, particularly in knowledge economy businesses like professional and financial services?

While established professionals, myself included (as a parent with children in nursery and early schooling), benefit from the flexibility of hybrid working, it’s essential to ask: Are we unintentionally neglecting a generation of younger talent? These newer professionals, who may have started their careers during the pandemic, are missing the close in-person mentorship we benefited from by working alongside more senior colleagues. Spending time in the office is particularly valuable for junior employees, and leaders must remember their duty to nurture and support the careers and wellbeing of more junior staff.

There is no one-size-fits-all approach to the return-to-office mandates. In fact, an ‘all hands on deck’ directive could create tensions between leaders and employees, and hybrid working will likely remain an important tool for attracting and retaining the talent businesses need.

When it comes to learning, is the current emphasis on virtual training actually leading to a more productive workforce, or merely a more convenient, individualised experience? How is HR responding to these concerns at the board level? Are we able to demonstrate improved productivity metrics, a stronger workplace culture, or higher engagement scores? I’m not convinced that we can. While the work environment has changed, the timeless question posed to HR remains: How are you helping the business to become more successful?

What has stayed the same?

I’d point to two battles.

The first would be how we support and develop managers and leaders. No matter the trouble an organisation takes over its development programmes, the standard bell curve of competence means that you will continue to have challenges arising from ineffective or poor engagement within these groups.

If you are required to deal with an operational issue as an HR professional, the chances are it started with and/or escalated from poor management practice. While I don’t think you can ever escape that bell curve, I do believe that developing good relationships with stakeholders at every level in your business will pay off. This holds as true today as it did when I first started work: good relationships result in better outcomes.

The second battle is around strategic input. The problem may arise in part from group professional-level imposter syndrome or from the difficulty in providing metrics around subjective people inputs. Whatever the case, getting the business to truly work with HR as a strategic partner still feels like a struggle for recognition, even with the rise of the chief people officer (CPO) role at board level. The CPO’s is still the new seat at the table and the need to justify and prove your worth as a HR professional feels as sharp now as it did when I started my career.

How do you create this influence and level up your impact? Through great stakeholder engagement and commercial acumen. If you can bring insight where the business sets its priorities or — even better — predict how HR can guide those priorities, you’ll truly succeed.

But sometimes it’s hard to keep that focus on stakeholders, business needs and strategic input when the latest reactive issue is across your desk!

What does the future hold?

In the short term the Government’s agenda in relation to workplace protections will recast the workforce landscape to some degree. The introduction of day-one employment protections will place even more emphasis on good performance management — again, highlighting the need for management development. It will be really interesting to see how that plays out.

In the medium and long term there will continue to be battle for talent and productivity. Organisations that get the balance right in the tug-of-war between the drive to increased in-office presence and the pushback from workers used to a better work-life balance thanks to homeworking will lock in a competitive advantage both to attract talent and to increase productivity.

Lastly, KPMG has just finished an internal programme detailing the potential of AI. There is so much opportunity to tackle challenges and boost productivity in many types of businesses, but careful management is essential to ensure that the workforce is able to use and embrace these technologies. HR definitely needs a seat in that conversation so that it can support the new roles and ways of working of the workforce of the future.