HR Insights Blog

It is safe to say that HR practices have majorly evolved in recent times. The focus has also shifted to this greater collective objective rather than what is beneficial for the company alone. In the process, the sense of responsibility in people has triumphed over just “attitudes” for their development. Not only the processes that makes a leader are evolving with collaborative technology but the way we define leaders are changing as well.

Topics: Leadership Development

The requirement profile is clear: Nowadays managers have to act on their own responsibility as well as in a team-oriented manner. But to ensure that “good leadership” are not just empty words, companies must ensure the right environment.

Topics: Leadership Development

The collective leadership that will be needed to meet the increasing complexities and
challenges around the future of business is unlikely to be sufficiently served by many existing models or programmes. We are about to enter an era of rapid innovation in which organisations will experiment with diverse ideas and new approaches.

Topics: Leadership Development

While standard measures of the effectiveness of global leadership initiatives (such as participant satisfaction and behavioural changes) continue, there has been a rise in the use of other measures, notably: sales, productivity and engagement scores of leaders’ direct reports, to help measure success. Improvements in these latter measures show a correlation to global leadership development effectiveness. 

Topics: Leadership Development

The selection of candidates, for global leadership development programmes, has historically focused on C-suite executives and predetermined high-potential employees. However, high-performing organisations are now making the process available to any manager who is interested - something that sets them apart from low-performing organisations, and also contributes to better global leadership effectiveness. Global Top Performing companies are less likely to rely on nominations from line management or HR. 

Topics: Leadership Development

More businesses are seeing personal and career development to be the responsibility of the individual rather than something that the company, be it through Human Resources or individual managers, directs and provides. There is a growing belief that people develop fastest when they feel responsible for their own progress, and that individuals should be encouraged to take the initiative in developing their skills and capabilities. For this to happen the individual employee needs to develop a sense of ownership over their career and personal development, and to understand the importance of honest self-assessment.

Topics: Leadership Development

The way that we define leaders is changing. More than half of our participants defined leaders not by their position within an organisational chart, but by their degree of influence and performance. As organisations become less hierarchical, flatter and more matrixed, employees find themselves needing greater leadership and collaborative skills for working and sharing across business units and geographical borders, and adapting to ad-hoc project work. 

Topics: Leadership Development

There is a feeling that Leadership Development has become too individually focused and elitist, often residing in a person or a specific role, and this has contributed to a noticeable growing transition towards viewing leadership as a collective process that is spread throughout networks of people. To facilitate this transition, businesses need to stop identifying individual leaders and instead, shift focus towards creating an environment and culture in which great leadership can develop and thrive.

Topics: Leadership Development

The concept of continuous training is a critical asset both in order to face and tackle the constant and quick changes in the economy and market. Also to allow people to grow professionally in a proactive and fruitful way, continious training has been reinforced in coroporate culture since a long time. Such growth is starting to have more and more influence both on a personal and on a business level.

Topics: Leadership Development

After comprehensive analysis of the 63 enterprises certified as Top Employer Spain 2015 and nearly 1,000 enterprises worldwide, we detected a number of HR trends and innovations that will set the performance of Human Resources departments locally as well as globally during this year.

With our new Top Employers Best Practices Survey that is developed by 50 experts worldwide and adapted to the realities of each country, we have evaluated nearly 600 best practices in nine different fields.The Certification Programme l is only for enterprises with the highest standards of Human Resources, which has also allowed us to capture the main trends in HR management.

Topics: Performance Management, Leadership Development, Compensation & Benefits, Career & Succession management, On-boarding

The way that we look at leadership is changing. With businesses facing the combined challenges of emerging technologies, newer working practices and increased employee and customer expectations, our approach to identifying and nurturing future leaders needs to evolve. Instead of focusing on a small group of pre-identified individuals, we now need to foster a more collective leadership mindset and build a culture in which future leaders can grow and thrive. Organisational culture is now a major differentiator for businesses looking to attract and retain the best talent, with leadership capability and agility a vital part. 

 There are two major shifts helping to drive this approach 

• Identification of potential leaders by influence, network and behaviours rather than by their role or position within the business. This arises from moving towards leaner, flatter, non-hierarchical organisations. 

• Individual employees taking responsibility for their own personal, career and leadership development, no longer leaving it to line managers or HR. Non-linear career paths and the need to keep skills up to date are driving this. 

