HR professionals are usually advised to coordinate their efforts closely with those of the strategic planners. The reason is simple. First of all successful firms in every industry, deal strategically with HR, secondly HR professionals are required to anticipate, rather than just react to organizational needs for management talent.

Does your Human Resources department have a flight plan that supports the overall objectives of your business? Here are 5 steps you can take right now to ensure that that your HR department is positioned to help Accelerate the Performance of your entire organization.

Create a Road Map. An Action Plan specifically for HR that aligns with your organizational Strategy. This plan should include everything necessary to ensure that your entire operation has the needed human capital, training, communication, safety program, employee procedures and policies in place. Keep the plan simple and communicate it throughout the organization. Once the plan is prepared, stay the course and follow through.

 Hire Right. Get the right people in the right places and get their actions aligned. Then, provide the necessary feedback, coaching and mentoring along the way and have the courage and discipline to make the tough decisions.

Take Care of Your People. This includes pay, benefits, safety, communication, and facilities. As a leader, make yourself visible and available on the shop floor. Treat employees with respect: It goes both ways.

Communication. Human Resource is at the center of your company communications plan. Respect your employees’ time by limiting meetings and keeping them short. Employee communication includes – all employee meetings, bulletin boards, newsletters, postings, birthday meetings, and letters of appreciation.

Accountability. To accelerate business performance, people must be held accountable for their individual performance. When you have an underperforming staff member, find out the reason for their poor performance. It could be anything from lack of necessary training/tools or the absence of the necessary skill set or simply because they just don’t care.

Realize that you can’t save everyone. Individual goals and objectives need to be set to establish the performance expectations and then tied to an incentive compensation plan. Conduct structured and timely performance reviews while fostering an environment that supports honest employee performance feedback.

Adapted from Chuck Gumbert‘s blog Flight Plan for Human Resources.