One of the easiest things to try (you may already be doing this) is managing by wandering around (MBWA) made popular by Tom Peters, slight alternative is the Gemba Walk (actual place where work happens). It is amazing how many problems can be fixed just by walking around.

HR team of 1 is never going to be easy so don't be too hard on yourself.

In reply to Steven :

thank you Steven. Although I do this given that we have an informal setting but the term (MBWA) is new to me.

I am standalone for around 70 perm staff so similar to you. My top tips would be:

- work out the key leaders/teams in your business and schedule monthly meetings. I have a loose agenda to cover recruitment, new starters/probations, absence/conduct/capability, training, engagement, AOB. In reality, we don't cover all of these every month because they're not all relevant but they do remind us of topics to discuss. The meetings tend to be more line management counselling/coaching! But gives me an early insight into any issues and allows me to make timely nudges, while building a relationship.

- take themes to your monthly meetings. Last month I was gathering feedback on our appraisal system (I had revamped), this month I am supporting planning for appraisals, next month I am discussing training needs, the following month I plan to start succession planning with them. Helps achieve some more strategic aims with dedicated time to do so

- schedule policy reviews cyclically throughout the year. The first year that I did this, it was a mammoth task because a lot of our policies were out of date or poorly formatted etc. Now I review a couple a month with minimal changes required.

- try as much as you can to sit in the open office. I used to have my own office but since moving out, I hear a lot more, people speak to me a lot more, I understand the business far better
- protect the beginning of your day for YOUR priority tasks and no one elses. A couple of days a week, I don't open my emails or messages apps until 10am. This gives me nearly 2 hours to work on my strategic projects without being drawn into something that is not important and probably not that urgent either. If it is urgent, someone will come to me in person or ring me! Otherwise you can drown in emails doing everyone else's priorities and never moving yours forwards.

- in terms of wellbeing, if you mean your own, identify a couple of people that you can truly trust. You are not going to be able to disclose confidential things to them, but for me there are one or two senior people who I can speak to a bit cryptically if I need support! E.g. "I am having a really hard day. I can't go into specifics but I have a dilemma/difficult conversation/personal challenge that is causing me stress/anxiety/upset and I'd just like to offload". Because I can trust them, I know it doesn't go any further (although this is always a risk) and I also know they won't probe me for details because they respect my job and my professional boundaries. They will become your morale lifeline!

I'm still working on being consistent with these tips - some days I dive right into emails, sometimes I don't have energy to be at my best in the monthly meetings etc. But it has certainly helped me to become more strategic and less transactional, while still getting the transactional bits done.

This is a very typical dilemma for an HR leader "in one person". Many find a balance thanks to clear prioritization: they allocate separate time for operational tasks and separately for strategic planning, so that one does not eat the other. Simple tools for task tracking, regular check-ins with management and a conscious focus on your own well-being help, because without it it is easy to burn out. By the way, well-designed employee benefits can support not only the team, but also the HR manager himself: betterme.world/.../.

Hi Hannah I am in a similar position working in a standalone role for a charity I'm looking for networking opportunities and wondered if you would be interested in connecting for bouncing ideas and keeping connected? it's easy to get lonely when you aren't in a bigger HR team I am finding

In reply to Hannah:

The Excellent Organisation, by Tom Peters.
He looked at what many of the top businesses were doing that others were not.

Basic premise is you will do better if you get off your seat and start walking around the place seeing what people are doing and how they are doing it.

Hi Hannah
Many people are a HR team of one, I was one myself for 130 in 17 countries - do not recommend! ChatGPT was my main HR assistent for bouncing ideas off. I also got myself a HR coach who was fantastic.

Tools for productivity. There are many platforms that will have similar case studies to this one:
haileyhr.com/.../

I know Astrid the HR manager in the case study, and she's probably happy to have a chat about how she sorted out her operational issues so she could focus on the bigger picture strategic issues.
Best of luck.

I'm a standalone HR Manager for a company a similar size to yours and I'm responsible for the entire department. To make matters more tricky, most of our workers are remote, so the usual great tips like walking the floors etc. don't apply. I've got around this by initiating HR one-to-ones with new starters, so they meet me a month after starting and then at intervals thereafter. I've found this has worked wonderfully, they know who I am, what I do and that I'm approachable right from the get go- we build the relationship from there.
For our established colleagues, I've been attending all of the team work days (we get each team together at least once a year) for visibility etc. Which is where I get to hear a lot of the issues I may otherwise not have been privy to (does mean a lot of travel and away days, but I think it's been very worth it).
I've also made sure to train managers on all the wellbeing initiatives - things I've put in place include partnering with an OH, getting us an EAP, return-to-work interviews and Wellness Plans. I think the most important thing as a standalone HR person is having a brilliant team of line managers who feel equipped and confident to make decisions, so that HR can be the guide, rather than expected to do it all. Further training my managers is my main goal for this year.

Hannah

I once was the sole HR in a company which ran around 550+ staff, in 25 different locations.
Each location had its own management team of 3 - one manager and two line managers. The 25 different locations were managed in turn by one of 3 'Area managers'.

If your are on your own, the best thing you can do, is concentrate on strategic stuff. So I rarely got involved in R &S and other admin work. That was up to the managers on their own sites. Managers made their own arrangements for managing holidays, etc., I might get involved if I was asked for advice on issues of absence, sickness and or disciplinary investigations etc., In difficult cases I might suggest the right wording in correspondence when we were dismissing staff, but it was always the responsibility of the area or site managers to 'own' this so I obviously discussed this with them so they knew what to do in future. Because the managers knew me and trusted my judgement/advice etc., they sometimes run things past me before taking action. But I rarely got involved directly with their staff.

I helped the senior management team in issues such as contracts, employment, disciplinary IF they needed assistance or help. In turn I'd often visit the sites to chat about any issues I wanted to individually discuss with each manager or if I felt individual input from me was appropriate.

I also wrote things like the company 'handbook' - with a lot of input from the other senior managers; I wrote applicable policies/procedures etc., ie regards to disciplinary, absence, recruitment and so on if updates were needed, and ran the follow up training for the site managers on these when necessary.

I hope this helps give you an idea of how you might wish to have a 'helicopter', approach to things you currently do?

David

Hello Hannah,

I’m in a very similar one-person HR role, covering both operational and strategic work, and it can definitely impact productivity.

What helped for me was delegating some HR-assistant-type admin tasks to existing roles, based on grade/capability, interest in an HR pathway, and the confidentiality level of the work. For example, I allocated general HR administration to the front desk/admin role (especially where there was an interest in HR), and more confidential operational support to the Executive PA.

This did require some role-alignment so the tasks were formally captured in role expectations and appraisal documentation. The benefit is continuity, operational HR can still run if you take a week’s leave, rather than everything sitting with you.So this can work until the company allows room for more FTE numbers and you prepare a business case since you will have seen the need especially considering the addition of the other staff numbers because that means more work.

Hi Hannah

That's not an easy ask for anyone, but it is doable.

Try to think about the main tasks that keep you busiest - for example what are the 20% of your duties that take up 80% of your time? Then look at how you might automate them, or devolve responsibility to employees/managers for them.

Map out your stakeholders (which could easily be each employee) and look at strength of relationship versus how it needs to be, how you keep them informed and involved versus how it needs to be, and who influences who (eg who you can rely on to spread the word about things if you can't be everywhere).

There's more you could do too.

You might also want to explore connecting with a more experienced HR professional to have a sounding board for your ideas and a safe space to explore the complexities of your working environment.

Gary