People management is a term that encompasses talent acquisition, optimization, retention and any other tasks that involve employees and their development, providing seamless business support and encompassing end-to-end processes to promote organisational and career growth.
What makes a successful company? Many leaders would suggest that it is the people who work under them – and they would be right. Having the support of an engaged, reliable employee base not only enhances efficiency and productivity (boosting the bottom line), but also nurtures an energetic and positive work environment. That said, while recruiting the right talent is a vital element of building an effective workforce, it’s not the only factor to consider. To put it another way: Great employees aren’t always found, but are more often developed through ongoing support.
People management, an extension of human resources (HR), takes the big-picture view of caring for and supporting employees throughout their entire time with the company, with the goal of helping them to be successful. As such, people management includes the essential processes associated with talent acquisition, but also extends to ongoing employee development, engagement and retention. In essence, the right approach to people management can optimise the entire employee lifecycle by addressing the unique needs, talents and career objectives of employees on an individual and daily level.
At the core of any organisation’s success lies a fundamental truth: A company’s growth and prosperity are directly linked to the satisfaction, commitment and performance of its employees. Encouraging and supporting employees, therefore, is not just a matter of being a benevolent employer. Instead, it directly correlates with tangible business outcomes and the overall health of an organisation. Understanding this principle reinforces the importance of people management.
More specifically, effective people management promotes:
Every new hire is the culmination of a range of different expenses – posting jobs, screening candidates, performing background checks and conducting interviews all come with associated costs, and those costs only increase once the employee is being trained and outfitted. These expenses are investments – ones that (ideally) the company will eventually recuperate as the employee begins to work. Unfortunately, too many new hires choose to leave their employers before that investment can pay off. At the same time, even established employees may seek other opportunities, taking their valuable experience with them.
One of the most tangible benefits of effective people management is its capacity to enhance employee retention. By cultivating a nurturing environment that recognises and rewards talent, companies can ensure that their valuable human assets remain loyal. An effective people management system minimises the costs of employee turnover, countering not just the financial aspects, but also the knowledge gaps and diminished team morale that come from losing important team members.
It can be easy to think of a workforce as a sort of clockwork mechanism, with every member as a cog, gear or spring working together towards a shared set of goals. But employees are more than just parts of a machine focused on doing their job: They want to understand how their role fits into the bigger picture, and they want their individual efforts to be recognised.
Clarity, recognition, advocacy – these concepts play a significant role in the effectiveness of an organisation. When employees know how they are contributing to the success of the business and are confident that their voices are being heard, they are more motivated to deliver their best. Likewise, knowing that they have the organisation’s support in their professional journey creates a sense of belonging. This feeling of inclusivity and value drives employees to not only meet, but often surpass organisational expectations, resulting in enhanced operational effectiveness.
Elevating employees from the cog status results in empowerment, allowing them to take more initiative and more direct control over how they approach tasks and problems. Of course, it’s easy to talk about empowerment without actually sharing any power with the workforce – but in terms of people management, empowerment is more than just a buzzword.
By offering consistent feedback, setting clear objectives and facilitating opportunities for career advancement, organisations create a space where employees feel both challenged and supported. Additionally, with the skills, resources, opportunity and authority to play a more decisive role, employees tend to rise to the occasion. An empowered environment allows for heightened engagement levels, increasing productivity alongside employee initiative, collaboration, communication and commitment to the organisation.
People management demands a balanced blend of both hard and soft skills (also called ‘power skills’). Given the overarching goal of guiding and supporting employees throughout their journey in an organisation, managers are expected to be adept in various aspects of human interaction, alongside technical and operational competencies. Such a diverse skill set ensures that a manager can cater to an employee’s professional needs, while understanding and addressing their personal challenges and aspirations.
