While there’s no doubt that growing quickly is an exciting time in a business, it can create a whole swarm of new challenges for HR professionals, especially with the technology that enables your strategic plans.
Whether you’re experiencing a rapidly growing headcount or expanding globally, you’ll undoubtedly come up against certain issues. And even the most experienced people professionals will probably struggle with one aspect or another of fast-moving team growth.
But you know what they say, forewarned is forearmed. We put together a list of the most common challenges that HR directors like you are facing, so you can grow even better. Here’s what we found:
Legacy tech not keeping up
Let’s be honest, the system (whether that’s a software platform or a collection of spreadsheets) that you’ve been using to manage your people needs isn’t going to cut it when your team keeps growing like weeds. So, you’ll need to start examining your tech stack to consider what’s working, what isn’t and what are the most important factors.
We use this digital maturity model to help HR teams understand where they really are in their digital journey. The closer you are to the grey ‘immature’ zone, the more important it is to review your software needs as you grow. Any pain points you’re feeling with your tech now will only get worse as your headcount increases.
When you’re reviewing the way in which your technology is currently set up, be sure to look at all of your HR and payroll needs, not just individual pieces. To get started, take a look at:
- Your core HR functions
- Payroll
- Workforce management
- Recruitment and ATS
- Onboarding
- Learning and development
- Employee self-serve capability
Read more: Five mistakes to avoid when selecting and implementing a new HR system
Change management challenges
Growing your headcount quickly doesn’t mean just getting rid of old tech and putting old processes into new software. It also means getting rid of old ways of working. That can mean new structures, policies and processes and training that not everyone will be excited about. Especially in startups where growth is the name of the game, these elements can shift fast. And some things that were fine in the beginning now need to be handled in a different way. To avoid the worst parts of this, working with a consultant on your change management strategy can be helpful.
Multinational payroll and regulations
When we talk about this level of growth, a lot of the time, we’re talking about international or global expansion into other territories. And that means contending with the rules and regulations around payroll, tax and employment terms for every country you move into. While this, technically, can be done with lots of reading and research, it can be a huge headache. Especially when things change (as they inevitably do). So, you need a payroll and HCM system that can handle different rules and policies, while still letting you see all your people data and do all of your global reporting in one place.
Misalignment internally
Speaking of payroll, your HR and payroll teams, whilst they work and partner on so much, in our experience, they don’t always see eye-to-eye on things. And, in certain scenarios, that can be ok. But when you’re onboarding people left and right and looking at new systems and ways of working which impact all of your employees and their experience, they need to be on the same page. First, that means documenting all requirements from key stakeholders in both payroll and HR. It is almost impossible to select a system without these requirements and their shopping list.
Not sure where to start? Our Advisory team can help you with process mapping and aligning your teams. Learn more: The Best-Practice Guide to User Journey Documenting
Communication and engagement
Having a bigger team can make it feel a lot harder to keep the wider team connected and engaged. And it can be difficult to know if your messages are making their way to everyone. When you’re growing, you need a really good mechanism or platform to engage your team if you want to protect company culture. You need a system that connects everyone together and creates a sense of belonging. Whether that is through an intranet, a communications app or across a series of platforms, designing a communication plan and defining channels that work is critical.
Another part of keeping your team engaged is making sure that your rewards and benefits stay both competitive and relevant. This is another place where communication is really important. Educating everyone on what their benefits or perks are and how to use them is key. You can never over communicate benefits and perks to the team. And if you can make your reward and recognition programme global? Even better! These days technology can replace ‘old school’ recognition with instant peer to peer badges and the like.
Accessible learning and development
As your company grows, especially in a hybrid world, you’ll need to consider your learning and development (L&D) plans. Not only do you need to consider international differences like language and cultural understanding, but you also need to make sure that your Learning Management System (LMS) is online and easy for your teams to access anywhere at any time. Luckily, L&D has changed a lot in recent years and many HR platforms include a powerful LMS module. So, as you look at your tech needs, be sure to take these factors into account.
Diversity and inclusion
When it comes to international teams, the buck doesn’t stop at just making sure everyone can understand messages from the CEO and their data security training. Real, genuine diversity and inclusion initiatives will be important too. And those initiatives will have to consider a lot more perspectives than you might be used to.
Time and resource availability
Possibly the biggest headache for HR leaders is not having enough time, or the right in-house skills, to make a new tech rollout (which, as we’ve said, is almost definitely happening in a high-growth business) a success. And that’s because those skills require a full-time HR specialist role with expert skills. Most businesses aren’t in a position to devote a full-time HR Ops Manager or similar to an internal project, search or selection or implementation. And this can be a source of great stress when you want to get the job done right without letting any of your business-as-usual work slip between the cracks.
We also know that some people may not feel ready to entrust their work to consultants. And, honestly, that makes a lot of sense. There are a lot of consultants out there who are generalists or haven’t worked in HR or payroll before. They haven’t been through the trenches with this sort of project and aren’t speaking from experience. They might be business analysts or new graduates and often just don’t seem to really ’get it’.
Which is why you need to be picky about who you bring in to help you. Here at Silver Cloud, all of our consultants have been in your shoes. Most of the team have worked in growing organisations in HR operational roles and experienced the pain of those changes. They have since gone on to implement for hundreds of clients (across many industries) and that knowledge is pure gold. They’ve been through the wringer with HR implementation projects and platform roll outs. They’ve done it all and they know how to get you through it. From experience.
