Develop a People Strategy to Meet Your Organizational Goals

By Dr. Vic | Jan 18th, 2024 | Employee engagement, HR consulting, Management consulting, Organizational development, People management, Talent assessment, | 0 Comments

An organization first needs to develop a people strategy for people development, which is different from HR strategy, in order to retain talent for its long term growth. Here are whys and hows.

What is a people strategy?

People are the heart and soul of any organization. To attract and retain talents, an organization needs an overall people strategy. People strategies are also needed for managing your workforce for organizational health and growth, and for individual employee development and career growth.

A people strategy is distinct from a human resources (“HR”) strategy, though the two intersect. An HR strategy tends to focus on managing departmental budgeting, compensation, benefits, legal compliance, and the like.

A people strategy, by contrast, focuses on employee engagement, career development, and workplace culture. A people strategy reflects the organization’s philosophy about the employer-employee relationship.

How does people strategies benefit an organization?

A people strategy sets the organization’s vision for its workforce:

Support an organization’s business goals. A sound people strategy future proofs an organization to meet current talent needs and anticipate future ones.
Motivate employees to perform at their best. An overarching organizational people strategy supports individual employees’ professional development and career growth.
Develop future leaders. By prioritizing employee development, a well honed people strategy helps an organization retain its best talent and cultivate new generations of leaders from within.
Develop healthy workplace culture. With strategies for employee engagement, learning, and teamwork, an organizational culture can improve the work environment and morale.
Improve the quality of products and services. Prioritizing people’s growth, development, and engagement will realize improvements in the goods and services they offer.

How to implement an organizational people strategy?

Employee engagement is the key

An engaged workforce is innovative and will go the extra mile to help the organization succeed. Engagement is central to a good people strategy. A workforce achieves high engagement when these are in place:

Transparency: An organization can build trust and mutual respect by being as transparent as possible about its plans and goals. An informed workforce best supports an organization.

Autonomy: Autonomy leads to motivation, which translates into better performance. People can be more creative and innovative when they have the freedom to make decisions about how they work. They feel trusted and valued, rather than stressed and passive under micromanagement.

Recognition: Regularly celebrating exceptional performance and success is an effective way to demonstrate that the organization values its people. Recognition creates incentives for better performance, and can also be cost effective.

These are only some of the ways organizations can foster greater engagement.

Employee learning & development, and career advancement

Employee learning and development is another pillar of an effective people strategy. By taking care of individual career growth, an organization can increase retention and better meet its business goals. Here are a few suggestions:

Focus on learning and development. Provide regular learning opportunities, both within and outside an employee’s current job duties. These can include in-house, online, and outside courses, micro-learning exercises, internal mentoring, and cross-functional assignments.

Create career paths. Develop milestones for employee career paths, so employees know where their efforts will lead. For particular individuals who show leadership potentials, an organization can also create individual leadership development plans.

Develop and support managers. Managers implement the organization’s policies and play a great role in fostering organizational culture. A good people strategy needs to enhance people, their operational skills, and soft skills for both experienced and first-time managers.

Solicit employee feedback, and act on it

An organization needs to have a mechanism for listening to its employees. An effective people strategy will include methods to obtain regular feedback about employee needs, wants, concerns, and suggestions. These can include surveys, team meetings, focus groups, and similar efforts. Only by checking in regularly with the workforce can the organization know whether its policies are on track.

Share feedback and action plans. Listening is just the first step. When employee feedback indicates the need for a change, the organization must act, hold itself accountable by sharing the survey results and its action plans for change.

Adjust as needed

Your people strategy is not static – it evolves to meet changing needs and priorities, and should be able to adapt to changed circumstances. An organization needs to adjust and recalibrate nimbly and timely.

The above are just some of the elements to consider when creating a people strategy for your organization. Each organization’s unique business needs and strategic goals will determine the specific details of its people strategy for people development. The broad focus should be on creating a workplace culture that provides everyone with the opportunities to thrive.

TEP.Global not only has a combined 100 years of experience and expertise in people management, talent acquisition, executive assessment, but also deep knowledge in building teams and workplace culture in organizations of all sizes. For more information and insights, please contact us.