What is business partnering?

BP involves sharing the responsibility of running a business. In an HR business partnership, a seasoned HR professional works with you and key senior staff to achieve business goals by creating an HR strategy that is aligned with them. This kind of partnering is a modern dynamic that goes beyond contractual obligations; it is in practice an alliance between two leaders, usually as part of your business’s leadership board. It is part of the continuously changing role of HR in your business, and what that means today. A strong human resources business partnership is one where both you and your business partner benefit highly from the relationship while focusing on the needs and obligations of your employees. Business partnering doubles as both a mindset and a model, and there are many positive outcomes from fully getting to grips with and developing both, which will be addressed in this article.

HR business partnering as a model

HR business partnering was a key interest of University of Michigan professor and business leader David Ulrich in 1999. He helped to revolutionise HR by proposing that HR partnering should be a core part of a business strategy. HR business partnering is just one key component of the ‘three legged stool’ model that he inspired. Today, there are many different business partnership models, some of which are modernised versions of the original three legged stool model, with a study showing that there are potential conflicts as to whether all ‘legs’ of the stool work together in harmony. Therefore, which business partnership model is right for you will depend on what you believe works best for your business. However, the most popular models are introducing an individual HR business partner and the three legged stool model, which includes the following areas:

Shared services

This is an administrative group that handles transactions within the organisation. These do not have to be HR-related processes; they can be other functional transactions. Examples include staff payroll, monitoring holiday and sick leave, recruitment administration and some basic employee relations.

Your shared services team does not have to be on-site; it can even be outsourced to a third party. It could be that the shared services team that you use for your business serves different businesses local to your area or on a global basis. Larger organisations tend to outsource their shared services department, but some small businesses find it more cost effective to do so as well. Other shared services include staff intranet and staff help services.

The benefits of having a shared services team include lower costs through cutting down on staff numbers, using cheaper accommodation for off-site shared services and greater efficiency though the streamlining of services.

Centres of excellence

The centre of excellence is a core team of senior, experienced HR staff. This team works on your business strategy to create staff initiatives, developments and interventions. They will also be involved with the long-term maintenance of learning strategies, training, establishing reward schemes, talent analysis and engagement. They will work alongside you in building employee relations, and will make sure that the outcomes of their strategies and initiatives are aligned with your overall strategies.

Strategic business partners

Individual strategic business partners work with you and/or your line managers to make sure that HR strategies are aligned with your business and people strategies. They will consult and lead on building the required strategies for your HR department, contributing new ideas and communicating them to your HR team. Generally speaking, they effectively connect you and your managers with the processes that fall under the umbrella of HR.

Individual business partner

Instead of using the three legged model, you may choose to have an individual human resources business partner, who is usually a senior member of your board. Like strategic business partners, they liaise between you and your HR team, making sure that all team developments, initiatives and other functions are supported and aligned in accordance with the overall business strategy. The individual business partner ensures that your HR team is working in the most cost-effective way and achieves results that benefit your business in the long term.

What decisions does an HR business partner make?

An HR business partner is not simply a part of the HR team; they are a senior employee who is perhaps a member of your board, helping you to make key decisions about:

• people functions
• demographics
• business culture
• employee well-being
• productivity
• training and learning opportunities.

These business partners also make sure that the goals of HR are integrated effectively with your overall business goals, however they are rarely involved in policy making; rather they help with the implementation of effective and relevant HR strategies.

Why is a human resources business partner model useful?

The HR BP model is a very effective way to make sure that your business is not overstretched in terms of finance and productivity. It means that you are aware, every step of the way, of how your HR goals are aligned with those of your overall productivity and financial goals.

The model is also useful in:

• saving you money in the long term. When your HR team is connected to the rest of your organisation effectively and is in sync with the entire business’s long-term and short-term goals, they will have a better understanding of which areas represent opportunities for increased efficiency and cost reduction;
• helping to combine people solutions with the achievement of objectives and the development of effective strategies to do so;
• providing necessary people solutions that are appropriately aligned with your goals and desired outcomes, such as training analysis and implementation;
• ensuring that there is healthier, faster and more accurate communication between the leadership board and the HR team.