Individuals need encouragement. Along with a sense of career ownership they should develop an approach and mindset that will enable them to maximise their potential. An understanding of cultural and social sensibilities will be crucial for future leaders operating in a global marketplace. This experience can be gained through undertaking challenging projects, possibly outside the business. Similarly, an understanding of wellbeing and mindfulness will help to reduce potential stress and burn out from an always on-line/always connected business culture.  

It is not only the recognised performers who need encouragement. All employees should be able to see leadership as something that is attainable if they can build and demonstrate the right behaviours and capabilities. The diversity and creativity of future organisations depends on it. 

The need for an agile, flexible leadership approach is paramount. Many future business challenges are as yet undefined, whilst technology continues to disrupt many previously established business processes. Our Leadership Development programmes need to address this and help create change agents and people who can comfortably lead organisational change.  

Top performing organisations are using all measurements to gauge the success of their programmes, yet many others tend to favour only subjective evaluations. The all-important commercial yardsticks of Return on Investment (ROI) and alignment with business performance shouldn’t be avoided. 

To maximise employee involvement in development we need to give them a seamless learning experience that replicates much of what they expect from technology in their personal lives. At home they now have better, faster and more responsive tech than at work, and will respond more positively to a 'personalised' approach that puts them in the driving seat.  

Encourage them to learn when, where and how they want. Mentoring, online coaching, video, social learning and collaboration are all ways in which the next generation of leaders expect to gain knowledge and access information. Businesses that deny them these methods, and particularly ones that make information difficult to access and share, could find themselves losing out on retaining the talent they need. 

Topics: Leadership Development

Since 1991, the Top Employers Institute certifies excellence in the conditions that companies create for their people. The introduction of a Top Employers Global Certification programme is a logical next step in view of the global trend in harmonisation of employee conditions. The first Global Certifications will be announced during the Global Certification Dinner on March 5, at the Hermitage Amsterdam Museum.

Topics: Performance Management, Leadership Development, Compensation & Benefits, Career & Succession management, Workforce planning & Talent strategy, On-boarding

What will be the major technology trends and challenges facing the HR world in 2015? Karen Higgingbottom wrote: Last year, the HR technology buyer began to really get in touch with their end users and look for technology designed to support people, not just processes, says Steve Parker, head of business transformation at Achievers. “This meant moving away from the outdated but consolidated offerings that employees, managers, and executives used only when they had to such as HR “self-service” to providing tools that people used because they want to – technology designed to engage and help people be more productive.”

Topics: Leadership Development

Yoga, pilates, and cardio fitness are other healthy options, even corporate gyms with personal trainers available during Office hours. These also cause a significant decrease in absenteeism. The research results of the Top Employers Institute make it blatantly obvious: Top Employers companies that have a gym inside and offer guided activities (personal trainer or courses) see a greatly reduced absenteeism rate: from an average of 4.3% to 2.9%.

The Top Employers Institute research examines all the diverse elements that contribute to make a company a Top Employer, or an excellent example of HR policies and strategies. Among the factors considered are those relating to work environment, an area that includes fitness facilities, corporate gyms, trainings and consultations, a dedicated budget, etc., which are competitive factors that are being increasingly implemented by companies.

Topics: Leadership Development

Madrid, 20 October 2014 - Human Resource Directors from more than 40 companies discussed their practices in leadership, learning, performance, succession and careers at the HR Summit organised by Top Employers at Campus Repsol in Madrid. During four simultaneous interactive workshops on Friday 17 October, these company leaders put emphasis on the need to move toward a culture of learning, leading by simply managing the complex, and making the employee the protagonist of his own career.

Topics: Performance Management, Leadership Development, Career & Succession management

There are few things in life as rewarding as seeing your offspring grow, develop, and become little knowledgeable people. As a mother, I know that it is not only a necessity, but also a point of pride, even an obsession at times. As a company, an organization that not only cares for the professional development of its people, but also for their personal growth within the corporate culture will have all the tools they need, like children who have just begun to walk. With the proper support, well-managed business professionals have the capacity to "change" the world, just like children.

Topics: Performance Management, Leadership Development, Career & Succession management

Is it more effective to recruit superstars from outside or to recruit among your own? Businesses confront the same dilemma that athletic clubs do when trying to look for new talent in key positions.

Topics: Performance Management, Leadership Development, Career & Succession management, Workforce planning & Talent strategy

More than 20 years ago our company was founded as the Corporate Research Foundation (and rebranded in 2008 to the CRF Institute). The initial aim was to show who were the best employers in the Netherlands . Almost a quarter century onwards that objective has not changed. But the scale at which we now certify employers has most certainly changed.

Topics: Leadership Development