The human resource department is the heart of a company. A manager of human resources takes the initiatives needed to keep the employee happy, drive the business operation and ensure the proper environment for the work to be done.

Therefore, an HR representative holds immense responsibility. By becoming a good HR manager, you can make a world of differences for a business.

In order to become a good Human Resource manager, you need to master the HR Basics, Essential HR Skills and develop above-par Social Skills.

In this blog, we will cover all of the skills that a good HR manager need to acquire. So, if you are an existing HR professional or want to become one in the future, this article will give you a nice idea on how to become a good HR manager.

We have divided this article into three major type of skills that you need. Which are –

1. Learning & Understanding the 5 HR Basics
2. Developing Social Skills
3. Mastering Other Essential HR Skills

Learning and understanding the 5 HR basics

If you want to build a long and successful human resource career, learning and understanding the 5 core HR functions are a must. Here we have laid out the must-have HR skills in detail.

Recruitment and selection

Recruitment is the single most important skill for a Human Resource supervisor. Depending on the company, an HR might have different job responsibilities, but preparing a job circular, screening, interviewing, and recruiting are the skills every company seeks in an HR manager.

In order to become a great or even a good human resource manager, you will have to excel at managing the whole recruiting process and ensure that your company is getting the brightest resource possible.

Learning and development

Recruiting is a must-have skill to find the most skillful candidates. But it is also expected that you will help them become the most skilled after they join your company. This is an integral part of human resource management, yet ignored by many. But without giving them proper training, you can not make your employee ready for bigger roles in the future.

Providing the employees with proper training, materials, guides can help them to become much more efficient. And an efficient employee means an efficient company.

Performance management

The human resource administrator is responsible for monitoring the performance of the employees of a company. But performance management is more than just monitoring how the employees are doing, it is also setting clear attainable goals for your employees, keep them inspired so that they stay productive and achieve the goals.

Performance management also includes periodical performance reviews, appraisal, and feedback sharing with the employees. Doing all these efficiently can help you manage the performance of your employees and the company at the same time.

Succession planning

Succession planning is another important process that the human resource manager oversees. It involves the identification of the employees as the possible successors to the senior positions in an organization when such positions become vacant. Employees leave companies or their position for many reasons such as retirements, job switches, and promotions.

It is the responsibility of the human resource manager to identify and prepare a successor to every position.

Compensation and benefits

Salary & benefit are other aspects of a business that is managed by the person in charge of the human resource management department. Setting appropriate salaries based on skills and performance and deciding on periodical increments are crucial parts of the business. A big part of employee happiness and company growth depends on this matter. So a good HR manager must become competent to manage compensation and benefit efficiently.

Developing social skills

You can’t expect to be a good human resource manager without having proper social or interpersonal skills. Here are the interpersonal skills that you must develop in order to be a good HR manager.

Communication skill

If the HR is not competent enough to communicate and connect with the employee, it is impossible for a business to grow. an HR manager has to communicate with the employees, upper management, and outsiders every day. That is why, to ensure he is able to communicate efficiently, proper communication skill is a must for an HR person.

Decision making

HR Manager often has to make challenging decisions for the company and its employees. One wrong decision can hamper the company and the employee’s happiness. For this reason, an HR manager must be capable of making great decisions, even in tough situations.

Conflict management

It’s not bad to have a disagreement with employees over some matters. A different point of view is often good for the company, as they offer more ideas for the company to grow.

However, when disagreement reaches the level of conflict. The human resource manager must step in. Conflicts between employees or upper management can break an employee’s morale and potentially reduce productivity. A person responsible for Human Resource management needs to find the reason behind the conflicts and solve it. This is why conflict management is such an important skill to have.

Build empathy

Empathy makes you not just a better human resource manager, but a better human being. If an HR manager wants to be the first person an employee thinks of when facing any problem, he must develop empathy.

To achieve it, a Human Resource handler must ensure a positive environment throughout the company, eager to listen to the employees’ problems, give the problems enough importance, and try to help & act upon them.

Empathy is not an easy skill to develop. But with practice, there’s no reason a human manager can’t be great at it.

Other essential HR skills

Apart from Core HR Functions and Social Skills, an HR manager must also master some other essential HR skills. Let’s have a look at some of these equally important skills.

Organizational skill

an HR manager oversees a lot of organizational processes. From interviews to training the employees, performance management, compensation planning, and preparing paper works for all of these. HR managers also need to create the rules & regulations on which basis the organization and the employee will operate.

To perform all these tasks efficiently, an HR manager must possess the above-par organizational skills.

Budgeting skill

From setting compensation & benefits to allocating money for pens & papers that a company needs for operation, an HR manager looks after every penny that a company spends. It is the responsibility of HR to ensure the company is not overspending on any sector.

That’s why an HR manager must be very good at budgeting skill.

Confidentiality skill

The HR department has its hands on some very sensitive data such as employee personal files, medical files, and many more. Moreover, they also have access to confidential documents such as salary, employee contract, and future planning.

an HR manager needs to master the confidentiality skill to keep the confidential data within himself.

Adaptability skill

Everyone needs to be adaptive, but no one in an organization needs the adaptability skill as much as the human resource managers do. An organization must be a free-flowing entity, when it’s time to make changes to the policy, a human resource manager must be the one to make it. Moreover, an HR manager is the one to lead from the front when adapting to the changes that will help the company grow.

Understanding and comprehending values

When making the tough decisions for your company that might upset some of the employees or might seem blatantly ignorant to the naked eye, a human resource manager must hold on to his values.

A company and more importantly a human resource manager must have a set of principles to follow, whenever a tough time comes these values must dictate the HR manager to take the right decision.

Becoming data-driven

Last but not the least, an HR manager must be data-driven. Taking decisions based on sheer intuition like a gambler is not the best way of work for an HR manager. However, in order to become data-driven, an HR manager must have access to digital tools that can back him up for data analytics. Modern HRM tools can be the perfect assistant for an HR manager by automatizing many aspects of the company while also giving him important information.

WP ERP HRM – a tool that helps you become a better hr manager

WP ERP HRM module is a free WordPress HRM Plugin that makes employee management very easy for an HR manager. With this plugin, you can see detailed employee profiles of your organization. Along with that, personal details, leave management, promotions, increments, performance, attendance is also available for the HR manager to monitor very easily.

WP ERP HRM has very detailed documentation that minimizes the learning curve as much as possible, so you’ll be able to get started in no time.

A good HR manager can contribute in company welfare better than anybody else

You must understand that there’s no alternative for a company for the human resource manager. HR manager is the behind the scene force for a productive and growth-focused company. HR manager is responsible for keeping the employees happy, training them to be more skilled, manage compensation and other budgeting of the company as well.

Because the human resource manager plays such a crucial role for the company, it is important for him to be efficient. To become a good HR manager, a person needs to master the Core HR Functions, Social Skills, and many other essential skills. We have talked about these skills in detail in this article.

If you are an aspiring HR professional, we hope it will help you give an idea of what is needed to become a good HR manager. If you are a human resource manager at present, this article might just be the one to improve on your lackings.