Find out the top 10 core skills you need to master as a human resources generalist and what hard skills you need to know to succeed in this job.
A Human Resources Generalist manages the day-to-day operations of the human resource office. He or she will participate in developing policies and programs that are relevant to the human resource office and the company at large. The role also includes developing developmental programs, benefits and compensation, organizational development and hiring of employees.
Besides that major role, he or she will get to perform the following duties; hiring employees for the company, undertaking employee training and development, undertaking space and organizational planning, perform and report employee performance evaluations, handle disciplinary issues, participating in policy development, handling employee benefits and compensation plans and ensuring employee safety and well-being.
Core Skills Required to be a Human Resources Generalist
Core skills describe a set of non-technical abilities, knowledge, and understanding that form the basis for successful participation in the workplace. Core skills enable employees to efficiently and professionally navigate the world of work and interact with others, as well as adapt and think critically to solve problems.
Core skills are often tagged onto job descriptions to find or attract employees with specific essential core values that enable the company to remain competitive, build relationships, and improve productivity.
A human resources generalist should master the following 10 core skills to fulfill her job properly.
Innovation:
Innovation is the process of translating new invention into a service that creates value or brings better solutions that meet the requirements.
A Human Resources Generalist ought to introduce innovation in their business to help save time and money giving a competitive advantage to grow and adapt the business in today's marketplace as well as creating more efficient processes and ideas with a likelihood for your business to succeed.
Judgment Skills:
Judgment is the ability to make a decision or form an opinion wisely especially in matters affecting action, good sense and discretion.
A Human Resources Generalist must be a person of good judgment with the ability to make the right decision at the right time and for right reasons especially in prioritizing the work correctly to focus on a few important things and ensure excellent results are delivered.
Assertiveness:
Assertiveness is the inclination to stand up for your rights or other people's rights in a calm and concrete way without being aggressive or accepting a wrong.
A Human Resources Generalist must be self-assured and confident to master the skills to put his points across without upsetting others or becoming angry and allowing the employees to do the same while complying with the company's policies and procedures.
Emotion Management:
Emotion Management is the ability to realize, readily accept and successfully control feelings on oneself and sometimes in others around you by being in complete authority over your thoughts and feelings that are generated whenever your values are touched.
A Human Resources Generalist must be able to manage his emotions as well as assist the staff to control their emotions to ensure that the professional reputation, the efficiency, and productivity is not compromised.
Emotional Intelligence:
Emotional Intelligence is the capability to identify your emotions, understand what they are telling me and realize how the feelings are affecting you and the people around you.
A Human Resources Generalist should be wise to handle different personalities that carry different emotions presented in the workplace while ensuring relationships are managed more efficiently by respecting your perception and the employee's as well.
Enjoyment of the Job:
Enjoyment of the Job is the ability to enjoy what you do rather than enjoying what you earn from it.
A Human Resources Generalist needs to creatively learn of ways to motivate his employees to benefit from the workplace by matching their personality to the culture of the organization where they fit best and allowing them to explore their hidden talents to grow and mature with the team.
Practical Thinking:
Practical Thinking is the skill to think creatively about projects or work that requires your full attention to be completed and to bring great results.
A Human Resources Generalist must ensure the decisions he makes are well sought after using professional characteristics for employees with high-level responsibilities to feel included and to allow growth for everyone in a constantly changing world that requires creativity.
Entrepreneurial Thinking:
Entrepreneurial Thinking is a mindset that allows embraces critical questioning, innovation, service and continuous improvement with an attitude of change.
A Human Resources Generalist should challenge himself to see the big picture and creatively think outside the box too with the ability to fight all the challenges faced and keep going in the face of calamity and the social skills needed to build great teams in the workplace.
Meeting Management:
Meeting Management is the skill to know and understands the reason why an official meeting should be held and who should attend.
A Human Resources Generalist must learn how to properly organize and conduct meetings to contribute to organizational effectiveness by determining situations that require a meeting, understanding types of meetings, planning the meeting, running the meeting to the close and managing people after the meeting.
Scheduling:
Scheduling is creating daily workflow charts that the employees are supposed to follow when working and submitting their projects.
A Human Resources Generalist must be dedicated to establishing and maintaining the schedule using either manual or technology methods to ensure it is always updated according to the tasks, the employees responsible or the time allocated to each task without fail or delay.
Hard Skills Required to be a Human Resources Generalist
Hard skills are job-specific skill sets, or expertise, that are teachable and whose presence can be tested through exams. While core skills are more difficult to quantify and less tangible, hard skills are quantifiable and more defined.
Hard skills are usually listed on an applicant's resume to help recruiters know the applicant's qualifications for the applied position. A recruiter, therefore, needs to review the applicant's resume and education to find out if he/she has the knowledge necessary to get the job done.
A human resources generalist should have a good command of the following hard skills to succeed in her job.