Multinationals now recognise that HR professionals have to be strategic players to be effective within the business. We report on Shell's latest drive to develop their HR people's leadership potential.

"There is a science, craft and an art to HR. Until now Shell has concentrated mostly on the craft but now we have taken things a step further," says Rick Brown, Shell's Vice President for HR Functional Excellence.

Standing up to the line can be difficult

Shell has understood that HR professionals want to develop their technical and leadership skills and, as a first step, has developed a competence model to help HR see where and what they need to change to get on in the company.

Brown, presenting the model at a recent RSM Erasmus University business networking event, explained that the new model allows HR professionals within the company to compare themselves in competencies and therefore gives them more control and insight into their own function and career paths. And Shell is looking to groom at least 500 HR people for senior roles.

Through involving HR throughout the company in the process we managed to create one competence model out of the many existing models and whittled it down to 26 global HR competencies said Brown.

Mind the gap, learn the business

"Some of the gaps which we found in doing this work were about being a leader and business understanding, and business understanding is the key competence that HR people need," says Brown.

And this 'gap' was referred to repeatedly during the open discussion at the RSM networking event by HR managers from several other companies including Unilever and Philips. 

"HR is missing business knowledge and understanding," said one of the HR managers. "We need to understand how to approach line managers," she said.

Another HR professional agreed, "A lot of the problem is about holding up a mirror and dealing with pushback from line managers.

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