The FINANCIAL — Only 33% of key companies in Georgia have Human Resource positions according to a survey carried out by The FINANCIAL. Out of 550 entities only 179 have a position under the name of HR Manager.
The FINANCIAL — Only 33% of key companies in Georgia have Human Resource positions according to a survey carried out by The FINANCIAL. Out of 550 entities only 179 have a position under the name of HR Manager. The remaining 67% of companies either have no persons responsible for human resource management or such duties are attached to the company directors or other division managers. Out of the 179 HRs in Georgia, only 16% are men, while 84% of HR departments are run by women.
The research was carried out among 550 small, medium sized and large companies based in Georgia.
“This situation has arisen because Georgia is a post soviet country, often HR is perceived as a job that only includes paperwork, salaries, bringing somebody into service and dismissals. In many organizations managers often combine this work with another post and that’s why they do not see the need for an actual HR,” said Nino Kurtanidze, HR specialist at JSC Nikora, leading meat producer in Georgia.
“However, in general, Human Resources’ function in retail involves: identifying various roles in the organization, recruiting persons with the right attitude to fit the job, training, motivation of employees and evaluation of employee performance,” Kurtanidze added.
“Companies’ heads of HR are dealing with a wide range of managerial and leadership competencies. But let me underline two of them which make this profession interesting and valuable for me. Those are the areas of people and personal leadership,” said Mikheil Bregvadze, Director of the Employee Services Division at Geocell, one of the leading mobile communication companies in Georgia.
“In the recent past the role of HR was more closely aligned with personnel and administration functions. Currently it has become evident that HR’s function should be more close to business and deliver strategic and transformation work,” said Tea Bokuchava, Quality, Standards and Communication Coordinator at Bank Republic’s Human Resources Department.
“The rapidly changing demand of the market speeds up organizational change and HR function must parallel the needs of its changing organization. Stretching oneself in line with rapidly changing market demands is the most interesting and at the same time challenging aspect of the HR profession these days,” Bokuchava added.
“Human Resource management represents a vital part of the organization on which depends a company’s success. HR is the middle man between employees and company management. It has a regulator function, which is quite stressful and psychologically difficult,” said Ana Gotsiridze, Head of the HR Department at Elit Electronics.
Moreover, according to The FINANCIAL’s survey carried out among 630 companies in Georgia in March, 40% of companies actually had a position under the name of PR. It turned out that PR managers are more needed professions than HR managers who are actually in charge of recruiting people. Furthermore, 80% of PRs in Georgia are women, while only 20% are men.
According to the survey the highest presence of HRs is in the energy sector (88%), followed by the financial sector (70%), non-governmental sector (53%), commercial services sector (50%), telecommunication sector (45%), healthcare sector (40%), international and local business companies (34%), capital goods and consumer staples sector (25%), consumer discretionary sector (24%), transportation sector (18%) and consumer services sector (9%).
The highest presence of female HRs is in the consumer services sector, non-governmental sector and healthcare sector, where all HR managers are women. Moreover, in the financial and telecommunication sector 90% of HRs are women, followed by the energy sector (86%), capital goods sector (85%), commercial services (83%), consumer staples (79%), international and local businesses companies (71%), consumer discretionary and transportation (67%).
The highest presence of male HRs is in the transportation and consumer discretionary sector (33%), followed by international and local business companies (29%), consumer staples and commercial services sectors.
“The interesting role of HR Manager ranges from interviewing prospective candidates, to providing the best possible environment for task efficiency at a minimal cost to the company.
Working in Human Resources is an important and rewarding job, which simultaneously helps the employer to serve the employees as well as helping the employees serve the employer,” said Nino Kiladze, HR Manager at Adress.
Bregvadze believes that building support of other divisions, motivating your staff, developing people and fostering open communications in a company are vital.
“The most interesting thing about being an HR is dealing with all the kinds of different people, different in everything from viewpoints to temperament. The most challenging aspect of the job in my opinion is speaking the language all these people do,” said Davit Kipiani, HR Manager of Marriott Hotels.
“One of the most interesting spheres in the HR field is communication with people and creating a comfortable environment for them. HR manages staff, and based on several criterions makes the decision to fire and hire staff members. Consequently, it is hard work to take the right decision freely,” said Gotsiridze.
The main problem faced by HRs is searching for the right people with the right experience for different positions.
“Companies and HR personnel have made great inroads and improvements in the area of recruitment and candidate selection over the years. However the traditional recruitment process is still costly and time-consuming for both employers and job seekers,” said Kurtanidze.
Kurtanidze underlines several common problems HRs face such as: external factors – multiple candidates sourcing channels due to shortage of talents, increased volume of applications due to the economic downturn.
“Complexity of data such as incoming applications in various formats – mail, fax, email and different job board formats, which is time consuming and involves manual screening and reviewing of resumes. Moreover, candidates are only telling you what they want you to know, wasting a substantial amount of time on interviewing unqualified candidates,” Kurtanidze said.
“Recruiting qualified candidates remains the biggest challenge as these are still hard to find. As more organizations lay-off staff and the unemployment numbers climb, recruiters are approached from more and more people looking for work. Rather than making a recruiter’s job easier, the increase in applicants means recruiters must be more judicious than ever in culling through the information to find the right candidates. Using all the tools available – including careful resume screening, phone interviews, face-to-face meetings, and both formal and informal reference checks – is more important than ever to make sure you are making the right choices,” declared Bokuchava.
Kipiani sees the main problem in the unpreparedness of candidates who arrive at job interviews and do not even know themselves what they want.
“It’s obvious that an HR manager, the same as any other type of manager, is time to time facing challenges to be solved and sorted out. But of course most of the things are related to employees; their performance management, relatively difficult employees to be managed, coaching, developing and if necessary changing people’s positions to achieve the well-being of a company – that also means dismissals, are not simple subjects and need lots of effort, time and energy,” declared Bregvadze.
“When it comes to the recruitment of people – the issues related to a clean and deep process of matching the right candidates to open positions are the key to success. Otherwise everybody will suffer: the newly recruited persons, departments where he/she was hired to, and the company itself,” Bregvadze added.
As Kiladze declares, the main problem is finding qualified candidates for the position you need. Most CVs Adress receives do not correspond with the requirements.
Staff motivation is one of the keys to the success of a company and consequently HRs conduct different activities for better staff management.
“Employee retention is one of the primary measures of the health of your organization. If you are losing critical staff members, you can safely bet that other people in their departments are looking as well. Exit interviews with departing employees provide valuable information you can use to retain remaining staff. Heed their results. You’ll never have a more significant source of data,” said Kiladze.
According to Kiladze, the best means of motivation are: a bonus system; overtime pay; celebrating annual holidays; congratulations and gifts on birthdays and other significant dates (marriage, engagement), etc.
As Bokuchava says, Bank Republic provides competitive pay and benefit packages to keep staff content.
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