With the recent pandemic, HRs and managers have realized the importance of using digital tools to enhance employee engagement. Technology has already enabled companies to improve their efficiency levels by multiple times. The advent of the digital age has increased the role of software in enhancing the value of organizations as it has enabled them to improve the company’s overall productivity.
With artificial intelligence playing a significant part in modern technology and permeating most aspects of business intelligence today, it is evident that the importance of software is going to increase in the future. In this changing landscape, technology’s importance will inevitably increase with time.
Hence, this is the perfect time for the HR department to adopt new technology and embrace the changes in employee management. Modern HR should also update themselves with time and become tech-savvy and possess various digital skills to undertake their responsibilities skillfully.
Modern technology has already enhanced various aspects of employee management by supporting the HR department. It has automated different processes for them to undertake their duties efficiently. However, it becomes useless if HR personnel using these applications is not tech-savvy enough and cannot use the various modules. Hence, the HR department must be well-versed with the new technologies by updating their digital skills.
What are Digital Skills?
We can define ‘digital skills’ as the capability to effectively research, evaluate, share, create, and use digital content. The ability to use modern smart devices like computers and smartphones is a part of digital skills. The ability to search for this blog, read it, and understand the various concepts are a part of digital skills.
As for the HR department, digital skills refer to their ability to effectively use digital media to undertake their duties. It includes using social media effectively to find new talent, using payroll software to successfully disburse employee salaries, generating insightful reports for improving various aspects of their company, and many more.
Digital HR: Dawn of a New Era for the HRs
Now that we have defined what digital skills are let us look at five of the most important digital skill that an HR should possess in 2022…
Embrace Social Media
HRs have been utilizing the power of social media to recruit candidates since the rise in its popularity. However, with modern innovations, they need to get social media savvy and look for creative ways to find and hire new talent. The current HR department needs to embrace social media and the various tools it provides to enhance its functionality.
While Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) systems have had the option to integrate with social media accounts to expand their scope of operations, the number of HRs who actively use this function is less than those who rely on the traditional role of an ATS.
As of 2022, HRs need to start utilizing the full potential of ATS by integrating it with the company’s social media accounts so that they can post new jobs to job boards, several social media platforms, and career web pages from a single location. Additionally, ATS provides various options for reporting about several candidate-related parameters that help improve the effectiveness of the recruitment process.
The HR team should be able to generate these reports using their software and make meaningful observations from them to understand the current state of their recruitment and the changes they need to make to streamline their hiring process.
Enhance Technical Skills
Recent updates in the HR world have revealed the benefits of implementing technology in the HR domain. Hence, the HRs must enhance their technical skills as we advance. Improving their technical skills would help them understand and appreciate the newer technologies that allow them to undertake their tasks.
From the candidate application experience to their onboarding to enhancing employee engagement to providing feedback channels to career development with training, technology has seeped into all aspects of the HR department duties. To ensure that you can keep up with the changes in technology, you need to update yourself with the latest developments in the HR technological realm.
As with any technology, HR systems and software keep getting better with new advancements. For example, artificial intelligence and machine learning were not even remotely related to the HR department until a few years ago. However, the latest HRMS software actively uses these technologies to enhance the employee experience and provide the HR with decisive data to improve their duties. Modern HRMS even utilizes predictive analysis to make educated guesses at predicting the company’s future, helping the HR team to take necessary steps to make the outcome positive.
Improve HR Software Proficiency
Human Resources Management Software (HRMS) has become synonymous with the HR department’s duties and functions. It has enabled the HR teams to improve their efficiency multi-fold. Hence, HRs need to increase their HR software proficiency and get themselves familiarized with new updates in the HR technological domain to help them use HRMS software efficiently.
HRs need to be constantly on the lookout for any new updates in the HR software market as there is a variety of HR software available today. This software ranges from simple single module tools to comprehensive modular systems that can undertake all the functions of the HR team.
Hence, ensure that you get yourself acquainted with all the functionalities and understand the system’s intricacies. Many software vendors provide training when implementing their software in your company. You need to ensure that you and your team attend these training sessions to understand your HRMS solution better.
Being proficient will all the system’s features would help use the software efficiently and save a considerable amount of time in undertaking administrative tasks that are often repetitive.
Leverage Cloud Architecture
In this digital age, staying connected is not a luxury but a necessity. Hence, you must leverage the cloud technologies to deploy an HRMS that is cloud-based and can use the advantages of that architecture.
There are several advantages of using a cloud-based HRMS over legacy software. The main benefits include:
- 24/7 access to your database
- Enterprise-grade encryption
- User access control
- Regular data backup
- Zero maintenance costs
- Remote access
- Avoid software installations
- Automated statutory compliance
- Enhanced scalability
- Increased Modularity
The advantages given above are why an increasing number of organizations are opting to use cloud-based HR solutions over legacy ones. By paying a small fee, the companies can enjoy the benefits of cloud architecture while overcoming the shortcomings of traditional software.
Since cloud-based HRMS is the future, HR professionals must learn the required skills to become acquainted with such software and its various functionalities and modules. Since these programs are used to improve the efficiency of employee management efforts, it is an essential skill for every HR to have in this digital age.
Develop Analytical Skills
As any good HR would know, reporting and analytics have considerable significance in the HR domain. While the traditional analysis methods would have been enough in the earlier days of HRMS, it has become quite complicated as we have developed various new metrics that were hitherto not measurable using the traditional techniques.
Hence, modern HR should also concentrate on improving their analytical skills to ensure that they can develop interactive reports on advanced metrics as and when required.
Although modern HRMS solutions also offer a variety of ways to generate these reports, having the expertise to create complex reports and infer meaningful deductions from them would help HR develop the required reports and provide strategic help for the management in implementing employee engagement plans.
Having good HRs with excellent analytical skills helps the company reduce the management costs and improve job satisfaction rates among the employees, thereby enhancing the employer brand of the organization, which help in attracting and retaining the employees too.
Conclusion
There are many digital skills necessary for modern HR that help navigate and conquer the complex HR domain. However, possessing the five skills discussed in this article is essential for any HR in 2022.
Being an HR, it is your responsibility to streamline the processes and help the management keep your employees engaged with your company. You should be able to utilize the technologies at your disposal to efficiently manage your employees and provide strategic enhancements to improve their engagement rate with your organization.
Possessing digital skills in this age would help enhance your overall skill set, which is essential to being a successful HR. Hence, you must concentrate on improving the five digital skills discussed in this article to ensure a successful career in human resources.
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