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Understanding people's behaviour and creating the right organisation culture
Core knowledge
People practice
Understanding the range of people practices needed to be an effective people professional
As people professionals, we need to be experts in our knowledge of people, of work and of change. An important part of this is having a core knowledge of a range of people practices, and understanding how different practices impact each other and work together in an integrated way.
People practices are the processes and approaches that we use across the employee lifecycle. Learning needs analysis, creating talent pools, developing people policies, analysing people data, managing grievances, recruiting people: all these are examples of people practices.
Some people practices sit within our specialist knowledge areas (such as resourcing, learning and development, and ER). But there are some people practices that are fundamental to all practitioners, whether you’re a generalist or a specialist.
This area of the Profession Map covers these key practices, and includes regulation and law, workforce planning, diagnosing capability needs, performance management, wellbeing, inclusion and diversity, and flexible ways of working (such as hybrid or remote working).
People practice standards
Each standard progresses through four levels of impact. Which level do you most embody in your day-to-day work?
Foundation level
At this level you'll understand:
- The employee lifecycle, and where the work you do sits within it
- Policy, regulation and law relevant to your work
- What workforce planning is
- How your organisation assesses people's skills and capability
- Performance management approaches in your organisation
- What wellbeing is and why it's important
- What inclusion and diversity mean, and why they are important
- Different flexible ways of working (e.g. workplace-based, hybrid, remote)
- N/A
Associate level
At this level you'll understand:
- The employee lifecycle and how other people practices impact your work and vice versa
- Policy, regulation and law relevant to your work and how to ensure people practices are compliant
- The stages of workforce planning including current workforce analysis, determining future needs, identifying gaps and action planning
- How to conduct skills or capability audits and gap analyses in your area of work
- Different approaches to performance management and their pros and cons
- Why wellbeing is important, and the different factors that impact wellbeing
- How to build inclusion and diversity into your work
- How to adapt people processes and practices for workplace-based, hybrid and remote working
- How to advise line managers and teams on workplace-based, hybrid and remote working, ensuring fairness and communication
Chartered Member level
At this level you'll understand:
- A range of people practices, and how to design them in an integrated way
- Current and future regulation and law relevant to your work, how to apply it, and how to mitigate risk
- How workforce planning informs other people practices and wider business planning
- How to assess current and future capability needs
- The impact of different performance management approaches, and how performance management data can be used to drive improvements
- How to integrate wellbeing into people practices
- How to integrate inclusion and diversity into people practice to create value in your area of work
- How to develop people practices for a hybrid workforce that enhance performance and engagement
- How to coach managers and leaders to build cohesion and trust across a hybrid workforce
Chartered Fellow level
At this level you'll understand:
- People practices across a range of specialisms, and how to integrate these to create a holistic people offering
- Current and future regulation and law relevant to your work, and how to assess impact and risk for organisations and industry sector
- How to use strategic workforce planning to inform future people and organisation strategy
- How to build future organisation and sector capability
- The impact of different performance management approaches on organisation culture and performance
- How to integrate wellbeing into people strategies
- How to build inclusion and diversity approaches that positively impact an organisation’s culture and performance
- How to identify strategic opportunities and adapt people strategies for a hybrid workforce
- How to integrate flexible ways of working within the wider organisation culture balancing the needs of all stakeholders
Resources to guide your work, career planning and development, available on the CIPD's main site.
- Diversity and inclusion at work: facing up to the business case - Report
- Inclusion and diversity in the workplace - Factsheet
- Labour Market Outlook - Survey
- People managers' guide to mental health - Guide
- Strength in numbers: what's new in performance management - Podcast
- Workforce planning - Factsheet
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