Return on HR Investment For HR Professionals

The Challenge

The HR Profession is under increasing scrutiny and pressure to deliver high value to its constituents with limited resources.  And more than ever before, justification is being demanded for the return on investment of dollars put into HR. 

The Solution

Metrus has devoted over 18 years to these questions, and offers custom solutions to HR professionals of all types.  Metrus offers an array of tools to help the HR professional:

·        Develop an HR strategy that is aligned with the overall organizational strategy

·        Develop strategic and tactical metrics (scorecards or dashboards) that will help monitor and evaluate the implementation of the HR strategy

·        Demonstrate the value of HR services and initiatives

• Benchmark services and results to best practices in other organizations
• Link HR scorecards to performance dashboards of internal supporting units or managed outsourced services
• Monitor supplier performance
• Develop ongoing monitoring and decision making systems to ensure that HR processes are operating efficiently and effectively
• Link HR performance to rewards
• Comply with government regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley

Background

HR, like other functional support areas such as Security, IT, Finance and Procurement are being asked to do more with less as competition or budget constraints require organizations to become more efficient and cost effective.  Metrus research and experience concludes that most support organizations devote 15-25% of their resources to low or no value-add activities.  This is also true of outsourced services in these areas.  Surely this doesn’t happen intentionally.  It happens most frequently because of:

• weak or poorly communicated strategy
• weak or ineffective measures
• too many lagging measures and not enough leading indicators
• failure to tightly connect HR strategies with department or supplier metrics
• weak links between performance goals and rewards (internally or in external contracts)
• insufficient understanding among employees or contractors of strategic priorities
• lack of involvement or  ownership of strategic priorities—that is, lack of self accountability—that leads to compliance rather than excellence

Metrus Services for Human Resource Organizations

HR Strategy Definition and Deployment.
One size fits all HR strategies do not work.  Research and experience have shown that HR strategies must be tailored and aligned with the overall strategy of the organization in which they operate.  Although there are some strategic elements that are common to a particular function or industry, many elements of the strategy will be shaped by the style and preference of CEOs or Boards, the values of the organization, its culture, and its history of HR related events.  Metrus has specialized in helping functions develop individual strategies that are aligned with the overall mission and strategy of the enterprise.  Most importantly, Metrus has a unique strategy mapping process that creates a picture of the HR strategy that is helpful in telling the story of how the HR organization will be successful, and in showing how it relates to the enterprise and other functional units.

Strategic Metric Development.
Just like strategies, one sized metrics don’t work.  The metrics must be tailored to the unique mission, strategy, and preferences of the executive team.  This doesn’t mean that the metrics must be unique—good quality metrics can be used in many organizations, if they fit the strategy.  Metrus has a proven process for helping the HR team convert their strategy into workable metrics to guide day-to-day execution and to demonstrate to stakeholders, such as senior management, that the function is truly adding value.

Metric Cascade to Internal Teams and to External Partners.
Metrics sitting in the HR suite don’t do much to help guide day-to-day employees either within the organization or those working for contractors or partners.  Metrus has a well-developed process for helping HR units connect their strategic metrics and priorities tightly to supporting groups.  This ensures that those groups are maximizing their times and energy on activities that are generating the most value for the organization.  Not only does this help create clear goals, but also a way to monitor implementation, and evaluate success.  By focusing on leading indicators, most HR groups will be able to help correct problems before they get out of hand.

Ongoing Monitoring and Management of Performance Measures.
Metrus has helped scores of organizations set up disciplined processes for deploying, monitoring, reviewing, and evaluating performance.  Metrus can provide process tools as well as software when needed.  Metrus also has strong capabilities in guiding HR units in linking rewards to performance, whether this is for internal units or external providers.

Internal Employee Surveys.
Some of the larger HR organizations need to know how aligned and engaged their employees are in supporting the mission.  It is not uncommon to find employees who are simply not engaged at the levels needed to achieve the HR goals, or to find engaged employees who are spending far too much time in non-aligned activities.  Today, most HR organizations cannot afford this waste of resources.  Metrus surveys contain comparable performance norms as well as custom items that are unique to your organization.  These items help identify the areas in which low or no value activities can be reduced, and ways to increase employee engagement and capabilities.

Internal Customer Surveys.
The services that human resources provides to the rest of the organization have a significant impact on the quality of service that the organization in turn provides to its key clients, and markets. Metrus Group internal customer surveys combine targeted sampling that identifies HR’s  key internal customers with modules custom-tailored to measure specific aspects of the services provided service.  This tool is also highly effective for helping human resources units assess the value or ROI of their services to their customers.

Supplier or Partner Surveys.
Most HR leaders understand the importance of focusing attention on their own organization, and on their customers.  Too often, suppliers are neglected in this process.  Yet, today, most HR organizations today are reliant on a variety of partners or suppliers to provide the specialized services they need.  If these providers are misaligned with your mission, you are not getting the full value from your outsource partners.  Sometimes it is inadvertent—suppliers don’t really understand your strategy and priorities, so they misallocate their resources (at your expense) in their good but misguided intentions.  Or, they are squeezed by cost or competing clients, and have only a “compliance” mentality.  In any of these cases, it is important to connect your measurement systems with your suppliers to assure alignment of priorities, and to assess the level of “partnering” that is occurring.

Sarbanes-Oxley.
Ethics compliance is a growing area of concern and one in which HR professionals are involved more frequently.  While many organizations have added hotlines to report ethics violations, most of these tools are after-the-fact lagging indicators.  Metrus offers a survey tracking system that identifies hot spots before they become catastrophes.  This early warning system provides the lead-time needed to investigate risk.

            Metrus has developed this suite of services to specifically target human resource professionals in order to make it easy for HR organizations to avail themselves of the capabilities that they are effective in bringing to the rest of the organization.

info@metrus.com
(908) 231-1900

953 Route 202
Somerville, New Jersey 08876

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