Human Resources departments are constantly shifting according to widespread industry trends. These trends rest on technological, social, and even viral paradigms. Here are four significant Human Resources trends that are in the process of altering our workplaces.
Table of Contents
Remote Working
During the last year, 30 percent of employees have been working remotely. Even though this number is far lower than the remote working totals recorded during the height of the pandemic, it nevertheless reveals a telling trend. Employees are aware of the advances in remote working technology and the freedom that this technology can enable. They no longer feel like they are entirely constrained by traditional 9-5 office life, which has so often been linked to institution-wide apathy and depression. Human Resources professionals are adapting to the new normal and creating workplace plans that involve or encourage hybrid working from new employees.
HR departments can entice good candidates with the promise of choice. Large companies have taken this to heart. Twitter, for instance, now allows all employees that do not need to be in the office to work from home for the foreseeable future if they choose to do so. This could be a big selling point for talented applicants that have lived through the pandemic and are highly tech literate.
Smart Software
Smart HR management software like Zenefits streamlines the workload responsibilities faced by Human Resources departments. By centralizing administrative elements into an easily navigable control panel, smart HR software has undoubtedly reduced the number of stress headaches experienced in hiring departments around the world. HR software allows professionals to monitor and control applications, onboarding, reporting, and just about any other HR task that would previously have been achieved and administered separately.
Mental Health
Work and mental health are inexorably linked. Human Resources departments are placing more of an emphasis on the development of comprehensive mental health care as a priority. Caring for employee mental health ultimately serves both workers and corporations well by ensuring that workers feel cared for and are allowed to have time off during or before the onset of crises. This means that poor mental health will not affect the working of a company unduly.
Critics of the mental health drive in HR have pointed out that a cynical productivity-driven attitude towards mental health will not do anything whatsoever to actually deal with the underlying problems causing workplace mental health issues – some of which may be caused by productivity culture inherently. Human Resources departments need to develop ways of genuinely and earnestly caring for workforces without equating health to productivity.
Big Data
Big data is having a profound effect on the Human Resources industry. Big data can be defined as any diverse and vast dataset that can only be efficiently analyzed by computers. The use of big data in HR is plural. Most obviously, companies have been using big data to analyze the potential candidate market – sifting through huge quantities of data, including resumes and successful skill-job partnerships.
