It is great to be involved in feel-good events that reward and recognise Personnel Today readers for being fabulous at their jobs. And that’s just what we did last week when we announced the winners of our inaugural Best Places to Work in HR Awards (see page 1), in association with Courtenay HR.
What is unique about these awards is that it is the employees in the human resources (HR) department who decide the winners. In this, the first year we have run them, we had 2,500 completed questionnaires from 100 qualifying organisations.
The results overall revealed some interesting insights into how HR departments are managed. It was reassuring to discover that, overall, 79% of HR people feel inspired by their leader, 86% feel trusted to do a good job, 80% feel they are contributing to the success of the business, and 79% feel the job makes good use of their talents. Individuals added that ‘having a good boss who gives me autonomy to do my job’ and ‘good teamwork and a trust mentality’ made their HR department a good place to work.
Where HR can improve is to look at stronger succession planning (only a third believe their HR function is very good at talent management), the opportunity to work on more strategic issues, more empowerment to line managers to manage budgets, and more cross-functional working.
The overall winner (which also scooped Best Small HR Department and Best for Employee Engagement) is a great place to work in HR, according to its employees, because of its ‘management style, the quality of staff and work-life balance, and its commitment to supporting and developing talent’. Its HR director Helen Giles adds that having few HR resources is no barrier to producing great results.
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Those organisations that reached the Best Places to Work in HR shortlist – and especially the winners – should be justly proud of what they have achieved.
Look out for further coverage and pictures from the event in next week’s Personnel Today.
