HR practices in Ireland

• Talent management and resourcing remains a top priority as organisations compete to attract, retain and develop workforces of the future.
• Nine out of ten survey respondents face skills shortages, especially in operational roles, and leadership and influencing skills are seen as the top capability gap.
• Turnover remains high, with employees moving for career progression or change, or because of the cost of living or location.

Recommendations

• Analyse future skills requirements and increase upskilling to reduce skills gaps.
• Invest urgently in leadership and people management skills to build capability to lead and retain employees.
• Implement financial wellbeing measures to help deal with rising costs and accommodation supports.

• Access to flexible and hybrid working continues to grow, with 40% of surveyed organisations planning to increase the use of hybrid working and 33% planning to introduce flexitime.
• Organisations most commonly require employees to work onsite either two or three days a week; only 14% reported having no mandated days.
• Only half of managers have been trained to manage hybrid working and a quarter don’t yet have a policy on remote working.

Recommendations

• Train and support managers to operate effectively in a hybrid world.
• Ensure that collaboration and the right activities are structured into onsite days and there is a clear rationale for onsite versus offsite work tasks.
• Review policies and procedures to align with new legal entitlements around requests for remote or flexible working.

• People teams are adding value through championing diversity, enhancing the employee experience and leading change.
• Top challenges are skills shortages, sustaining culture and managers’ ability to manage.
• HR’s contribution to the business has been constrained by lack of time and availability of managers to carry out people management activities, along with ineffective devolution of HR practices to managers.

Recommendations

• Assess the effectiveness of current supports to people managers, diagnose key skills gaps and increase levels of training to embed good people management practices.
• Define how best to devolve HR practices and increase the use of technology/AI to support managers in their people management responsibilities, focusing on the impact on employee experience and retention.
• Provide ongoing upskilling and development for the people team, particularly on leadership, technology and the team’s capacity to deliver transformational change.

• Automation, technology and AI is one of the top external drivers of change, with the people function increasing its digitalisation, particularly in the use of virtual-based learning, automated HR processes and analytics.
• Although there is no evidence of increased use of automation to address the skills shortage, there is a concern about capability gaps relating to technology design, programming and AI.

Recommendations

• Develop people professionals, managers and employees so they are up to date with technological advancements, while minimising the risks and maximising the benefits of emerging AI tools.
• Ensure people-centric decisions are central to the introduction of technology and optimise the benefits of technology in delivering HR strategies and services.

• Leadership and influencing skills were identified as the most concerning capability gaps, as organisations recognise that future leaders are not adequately equipped to build the right culture and support the employee experience in a hybrid working world.
• An increasing number of organisations are adopting policies to address employee issues, including those for domestic abuse, additional leave for parents, and fertility/menopause challenges.
• While most organisations are engaged in activities to support sustainability, such as wellbeing, diversity and inclusion and flexible working arrangements, most do not have a specific strategy on sustainable people practices.

Recommendations

• Establish a culture built around a common purpose and ways of working, incorporating increased levels of digitalisation and working patterns.
• Increase training for line managers to ensure they are able to effectively create an inclusive environment and can drive employee experience.
• Upskill on sustainable people practices, and provide appropriate leadership on addressing the issues organisation-wide.

• Maintaining a wellbeing culture remains a challenge and there is investment in mental health supports and online wellbeing and health initiatives.
• Mental health and acute medical conditions were the most common reasons for absence in the last year.
• Over half of organisations identified workload as a contributing factor to mental health issues.

Recommendations

• Build effective management training programmes – including absence management – to help support employees and address working hours and workload issues.
• Adopt a more proactive approach to ways of working and job design in light of workload and technology challenges.
• Increase messaging about disconnecting from work outside work hours and tackle any ‘long hours’ culture.

HR practices in Ireland 2023

HR practices in Ireland 2022

HR practices in Ireland 2021

HR practices in Ireland 2020

HR practices in Ireland 2020 infographic