A human resources business partner has a multi-faceted role on your board and can give you keen insights into how your HR team creates people solutions. They will also streamline communications for you, ensuring that new HR strategies are created and embedded in the HR team efficiently.

Business partnering as a mindset

A business partnership mindset is required in order to develop successful relationships with current and future business partners. The core attributes of this include:

• flexibility, combined with a sense of humility and openness to new ideas, while being able to defend your own carefully and diplomatically;
• being focused on the outcome, where both parties are aware of what they are hoping to gain from the partnership;
• solutions-based thinking – working collaboratively to solve problems that you would not be able to solve alone;
• making sure that your core values and ethics are aligned in a way that is synergistic and enables you to achieve your goals.

These mindset attributes are valuable to you as a business leader, but also to whoever you have integrated into your team as either a strategic business partner or individual human resources business partner.

What does a successful HR business partnership look like?

In his more recent 2012 book ‘HR from the Outside In: Six Competencies for the Future of Human Resources’, David Ulrich states that there are six competencies of HR that both you and your HR business partner should work together to implement. These six competencies are:

Strategic positioner

This involves looking at any outside influences on your organisation, including the external market and the field that your business is in. Look at governmental changes, new labour trends and sociological changes, and integrate them with your HR strategies.

Credible activist

Being a credible activist involves being reliable and showing your organisation that you can complete what you set out to do. Your aim here is to gain the trust of your stakeholders, inspiring your team and boosting morale.

Capability builder

Being a capability builder involves going back to the core foundations of your business, discussing your image with stakeholders and coming back to why your business is important in the field. Learn new ways of communicating your business’s image and core principles to make sure that all of your employees understand key branding points and ethics.

Change champion

As a change champion, you are looking to promote change in your workplace. Your HR team can be a great help in improving organisational structures in your workplace, but you will need to have experienced business partners to help you execute internal transformations that you can be confident in. This will involve assessing what your core values and missions are as a company and whether your current organisational structure is doing its best to work towards those missions and values.

Human resource innovator and integrator

Consider your overall business objectives alongside the training, learning and development requirements of your whole team. Learn how to improve employee performance by making sure that their skill set matches that which is required of them to meet your targets. Make sure that when new skills are required or need to be updated, this information is adequately communicated through the HR team.

Technology proponent

Make sure that your HR team is up to date with the latest performance management tools, but also social media and social learning tools as well. Create a team that can assess data to show which training and knowledge-based initiatives are most effective, and predict what your next steps should be.

What key aspects should I look for in an HR business partnership?

You will need to make sure that whoever you choose for an HR business partnership is the person best suited for the job. You are ideally looking for partners who are diplomatic leaders themselves and will help you to transform your business in a positive way. These are just a few of the key attributes to look for in a business partner:

• credible;
• capable;
• community minded;
• charismatic;
• able to see the bigger picture rather than always focusing on details;
• natural strategist;
• strong sense of responsibility.

Your business partner should have as many of these traits as possible; combined they will make for a more efficient partnership, as you will be able to rely on them for integral support during difficult decisions and during important strategy decisions.

You can create a strong HR business partnership with an individual business partner who helps you and your senior board to align your business strategy with the aims of your HR department. The aspects of the strategy that they will advise on will include people development, recruitment, learning initiatives and communicating core brand ethics and values to your entire team. Having a capable, credible and charismatic business partner is a great way to streamline processes in your business, saving you money and making communications more effective in the long term.

However, you can also use the ‘three legged model’, which incorporates HR business partnering into the bigger picture of HR transformations such as shared services and a centre of excellence. There are many HR business partnering models to choose from, and what suits your business will depend very much on the size of your business and its organisational structure.
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