Consumer-centric Approaches to HR

Advances in digital technology are bringing about new approaches to the way organisations operate. A shift towards a customer-centric approach to human resources has been largely enabled by smart digitisation. This approach requires organisations to rethink the way they interact with employees, re-evaluate the structure of the organisation and the way they manage work-force related activities.

Rick Hall, Executive Director, Human Resources Global Service Delivery at Merck discusses the shift towards consumer-centric approaches to HR.

Shifting Lenses: From Process to People and Business

The changes brought about by the digital revolution are having a deep impact on the way businesses are organised and how people view work. We are already seeing the lines between professional and personal lives crossing over. In some organisations, employees take their mobile devises to work and use their own preferred app to complete assignments. While it is exciting to see an empowered workforce taking control of how they work, we have to ask ourselves what does this mean for HR? For progressive organisations, it means a move towards designing mobile, social and customer-style experiences for current and future employees.

Consumer-centric HR at Merck

Rick Hall, Executive Director, Human Resources Global Service Delivery, observes that “HR is going through a paradigm shift, from historically being very process driven to looking through the lens of the employee and business”. Although new to Merck, an example of what the organisation has done to introduce consumer-centric approaches to HR can be seen in one talent sourcing scenario. Looking at the business context, one that was driven by heavy growth due to innovations in the organisation’s oncology business, an opportunity to introduce consumer-centric HR was identified. To attract people with different set of skills, knowledge and capabilities than in the past, it became important to source and engage the right talent and present them with the right employer brand. Rather than approaching this HR process in the conventional sense of end-to-end recruitment and staffing, HR created an experience for candidates by:

1. Sourcing and engaging the right talent pool

2. Presenting an employer brand that resonated with the candidates

By viewing talent sourcing through the lens of people and business, HR moved away from the tried and true process of writing a job ad, advertising, screening, shortlisting and interviewing. In doing so, the organisation was able to differentiate itself in a competitive business environment for talent attraction.

Hall’s key advice for companies wanting to create greater customer-style experiences for employees: “Whatever it is that HR is building and designing, the first, foremost and preeminent perspective that HR should be dealing with is that of the employee, leader, manager, the person who will experience that process.”

Value to the Business

As HR becomes more remote, mobile, social and automated, it must focus on how to get the best results from employees while eliminating processes that are non-essential. The intended outcome of introducing a more consumer-centric approach to HR would be more engaged employees who are focused on work and not interrupted by HR processes.

This greater reliance on technology will continue to evolve HR into a critical enabler of business strategies. As with any transformation, organisations will be met by resistance to change from those comfortable with the status-quo. Despite the challenges, questions such as “how can HR leverage the immediate connectivity of mobile apps to stay in touch with their employees–no matter where they are?” will continue to drive process thinking, design and innovation in some of the most progressive organisations around the world.