With that in mind, the following are among the most important people management skills:
Empathy
Central to effective people management is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. An empathetic manager can perceive the challenges, concerns and motivations of their team members, making it easier to offer support and guidance tailored to each individual’s needs.Communication
Clear and concise communication is the bridge that connects managers to their teams. It facilitates the sharing of expectations, feedback and information, ensuring that everyone is aligned with organisational objectives. For managers, communication takes on additional importance, allowing them to effectively understand the needs and concerns of various stakeholders and then disseminate that information throughout the team.Trust
Trust forms the foundation of any healthy professional relationship. Managers should not only be trustworthy, but also willing to place trust in their employees, empowering them to take initiative and ownership of their roles.Active listening
More than just hearing words, active listening involves fully concentrating, understanding and responding to what the other person is saying. It demonstrates genuine interest and respect, leading to a deeper grasp of team members’ perspectives.Task prioritisation
With so many responsibilities, managers must be adept at prioritising essential tasks without allowing less essential concerns to fall through the cracks. This ensures that the most urgent and important responsibilities are addressed promptly, creating a culture of efficiency and productivity.Motivational ability
Possibly more than any other position, managers are expected to inspire and drive their team towards success. By understanding individual triggers and aspirations, managers can tailor their motivational techniques to uplift and energise their teams.Creativity
Innovative problem-solving and out-of-the-box thinking are invaluable in people management. Creativity helps in crafting unique solutions tailored to individual needs, ensuring that both the employee and the organisation thrive.Organisational aptitude
Systematically arranging resources, tasks, people and schedules is at the heart of people management. A manager with a strong organisational aptitude can seamlessly orchestrate complex projects and interconnected processes, ensuring that deadlines are met, goals are achieved, and people are being deployed in ways that make the best use of their abilities.Emotional intelligence
Emotional intelligence is the ability to recognise, understand and manage one’s own emotions while being considerate of the emotional states of others. When it comes to people management, high emotional intelligence ensures that managers can navigate challenging situations with tact, resolve conflicts amicably and foster a harmonious team environment.
Developing the right skills can put managers in an advantageous position to encourage and support the people who make up their teams, but unlocking the full potential of a workforce takes something more. The 5 Cs of effective people management is a person-focused strategy for building an optimally engaging and empowering employee experience. This breaks people management down into five key components:
People management can be said to begin during the hiring process. Recruitment policies backed by powerful tools help to ensure that individuals being considered for a position not only possess the necessary skills, but also align with the organisation’s values and goals.
This stage continues even after a hire is brought onboard – providing consistent training and equipping team members with the tools that they need for success. Furthermore, constructing the right team structure, establishing processes and defining clear success metrics give employees a solid understanding of their roles and the larger objectives that they are working towards.
As the name suggests, people are the central focus of people management – and that includes their interests, concerns, challenges and goals. By applying many of the power skills discussed earlier, managers can better understand what makes their people tick, and use these insights to create personalised management strategies.
Recognising that every team member is unique, leaders must invest time into getting to know the different personalities, motivations and aspirations within their teams. Also, while digital solutions exist that can capture and analyse employee data to uncover some of these insights, it is generally more effective to pursue this information naturally by interacting directly with employees. Put simply: Get to know them before worrying about how to manage them.
Teams aren’t teams if they can’t coordinate their efforts. Without collaboration, teams risk working in silos, leading to duplication of efforts, missed opportunities for synergy and even contradictory outcomes. True collaboration ensures that varied perspectives are considered, leveraging the diverse experiences and skill sets of team members and resulting in richer solutions and more informed decision making.
Likewise, promoting a collaborative environment in an organisation goes beyond merely achieving project-specific goals. It plays a crucial role in building a cohesive work culture where individuals feel valued, heard and understood. In the realm of people management, collaboration is not just a tool for task accomplishment: It is an essential ingredient in building trust, open communication and shared responsibility. When collaboration is deeply embedded in the organisational culture, it cultivates an environment where continuous learning, mutual respect and shared victories become the norm, rather than the exception.
Collaboration is not possible without clear and effective communication. When teams communicate seamlessly, they function harmoniously, ensuring that individual contributions align towards a collective goal. Open channels with regular feedback lead to a better understanding among team members, while also providing a platform for constructive criticism and mutual growth.
