People power rules OK

By VICKI JAYNE

How can human resource initiatives add to an organisation's performance and profitability?

It is easy enough to chant the "people are our best asset" mantra, but harder to deliver measurable value on that proposition.

Massey University has come up trumps by creating a web-based recruitment system that dramatically cut hiring times and job advertising costs.

This initiative not only shaved $600,000 off the university's annual talent-hunting bill, but also earned it a top prize at last week's national Human Resources Institute awards.

Other lauded HR strategies ranged from literacy and employee empowerment programmes to the imaginative use of a movie theme.

Entrants from throughout the country were evaluated on five criteria: leadership, effective change management, innovation, employee relations and culture. To earn awards, HR initiatives needed to have been in place long enough to prove their worth.

Massey University's HR department first started exploring a better recruitment method in late 1999, prompted by the growing expense of filling 400 positions a year.

Other drivers included the need to co-ordinate recruitment processes across three geographically distant campus sites, and to reduce the amount of paperwork involved.

What began as the creation of a job website ended up taking in the whole recruitment process, says Bill Kimberly, manager of project and strategy in Massey's HR department.

"It covers everything from creating a job position through approval, automatic placement on the website, to the delivery of online applications.

"All details of the process are entered on to databases so there are a lot of efficiencies in not having to replicate processes. The whole thing is completely seamless."

It is also homegrown. After checking available recruiting software, the three-strong project team of Kimberly, business analyst Bronwen Bayliss and computer consultant Alan Howard could not find anything that fitted all of Massey's needs. So they designed their own system.

"Another reason for building it ourselves is that we wanted our own brand on it," says Kimberly. "When you're recruiting, it's important to have the Massey brand upfront."

Initially implemented within the HR department, the system was introduced across the whole university in April last year. All training was done in the two weeks before launch and the implementation worked well from day one, says Kimberly.

"It is an easy system to use because it's so intuitive. We ran a customer survey about six months after implementation and another one three to four months ago and 92 per cent of respondents thought it good or exceptionally good.

"It's saved money, we get a good type of applicant coming through, and it helps to lift Massey's profile."

While the winning entry focused on one area of HR, Glenn Keen, an awards judge and director of HR Alliances, says this year's entries were characterised by a more generalised approach than in other years.

"Companies are looking at HR in a more integrated way - aligning it with business vision and practice."

One company tackling HR in that light is second-time winner Ecopine.

It picked up an award last year for performance management.

This year it earned one of the top regional placings (Auckland) for an initiative based on Professor Iwai Kobayashi's book 20 Keys to Workplace Improvement.

While these cover many operational issues, the basic premise is that action should energise the workplace through empowering employees at all levels to improve what they do every day.

"What's neat about it is that it gets people really enthusiastic about their work," says Ecopine's manager for organisational development, Karen Boyte.

Key 3, in particular, focuses on small group activities, harnessing the wisdom of the shopfloor. Each operational team meets 15 minutes before its shift to discuss safety, production targets and communication.

Since these daily meetings started just over two years ago, productivity has increased significantly, record safety levels have been achieved and about 13,000 ideas implemented.

So far, Ecopine has introduced 15 of Kobayashi's keys, each of which contains performance levels that range from beginner to world-class.

Some of these are still in their early stages but all build one on another to improve every aspect of workplace performance, says Boyte.

New enterprise Kiwibank earned its top placing in the Wellington region for a training programme that had some tough objectives.

From its Wellington head office, the HR department had to train more than 2000 staff who were effectively on loan from another organisation and could not be taken out of circulation for long. All this took place under a critical media spotlight.

Using a mix of pre-course work, five training days, a play system to practise on, e-learning refresher manuals and coaching, Kiwibank - with Wellington company AMR Capability Solutions - trained and certified 534 banking representatives and 1700 supporting retail officers in a tight timeframe.

Although there was no southern regional winner, Christchurch network services company Connectics earned a highly commended award for introducing a literacy programme to help workers to cope with increased job complexity and tougher safety requirements.

Results included improved safety, performance and worker morale.

The Navy earned a highly commended award in Auckland for introducing an employee feedback system aligned with its leadership model and core values.

And persuading Vodafone management to dress up as movie characters from The Matrix to launch the company's strategic plan characterised an approach that earned HR director Jan Mottram the inaugural HR person of the year award.

She is described as playing a key role in creating an organisational culture with an "integrated sense of values and fun".

Top HR people and projects

HR person of the year: Jan Mottram, director of HR, Vodafone.

HR initiative of the year, national winner: Massey University.

HR initiative of the year, Wellington region winner: Kiwibank.

HR initiative of the year, Auckland region: Ecopine.

HR initiative of the year, Auckland region, highly commended: The Navy.

HR initiative of the year, central North Island region, winner: Massey University.

HR initiative of the year, southern region, highly commended: Connectics.

* vjayne@iconz.co.nz