How To Achieve Sustainability with Human Resource Outsourcing

This is part 2 of a series about human resource outsourcing. In Part 1 of these series, I discussed the value of adapting sustainability programs in the company’s business agenda. Sustainability refers to maximizing the company’s current inventory of assets in order to introduce efficiency, lower costs and contribute to the welfare of society and the protection of the environment. One of the most important, yet overlooked asset in an organization is people. Companies are hesitant to invest more resources for people because their unpredictable nature makes them difficult to manage.

Human Resource Outsourcing or HRO has grown in popularity in recent years as an effective strategy for optimizing the abilities of the human resource without any of its inherent risks. While providers of Human Resource Outsourcing services institute processes that qualify candidates based on technical and fundamental competencies, updated models for HRO systems have shifted more focus on addressing the behavioral component.

One of the leading proponents of behavioral-based management is Light-Core , a business improvement consultancy firm from Greater Toronto Area, Canada.

Since 2001, Tim and Sharon Gilmour-Glover have been helping businesses in North America navigate economic turbulence through the tenets of Behavioral Leadership. Behavioral Leadership identifies behavioral patterns that inhibit performance and discourage productivity within the organization. By addressing these disruptive behavioral patterns, a company can overcome fears and self-limiting beliefs and accomplish more goals.

In 2014, Light-Core decided to introduce its services to one of the most progressive yet volatile regions of the world, Asia. The strength of Asia as an emerging global superpower came to light in the Euro Zone crisis which culminated in the Greek elections of 2011. The effects on the financial breakdown were swift and immediate not only to Greece but to EU member nations as well. Among those affected were Spain and Italy.

But Asia remained steadfast and companies that outsourced services to ASEAN nations such as the Philippines continued to profit and retain successful operations. ASEAN’s resiliency further reaffirmed the decision of the community to integrate in 2015. ASEAN Integration will result in the lowering of trade barriers and have an effect on political, economic, cultural and societal structures the success of which are contingent on adapting ideal behavioral patterns.

Managing Human Resources Outsourcing

Through a business development agreement with a Philippine-based outsourcing services provider, Benchmark Global Management Solutions Incorporated, Light-Core is opening its Behavioral Leadership business consultancy services to companies of all sizes and industries. According to Light-Core CEO, Tim Glover, the timing of their expansion to Asia is perfect.

“The business community has never before experienced a more demanding, complex, fast paced business leadership environment. The playing field, and the associated mechanics and logic of business, are now changing faster than a leader’s capacity to adapt. The result, most leaders are now in over their heads. The world that they trained for and experienced is not the same world that they now must navigate.

To thrive as an organization go-forward, people, starting with leadership and then including next generation leaders, must develop new skills and capacity in order to successfully navigate today’s highly volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous or VUCA environment. With the ASEAN Integration of 2015, businesses need to re-orient their way of thinking from the old economy to the new economy become more important.”

Under the new economy, businesses need to recognize the value of people in contributing to the success of the enterprise. Managers should open up the decision-making process to their people and allow them to be leaders in their own capacity. Leaders are identified by their willingness to take risks and be held accountable for their decisions.

It remains to be seen if companies in the Philippines and Asia are ready to accept the notion of putting people outside management in a capacity to make decisions. Asia has a history of uprisings and a militant labor force. Thailand has had 18 military coup incidents since 1932. Of these, 11 were successful.

In order to alleviate the risks associated with the hiring of the human resource, Light-Core has partnered with Benchmark to design a unique value proposition: a Human Resource Outsourcing framework supported by the principles of Behavioral Leadership. Under the agreement, Benchmark creates the talent pool, implements the standard qualification process of subjecting candidates to interviews and assessment tests on technical, fundamental skill and the behavioral profile.

Those who pass the preliminary screening will be included in the training program. Candidates who complete the training program are given a 6-month work contract and will be assessed monthly using performance-tracking analytics.

Candidates who score within prescribed parameters during the first quarter of the contract will be taken under Light-Core’s Behavioral Leadership program which includes use of online diagnostic modules, individualized coaching sessions with a Light-Core accredited trainer and face-time with Tim and Sharon Glover for top managers and the key decision makers. Light-Core’s proposition is not a one-time arrangement but a customized on-board program that guarantees the client meets its month-to-month targets.

Light-Core’s value proposition is congruent to the principles of sustainability in that for businesses to thrive it must look inward and develop its own people through a program of trust and transparency.