A culture of communication within an organisation may also play a pivotal role in shaping an employee’s perception of their significance within the business. An employee who is kept in the loop and understands the bigger picture is more likely to feel valued and motivated. By equipping employees with efficient communication channels, businesses can ensure consistent, effective and transparent interactions that are key to robust people management – even when those interactions occur remotely.
Lastly, the ability to confront is a necessary, albeit challenging aspect of people management. As teams grapple with internal challenges and conflicts, addressing them proactively and ensuring open dialogue is pivotal. This is not to say that confronting must feel confrontational: People perceive and approach tasks differently, and these personal differences should be addressed in a friendly, positive and understanding way.
Of course, there are times when conflict becomes more aggressive and less productive. In these situations, people management must be capable of acting fairly and decisively to resolve the conflict so that every party is satisfied with the outcome. Failure to do so can lead to resentment or mistrust within the team, harming productivity.
With so many elements and such a broad mandate, there are many different ways to approach people management – and some are more effective than others. To help ensure that an organisation’s employees are being directed along the right path to success, consider the following best practices for people management:
One of the earliest steps in effective people management is to provide clarity. Employees need to understand what is expected of them – not just in terms of task outcomes, but also in terms of behaviour, collaboration and adherence to organisational values. When expectations are clear, it eliminates ambiguities and sets the foundation for accountability.
Employees do not want to stagnate: They want to update and upskill, improving their work value and opening up new opportunities within the company. Organisations that prioritise and facilitate continuous education create a culture of learning, and often find that their employees are better equipped to handle challenges while also being more adaptable to change. Continuous learning is for managers and other leaders as much as it is for the workforce; everyone in the organisation can benefit from career development opportunities and knowledge sharing.
Be constant in providing feedback: Regular feedback, when it is positive and constructive, ensures that employees know where they stand and which areas require improvement. More than simply bringing employees back ‘in line’ when they make mistakes, feedback is a proactive approach that prevents small issues from snowballing into significant problems.
While guidance is essential, micromanaging can be counterproductive. Trusting employees to take ownership of their tasks will naturally lead to them feeling more invested in the outcomes, boosting both morale and efficiency. It is the job of the people manager to make sure that the employees have access to the resources and professional support that they need to perform at their best levels; however, once these needs have been met, the best managers are the ones who step back, extend trust and allow the employee to make their own unique contributions.
A natural human response when faced with potential problems is to ‘wait and see’, but letting performance issues fester can lead to much greater problems. On the other hand, by addressing such concerns promptly and constructively, managers can not only course correct, but may even be able to turn the issue into a positive learning opportunity for the employee.
Forward-thinking organisations understand the value of innovation. By creating an environment where employees are encouraged to think outside the box and propose novel solutions, companies can position themselves for sustainable success.
Not every innovative idea is successful, but that should not stop innovators from trying. Failure is an intrinsic part of growth – instead of penalising mistakes, organisations should view them as learning opportunities, ensuring that employees are not deterred from taking calculated risks in the future.
Behind every breakthrough, every innovation and every success story, there’s a team of dedicated professionals striving for excellence. This is because great companies are built on a foundation of great people – yet this foundation requires maintenance. An intentional and comprehensive approach to people management makes it possible to turn every employee into their best work selves. To do this, organisations need not only mentorship and resources, but also powerful software solutions to streamline and enhance the work experience.
ServiceNow HR Service Delivery gives your organisation the tools to connect and inspire your workforce. Offering a unified employee experience, HR Service Delivery not only boosts productivity, but ensures operational efficiency across various departments. With the built-in Employee Center, managers can effortlessly scale service delivery solutions and employees can access crucial resources. Manager Hub empowers leaders with personalised tools to stay in sync with their teams, even on the go. Automated workflows pave the way for employees to accomplish more in less time, without hurting the quality of work. And with Now Mobile, HR Service Delivery is just a tap away.
For those companies interested in building a better workforce, ServiceNow provides the comprehensive solution they’ve always wanted. Demo ServiceNow today!