My advice to future HR professionals

Learn these 3 key skills, and you’ll be off to a great start!

Recently I was invited to share my on-the-job experience of HR with some of the students at ESGRH school in Paris. Here’s what I told them:

HR education often focuses on the wrong things

All too often HR training focuses deeply on legal and administrative topics, like mastering payroll processes and respecting state compliance.

And when employees think of HR it’s for an admin question, about health insurance, or when something goes wrong. For managers they often think of rules and regulations, or that we’re here to ‘ruin the fun’.

And this becomes a vicious cycle: the business already undervalues HR, we don’t necessarily have the tools to prove them wrong, so the cycle continues.

So what are the core skills of modern HR?

It would be easy to assume that success in HR is only a matter of rote learning a lot of laws, processes and how to use outdated software — but in reality, that’s only a small part of the picture.

Modern HR professionals handle everything from employer branding to hiring; career development and organisational design; company culture, business partnering as well as strategy and policies.

And sure, all of this is underpinned by broad knowledge of the legal and administrative framework of the countries we operate in — but it’s certainly not the only value add HR can bring to the table.

In order to succeed in modern HR, you need to develop three key skills:

• Business Acumen
• High EQ
• Influence

Business Acumen

HR doesn’t happen in a vacuum. You do HR to solve business problems, not to simply ‘do HR’. Our work is contextual — without exception. So, a deep and broad understanding of the business: the product, the go-to-market strategy, the technology, the competitive landscape is essential for effective HR.

But how can a young HR graduate (or someone changing careers) develop business acumen? It’s not as if senior people are going to be inviting you into strategy meetings on day one.

My advice here is to act like a sponge, and to invite yourself into those meeting rooms. An attitude of genuine curiosity (“Hey, I’m really interested in better understanding our product approach, mind if I sit in?”) will get you far — the worst that can happen is that someone says no.

Or invite a different coworker for coffee every week and ask them to tell you all about their jobs and how that fits into the bigger picture of the business — a hint: people LOVE to talk about themselves!

Then of course, there’s good old fashioned online research. Ask your colleagues for pointers (‘If I wanted to learn about Security 101 where would you suggest I start?’).

High Emotional Intelligence (EQ)

Great HR managers have high EQ.

I could write an entire blog post on developing EQ (and indeed I might!) but for now, know that high EQ starts at home, with self-awareness. If you’re not sure where to start, start by getting to know yourself — observe your energy levels and moods and start to notice any patterns.

HR managers need to be incredibly self-aware, in order to reach step two which is self-regulation. HR is often involved in situations where tensions run high (think employee disputes, salary negotiations, a dismissal process) or where negotiating well is key. The ability to self-regulate, and to read emotional signals from other people and react accordingly is a facet of EQ that I rely upon every day.

A HR professional who inherently understands the nuances of human behaviour and can predict the potential range of reactions to different situations is indispensable. And, a HR person who can think on their feet and display great dexterity in their responses to emotional situations is in a good position to get things done.

Which brings me to our last key skill…

Influence

It’s all well and good to thoroughly understand the business (business acumen) and to understand how to navigate people well (EQ), but all of that is fairly useless if nobody listens to you.

This is where influence comes in to play.

The ability to bring people along with you, to change their minds, to challenge their thinking and to propel them into action is how the real work of HR gets done. Particularly as often we don’t have direct hierarchical responsibility over others in the organisation.

The key to influencing others? Understand what they are trying to get done, and what matters to them — and showing how you can help them get there.

Fellow HR professionals, what skills would you add to this list?