Which Strategic Human Resource Management Skills are crucial for an HR Career?

Human Resource Management has consistently been considered an excellent job specialisation due to its earning potential, accelerated career growth prospects and growing demand. With this popularity as a career choice also comes increasing competition for HR jobs and higher level HR management roles, requiring professionals to frequently up-skill themselves to stay ahead of the curve. This article lists the crucial skills every Human Resource Management professional should focus on to advance their career.

HR Skill #1: Strategic Planning

The crux of Strategic Human Resource Management is no longer about just managing people. In today’s complex global environment – especially in large organisations that have many layers of management between employees ‘on-ground’ and senior management – HR professionals need to translate the value of human capital to its impact an organisation’s bottom line.

Human Resource managers need to work with senior management to understand the organisation’s direction and then strategically plan resources (i.e people) that effectively contribute to a company’s growth, profitability and sustainability. Recruitment, job rotation, up-skilling and role identification all factor into HR strategic planning and management, for both short term and long-term business objectives.

HR Skill #2: Personality Management

It’s universally acknowledged that a Human Resource Management role consists of more personality juggling than any other job role, making Personality Management one of the most important skills for an HR professional to posses. Personality is the way an individual’s temperament responds to and interacts with a given scenario. Maximising an employee’s contribution to a company requires that its people work well together, remain motivated, and develop personal and professional skills that benefit the organisation and themselves.

Even simplifying and grouping people into Introverts and Extroverts can help HR managers understand what drives and motivates an employee. According to Harvard Business Review, the key to managing both Introverts and Extroverts is to have open and very candid discussions with people as individuals and as a team, to properly balance personality team dynamics to get the best results.

HR Skill #3: Communication, Communication, Communication

It can not be overstated enough at how vital outstanding communication skills are for a Strategic Human Resource Management role, as it requires being adept at liaising and managing people across diverse cultures, backgrounds, levels and skills. Communication covers nearly all aspects of HR: active listening skills, negotiation skills, mediation skills, etc. In addition, communication helps act as a bridge between employees and the management, communicating strategic management objectives into actionable plans for the workforce and communicating workforce needs into organisational directives.

Looking to learn more about Strategic Human Resource Management? Consider a Masters degree in HRM. You can also book a free, personal session with our Higher Education Consultants to identify which HR degree course would best suit you.