Strategic Human Resource Management Examples + How to Develop a Plan

According to 77% of HR professionals, senior leadership relies on HR to help navigate new situations or practices. Yet HR professionals still have a hard time getting a seat at the leadership table. Nearly one-third of them continue to report that senior leadership doesn’t recognize them as crucial to the business function.

Business executives must realize that human resources are vital to achieving the company’s goals. Many HR professionals are still trying to figure out how to contribute impactfully to overall business strategy, performance, and success.

For most HR professionals, the answer lies in strategic human resource management. This approach elevates the HR professional’s role from one that handles mundane tasks to one that provides indispensable insight and strategy to executives working toward a specific mission.

Not implementing SHRM could keep the HR department on a path of misalignment between the everyday HR functions of the company and the long-term objectives set by corporate leadership. Fortunately, this post can help you avoid this outcome by explaining what SHRM is, why it’s important, how it benefits your company, and how you can create a solid strategy that moves the business forward.

What Is Strategic Human Resource Management?

Strategic human resource management (SHRM) aligns HR policies and practices with an organization’s long-term goals and objectives. It goes well beyond managing the HR department’s day-to-day administrative tasks to ensure that every activity is moving the organization toward achieving its ultimate mission.

This involves building a cohesive framework for attracting, onboarding, and retaining the kind of employees who can support the strategic direction of the company. If you already have a well-functioning HR department, you may wonder if making the pivot toward SHRM is worth it. There are a few reasons why this shift is critical in today’s business landscape.

Why Do You Need SHRM?

As an HR professional, you’re likely already aware of the importance of the department in ensuring the organization has what it needs to run efficiently and effectively. However, strategic human resource management plays a particularly crucial role in pushing companies toward success.

First, SHRM aligns HR with business strategy. This ensures that you hire the right people, build the right culture, and implement solid policies and procedures, all with the company’s ultimate goals and mission in mind.

SHRM also supports talent attraction and retention by helping you properly forecast talent needs based on data. It also allows you to properly identify skills gaps and reskill the workforce to address them, as well as nurture and improve performance. All of this contributes to a strong employer brand, which makes your company a place where people want to work.

Finally, SHRM improves organizational performance and overall company success. As you continue to develop the skills and talents of your workforce based on the company’s needs, you’ll increase employee engagement, productivity, and performance. As employees perform better, so will the organization.

If you’re an HR professional wondering how to earn a seat at the table where critical decisions are made, implementing an SHRM strategy is the way to go. It’s hard for corporate leadership to ignore strategic solutions that offer a clear pathway to the achievement of the company’s mission and goals.

How to Create an HRM Strategy

The first word in the SHRM acronym is “strategic” for a reason—you need a strategy to do it well. Here are four steps your HR team can take to create the ultimate HRM strategy to help move your company forward.

Analyze Your Workforce

To be strategic about your workforce, you need to know what resources you have in-house and what you need to source from elsewhere. As you build your strategy, take time to assess your employees’ skills and figure out what roles may need to be changed or added to help the company achieve its mission.

Forecast Demand for Talent

Properly forecasting talent demands ensures your company has the right number of employees with the right skills and in the right roles to get the organization to the finish line. Doing this well means aligning your objectives with those of senior leadership, defining metrics, using data to inform hiring activities, and conducting periodic evaluations to make adjustments where needed.

Identify Skills Gaps in Your Workforce

Identifying skills gaps helps you know which piece of the puzzle is missing when it comes to the knowledge and competencies the company needs to achieve its goals.

Provide Ongoing Training and Development for Employees

Once you have identified the skills gaps in your workforce, you’ll need to create a plan to hire, upskill, and reskill employees to fill those gaps. When employees have the right skills, your organization can begin moving in the direction of your goals.

What Are the Benefits of SHRM?

Although getting a seat at the table as an HR professional is important, you should know that SHRM has plenty of other benefits for your employees. Here’s a glimpse into two ways this approach can transform your organization and workforce.

Improved Employee Engagement

SHRM is a data-driven practice that helps you identify and analyze trends in employee engagement and work to correct any issues that arise. SHRM also helps you communicate to employees how their work is connected to the mission. Research shows that just a 10% increase in employees’ connection to the organizational mission can increase profitability by 4.4%.

Improved Employee Retention

Practicing SHRM means providing employees with strategic opportunities to learn new skills (which is important to 87% of Gen Z graduates entering the workforce) and a clear internal path toward career advancement. This contributes to career satisfaction and can enhance loyalty in your organization.

What Are Some Examples of Strategic Human Resource Management?

It’s always good for HR professionals to focus on implementing proven methods to improve their employees and the organization as a whole. Check out these five strategic human resource management examples to see which companies are getting it right when it comes to SHRM.

Google

Google has been one of the most famous strategic human resource management examples for many years. The company’s strategic approach to human resources development involves making all HR decisions based on people analytics data. The team uses this data to identify everything from skills gaps in their workforce to how to best help employees thrive at the company.

Cisco

Cisco is one of the best strategic human resource management examples because its executive team gives HR professionals a prominent seat at the table. The HR department at the networking technology company works with the chief strategy office to ensure their goals are aligned.

By implementing this crucial aspect of SHRM, the HR team is better able to assess and use the skills of their current workforce while analyzing which skills they will need in the future to drive long-term success.

Wistia

Wistia is a popular video-hosting service that helps other companies create and market videos to showcase their offerings. By tapping into automation to complete routine tasks, the company has been able to turn its focus to “forward-looking work” like employee engagement and retention, seamless onboarding, and managing hiring needs in line with the company’s growth trends.

KIPP Nashville Public Schools

KIPP is a network of tuition-free public charter schools operating across the United States. The organization uses SHRM by implementing HRIS technology to automate processes and collect and analyze employee data.

By automating routine work, the team now has time to think strategically about the schools and gather the data they need to keep employees happy. This increase in employee satisfaction has helped the organization retain happy personnel who work hard toward the mission of the schools.

ISTS

ISTS helps employers and nonprofit organizations start and manage educational assistance programs in the form of scholarships, tuition reimbursement, and student loan repayment. This company uses HRIS technology to specifically automate performance management by holding quarterly review meetings.

By using software to work more efficiently, the team can prioritize strategic work like employee skill development, performance assessment, and engagement. This has led to much better success with the workforce and the organization as a whole.