Research Alert: As Budget & Staff Cuts Continue, HR Executives Face Pressure To Respond to New "Borderless Bus. Environment"
May 06 2013 - 2:30PM
Business Wire
In the face of significant staff and budget reductions, HR
executives face continuing pressure and new challenges in 2013,
driven in part by the new "borderless business environment,"
according to new key issues research from The Hackett Group, Inc.
(NASDAQ: HCKT).
According to The Hackett Group's research, leaders are focusing
on several HR strategy issues for 2013: process improvement,
including cost reduction and standardization of processes, data,
technology and organizational culture; improving the effectiveness
of talent management; obtaining more value from data to enable
better decisions; and expanding the use of technology.
The Hackett Group's research also found that HR organizations
have made little to no improvement over last year in terms of
strategic workforce planning capabilities. Finally, the study
reveals a “back to basics” trend in measurement, as HR
organizations seek to find an appropriate balance of cost, quality,
and effectiveness.
"While companies continue to set aggressive goals for growing
revenue and profits, today's business world is extremely volatile,
and HR is being asked to do more with less," said The Hackett
Group's Global HR Transformation and Advisory Practice Leader Harry
Osle.
"We're also seeing a dramatic shift in the business environment,
creating new opportunities to roll out a flexible, virtual,
data-enabled model for service delivery," said Mr. Osle. "Companies
are realizing that growth is no longer limited by physical borders,
and country borders are no longer a large obstacle when sourcing
talent, capital, technology, goods and services. Internally,
functional borders between business services operations are also
coming down in the wake of cross-enterprise, end-to-end process
ownership. Finally, there are dramatically fewer barriers to
service delivery placement, with Global Business Services
operations able to provide seamless support to internal
customers."
The Hackett Group's research found that companies continue to
focus on cost reduction in HR for 2013. Operating budgets are
expected to drop by 0.79 percent on average, along with staff
reductions of 1.89 percent. More than half of all companies said
they expect to see HR budget reductions this year, while another 26
percent said they expect to see no change.
Talent management is clearly a top issue for HR leaders in 2013.
Organizations are seeking to improve talent management capabilities
to enable their companies to react faster to changes in the
business environment, and also align more closely with business
strategy to anticipate future staffing needs.
One of the most significant year-on-year increases in priorities
seen in The Hackett Group study is improving the quality of HR data
analysis and reporting capabilities for decision-making. This area
has not been a historical strength for HR, and will require a
formal strategy for better leveraging technology. Another item on
the strategic agenda is building data analysis and business
partnering capabilities within the HR workforce, which saw a 20
percent rise since last year’s study in the ranking of “developing
the future competencies/skills of the HR function.” Data and
analysis-related skills are a big part of making this happen.
Despite being a foundation of talent management, strategic
workforce planning appears to be the Achilles' Heel of most HR
organizations, The Hackett Group's research found. The research
showed virtually no improvement over last year, and only 13 percent
of organizations have fully defined and standardized capabilities
in this area.
HR organizations have ambitious plans to expand their use of
technology in 2013, despite budget restrictions. Rolling out
Web-based and self-service tools continues to be a leading
priority, along with improving the ability to access and analyze
data. But HR organizations appear to be quite fragmented in the
tools they are using. The Hackett Group believes that this
smorgasbord approach is neither sustainable nor practical given
HR’s limited resources, and recommends that HR teams make careful
and informed choices based on the profile and needs of their
company.
Finally, The Hackett Group's research identified a "back to
basics" trend in HR measurement. While cost remains the most common
measurement across HR, there is a significant increase in the
proportion of companies measuring employee engagement, as HR
leaders try to document the value they add. At the same time, the
proportion of companies measuring HR transaction errors increased
significantly, showing greater efforts to balance cost and
quality.
More details on The Hackett Group's research is contained in the
full HR Key Issues Research Insight, which is available at no cost
(registration required) at:
http://www.thehackettgroup.com/research/2013/key2013hrex/
About The Hackett Group
The Hackett Group (NASDAQ: HCKT), a global strategic business
advisory and operations improvement consulting firm, is a leader in
best practice advisory, business benchmarking, and transformation
consulting services including strategy and operations, working
capital management, and globalization advice.
Utilizing best practices and implementation insights from more
than 7,500 benchmarking studies, executives use The Hackett Group's
empirically-based approach to quickly define and implement
initiatives that enable world-class performance. Through its REL
group, The Hackett Group offers working capital solutions focused
on delivering significant cash flow improvements. Through its
Archstone Consulting group, The Hackett Group offers Strategy &
Operations consulting services in the Consumer and Industrial
Products, Pharmaceutical, Manufacturing, and Financial Services
industry sectors. Through its Hackett Technology Solutions group,
The Hackett Group offers business application consulting services
that help maximize returns on IT investments. The Hackett Group has
completed benchmark studies with over 2,800 major corporations and
government agencies, including 97% of the Dow Jones Industrials,
86% of the Fortune 100, 90% of the DAX 30 and 48% of the FTSE
100.
More information on The Hackett Group is available: by phone at
(770) 225-7300; by e-mail at info@thehackettgroup.com.
Hackett (NASDAQ:HCKT)
Historical Stock Chart
From Sep 2024 to Oct 2024
Hackett (NASDAQ:HCKT)
Historical Stock Chart
From Oct 2023 to Oct 2024