Mr. Gisdakis is one of the partners of Breitenstein Consulting.
Mr. Gisdakis: Why is strategic HR work so important for SMEs in particular?
SMEs are particularly affected by the shortage of skilled workers. Since the coronavirus pandemic, corporations have been increasingly moving into the regions and competing with local companies for scarce workers.
Why does strategic HR planning play a key role here?
To gain lead time. The more precisely you know your future requirements for skilled workers – I’m talking about 3-7 years – the better you can align your HR tools accordingly.
How does that work?
There are methods to bring together factors such as business strategy, innovations, but also personnel data such as fluctuation or my age pyramid and to create scenarios. Quantitatively and qualitatively. Then you know exactly in which jobs people or skills will be missing in the future. You can do this without expensive IT tools. We do this together with a few workshops with HR and the business managers.
Why is this so important for employer attractiveness?
Real beauty comes from within. Fancy employer branding doesn’t help if the job doesn’t deliver what it promises. If you know your future target groups exactly, then you can align your HR work very precisely with them. Employer branding, personnel development, talent programs – but also employment conditions, leadership and culture. These instruments then have a common goal: finding the right people and retaining them in the long term.
What do you mean by sustainable HR work?
Corporations have been doing this very systematically for a long time and have successfully aligned their HR work for the long term.
Many SMEs do not yet do this. However, more and more people are explicitly looking for medium-sized companies with between 250 and 3500 employees. Because they are looking for security and internationality, but at the same time a family environment. Because they want to take on holistic responsibility quickly or because they don’t want to live and work in conurbations. Corporations are often too abstract and impersonal for them – yet they are demanding in terms of employment conditions and culture.
You have to understand these people precisely, introduce them to the company and offer them exactly the right environment. The organization and management culture must be just as tailor-made as the flexible income system or the workplace. It takes a few years to develop something like this. This is what we mean by sustainable strategic HR work. This is precisely where SMEs are more flexible than large corporations – this is their strategic advantage in the battle for the right specialists!
