MANAGEMENT FEBRUARY 2020
INCREMENTAL HR
Manufacturers know how to drive incremental
improvements in production – but they can easily
apply the same principles to the world of HR
Whatever the size
BY ADAM BARRETT, HR TECHNOLOGY SPECIALIST, ACCESS GROUP
and scope of
their operations,
manufacturers
are continually
scrutinising
production processes as they
strive to be as efficient and
productive as possible in a
competitive global market.
Innovations such as Just-in-
Time delivery, automation
and data-driven systems
have transformed operations,
enabling businesses to save
time, eliminate waste and
ensure strong ROI on resources.
The factories of today
might look very different to
how they did 50 or even 20
years ago, but that doesn’t
mean they have undergone
wholesale change overnight.
For SMEs in particular,
change tends to involve making
gradual improvements to
processes, ensuring they are
carefully managed to avoid
over-spend, test effectiveness,
minimise operational
disruption and gain support
from both the board and the
wider team.
What might look like a
negligible saving of just a few
minutes or pounds can add up
to something more substantial
and make a real difference
where profit margins are tight.
While it is natural for
manufacturers to concentrate
their investment on improving
frontline production, it is
important to consider how
back office functions can
support it too. In order to
achieve their productivity and
efficiency goals, they’ll need
to apply the same principle of
continuous improvement to
their marketing, finance and,
of course, HR processes.
The power of HR
HR professionals, and those
with HR responsibilities,
certainly have their work cut out for them in a
modern manufacturing environment. Labour
shortages and staff churn are two of the biggest
challenges, but so too are legal compliance
(for example, with National Minimum Wage
regulations), managing absence due to illness
or injury and employee engagement.
In a sector typically characterised by
fluctuating seasonal demand, production
managers depend on flexible teams of permanent
and temporary workers to meet deadlines.
But how can HR teams successfully engage
what could be a disparate workforce, spread
across sites in the UK and overseas and
comprising people who do not speak the same
language and who have different expectations
about workplace culture? Or, how should they
support employees concerned about job security
in the automated age, or EU nationals who do
not know what will happen after Brexit?
These are all big questions, and it is easy to
see why tackling them seems like an impossible
task, especially for the significant number of
SMEs without a dedicated HR department.
Exacerbating the problem further is the fact
that those responsible for HR in these smaller
firms are likely to spend the majority of their
time updating employee records and details
about sickness absence and annual leave,
manually, on spreadsheets.
This leaves them with little time to deliver the
low or even no-cost HR initiatives that genuinely
drive engagement. It also means they are unable
to take their first step in addressing serious,
and usually related, issues such as high sickness
absence levels and low morale.
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