Design thinking is emerging as a new trend in HR

Abstract

After several years struggling to retain talent and ensure commitment to the company of the employees, to improve leadership or building a strong Corporate Culture, 92% of the HR Senior Managers and Directors that have been interviewed by Deloitte in its « 2016 Global Human Capital trends » report have mentioned as top priority the need to re-think and re-design its organizations.

Indeed, the current reality shows that the employees are overloaded with work resulting from the fact that their teams have been reduced, flooded with information and e-mails, stuck in endless meetings or in boring training sessions, and with no time to actually do their jobs. Despite the improvements introduced in terms of technology in most companies, the fact is that productivity has not been increasing. The employees complain about the complexity of processes, the amount of different tools and applications and the time it takes to execute the instructions as to perform their work.

Meanwhile, we are seeing a new wave of young people applying for jobs and entering the jobs market, that challenge the status quo, the ways of management and leadership, that constantly are looking for job experiences that are interesting and enriching, continuous learning, fast career developments, flexibility in terms of working hours and work places and digital tools, that are up-to-date and innovative.

According to this report, this «new organization» needs to be based upon a new leadership and management model, in the design of a working environment that is simple and where people feel good, in a structure of project teams that have high autonomy, in a new model of career development and of strong company culture, where values are understood, onboarded, integrated and lived by both employees and customers.

Nowadays, companies with innovative HR departments (like GE or Nestlé) are developing efforts to incorporate design thinking, as an approach centered in human behavior, to better understand the needs and expectations of their employees, and, thus, design news ways of managing, developing and training them. Instead of remaining focused in creating processes and programs, these innovative companies seek to simplify the working environment, developing initiatives, apps and tools that help their employees to be more productive and feeling less stressed.

But, for that to happen, the role of HR needs to be different. The HR teams need to develop new competencies, in order to take a view of their organization from a new perspective, more focused in the employees experience at work and not just in processes. These new competencies will provide the inspiration to re-design the working environment itself, the way people communicate and interact with each other, the way they recruit, train, develop talent, involve and evaluate their people.

Design thinking is focused on the individual and its experiences not in the process. Introducing design thinking as an HR management practice, means to study people in their working environment, developing «personas», understanding their concerns, motivations and expectations, to generate ideas fast, to prototype these ideas, test them, receive feedback from the users and implement new solutions. The ultimate goal is to develop an employee experience, which is simple, rewarding and motivational for all employees during their entire
time in the company that will ensure high levels of involvement, talent retention and increase of productivity.