The Importance of Human Resources in Organizations.

The importance of having a human resources department in your business regardless of the size of your company is crucial. Specially for small organizations.

Sometimes company owners of small organizations underestimate the role of HR, and they prefer to outsource some of the HR tasks but believe me when I tell you that is not the same as having an HR presence in your organization.

I am a passionate HR professional that believes that human resources is the heart of the company and at the same time a referee of the organization. Let me go more in depth on why I think like that about HR.

First, I think HR is the heart of the organization since it helps the company to be balanced between the organization and the employees. The human capital (employees) are the mayor assets on any company since they bring the revenue for the organization. Therefore, leaders, and owners should go above and beyond to make the employees happy. Second, HR is like a referee since it needs to make sure that the relationship between leaders and employees is fair and that both parties follow labor laws and the organization’s rules.

Well now let’s see the different areas that HR can support and help your business.

Recruiting and Talent Management : Having an expert on recruiting help tons since that person will have more understanding and knowledge of the company, the company’s culture and the needs to get the perfect fit for the organization. Outsourcing can be more expensive than hiring an HR person in-house in the long run.

Business Budget: HR can make a great alliance with the finance department, to help control the different costs such as workforce management, getting the best benefits rates (health care coverage). In addition, HR is responsible on analyzing the labor market, salaries based on every job. Having an HR person in charge of these things is very helpful especially in small businesses that have budget limitations.

Employee Relations: It is almost inevitable to avoid conflict within the same company among the employees or their managers and that’s okay (it happens even to the best families). The important thing here is to have an HR person that identifies, investigates, mediates, and resolves any kind of issues or conflict.

Training and Development: This is one my favorite areas in HR, and it is very important for small organizations too. Basically, HR conducts a needs assessment across the organization in order to determine what types of skills or gaps the employees are lacking, based on those results the organizations identify the training needs for the existing employees and develop different trainings to close those gaps by using different methods and programs. Using different methods of training helps to reduce turnover and increase employee retention.

Employee Branding: This one is very important for any business small or big it doesn’t matter. HR needs to oversee and lead the employee branding, because it’s basically the identity and the reputation that the company is going to get known as. The employee branding begins with the recruiting process since it’s the first contact that a prospect employee is going to have with the organization. (I will talk more in detail on another blog in order to give you more information).

Employee Performance: Basically, Human Resources has a crucial role in this area since it needs to develop and implement performance management programs that measures the employee’s performance which help to know if they have the satisfactory skills set for the job, or overqualified or if they are under performing. So, it is important to identify the employee’s performance therefore organizations can act accordingly. In case they need to promote, give more training or let go any employee.

HR Supportive for Business Culture: Human resources has a big role to support and promote the company values, vision, and mission, as well as having the employees engage and promote the culture of the company. Specially, small businesses need to create a consistent work and a nontoxic work environment. (Toxic work environments tend to happen more in small organizations).

Diversity and Inclusion: Now more than ever organizations need to pay major attention in this area. By having a diverse and inclusive culture in workplace makes feel everyone, regardless of who they are or what they do for the organization, equal, involved and supported. HR plays a big role on implementing diversity and inclusion initiatives, but the CEO of the organization needs to support, and promote those initiatives 100% in order to work.

HR Compliance: This is very important for your business since compliance consist of defining process, procedures, and polices in order to ensure your organizations runs smoothly and without any liability. Basically, your organization needs to be at compliance with the employment laws of your state and must be followed in order to avoid any kind of fines or penalty.

In conclusion Human resources is very necessary for any organization regardless the size of the company , and let me clarify that it’s not just to have a HR department, it’s to have a HR department involved and engaged with the organization and their employees. At the end the human capital is the major assets an organization can have therefore, it should be treated fair .