Wayne Balshin is the executive director employee relations at Vancouver Coastal Health. Most recently, Balsihin was announced as the winner of the Award of Excellence: HR Professional of the Year 2011 at BC HRMA’s 49th Annual Conference.  Recognized for developing a range of workforce initiatives that required ‘out of the box’ strategy and deployment with provincial union and multi-health consensus, Balshin‘s dynamic thinking has delivered multiple benefits to both the VCH and its employees.

What innovations or accomplishments do you feel contributed most greatly to your achievement of being named the 2011 HR Professional of the Year?

Involving stakeholders, listening and valuing the feedback from HR advisors, employee engagement staff, managers and the unions have shaped and sustained three initiatives in particular.

“How would you manage if you were diagnosed with a disability or experienced a one-time extended absence like unexpected surgery?”  This is the question posed to staff when I created Vancouver Coastal Health’s Attendance & Wellness Program in 2008 to help 17,000 employees understand the importance of preserving their sick bank to take care of themselves and their family should a disability or illness arise. In the past three years, this program has resulted in 350,000 less sick hours and financial savings of more than $6M.

Continuous Communication was an initiative I developed to help managers with a large span of control find an alternate to the time-consuming performance review process. Continuous Communication connects the manager with the front-line staff person at least once a year in a one-to-one conversation focusing on what’s working well, exploring the barriers to success, career and skill development, and providing performance feedback. We worked in partnership with Royal Roads to develop this simple but robust program in 2009.

Throughout my career I have been asked to investigate and facilitate resolution to complaints of disrespectful conduct or harassment in the workplace. It became clear that a policy was only one tool and other strategies needed to be developed. I streamlined the VCH Respectful Workplace and Human Rights Policy to be a living document that provided practical advice to staff. The policy, which promoted each employee taking responsibility for building a respectful workplace, was the springboard to the development of educational workshops led by HR advisors for employees and managers.

How can HR move further ‘out of the box’ to strategically target the bottom line?

It starts with defining your HR value proposition. VCH’s strategic lens is ‘people first’ and our HR programs are designed to support that lens by optimizing our workforce, using resources efficiently, improving workplace engagement and planning for any future HR shortages. At VCH, our HR practices including filling vacancies, disability management, reducing short term sick leave and overtime. These and other factors are translated into measurable data to enable the organization to easily see how HR’s programs contribute to the bottom line and improve staff productivity.

What skills, tools or programs do you consider essential for HR to develop and implement to ensure success for their organizations?

There is an old adage that managers are your chief recruitment and retention officers. To this end, HR should be developing skills, tools and programs enabling managers to succeed in hiring the right people, keeping them engaged, promoting productivity and achieving quality and timely customer service in a supportive environment. At VCH we have created a variety of education programs for managers and directors to build organizational capacity by strengthening management and leadership competencies. The New Manager Orientation program includes Finance 101; Team Development; Performance Management; Managerial Skills for Resolving Conflict; Labour Relations 101;  and Performance Management modules.

What is the greatest lesson you have learned to help you succeed in HR?

Identifying opportunities for improvement and being guided by your principles. Years ago I represented Vancouver General Hospital in an arbitration case involving an employee who was terminated for unsatisfactory job performance. I indicated to the union we were correct in terminating the clerical employee because the manager followed the proper steps of performance management. We went to hearing and won. The arbitrator stated, “…employees in those classifications must be able to achieve and maintain an adequate workload coupled with a high level of accuracy. They also require organizational skills, the ability to work with a team, and a personality and attitude conducive to dealing with patients, relatives and the general public.” The lesson in this case was twofold: first, the arbitrator articulated some good statements regarding job performance and importance of accuracy, teamwork and customer service; second, good facts make good law.

PeopleTalk: Summer 2011