Dive Brief:
- Median salaries for CHROs in the banking industry rose by 7%, while retail banking officers' median pay declined by more than 7%, according to the Crowe 2018 Bank Compensation and Benefits Survey. Crowe, a public accounting, consulting and technology firm, collected data from 420 financial institutions on salaries for 263 job positions and information on HR practices, director compensation, incentives and benefits.
- Recruiting and retaining millennials, the largest age group in the workforce, is a top focus for banks, survey results showed. Although more than 51% of the respondents said that hiring younger workers was either "very challenging" or "somewhat challenging," only 19% had a recruitment and retention strategy for bringing them onboard. Respondents cited compensation, promotion opportunities and job flexibility as the most common issues in attracting millennials.
- The survey also revealed trends in pay; 49% of financial institutions took action to address gender pay disparity, with the most common approach involving an analysis of pay differentials.
Dive Insight:
HR concerns — a tight labor market, turnover and the digital transformation — are at the center of organizations' current business threats, making HR professionals' expertise critical. Organizations are relying on HR leaders to think strategically to prepare workers and position employers for the future of work via employee initiatives like leadership development and a more robust recruiting experience.
The administrative role of HR has been shrinking for some time, especially as HR becomes more fluent in analytics and generally improves its ability to talk to the C-suite in the language of business. However, a 2017 study by the HR Certification Institute (HRCI) found that while business leaders wanted more HR strategic initiatives, company-wide support for these ideas was lacking, despite their proven success.
"CEOs have no interest in you being an HR leader, they want you to be a business leader with HR expertise," Michelle M. Smith, current VP of marketing at O.C. Tanner, told attendees at the Society for Human Resource Management's 2018 conference. Recognizing the business impact of people management and communicating that effectively is one way HR leaders can cement themselves as strategic partners.
But many industries seem to be recognizing the need for change, regardless. Timothy Reimink, Crowe's managing director in its financial services performance consulting group, noted in the release a shift in focus from top retail banking executives to HR executives: "...the upward shift in top human resource functions indicates that banks are putting a high priority on finding and retaining the right talent in this competitive labor market."