The tight labor market continues to create significant challenges for human resource professionals, according to XpertHR's report, "Top HR Trends for 2020."

XpertHR surveyed more than 700 HR professionals for the report, publishing the first part, "Top HR Strategic Challenges for 2020" (Part Two, to be released at a later date, will address compliance challenges.)

The top strategic challenge for HR professionals? Not surprisingly, recruiting and hiring, cited by nearly 30 percent of respondents. Of those, half (50.9 percent) are extremely challenged in their quest to find high quality candidates, more than double the percentage of respondents who found this issue a challenge in 2017 (22.7 percent).

"Finding skilled, qualified applicants is a struggle for many," says XpertHR's legal editor Beth Zoller. "Building a place where employees want to work, seeking out untapped job markets such as older employees, veterans and those with a criminal past, and taking advantage of non-traditional candidates such as gig workers, remote workers and jobs shares are all tactics that employers can implement in order to meet their talent acquisition needs."

Other key survey findings pertaining to recruiting and hiring:

20.6 percent are extremely challenged by eliminating unconscious bias during the recruitment process, compared to 11.6 percent in 2018 and 14.1 percent in 2019.
18.8 percent say they are extremely challenged by aligning talent acquisition strategy with business objectives, compared to 11.7 percent in 2017, 9.8 percent in 2018 and 8.1 percent in 2019.
17.1 percent are extremely challenged by hiring a diverse workforce, versus 4.9 percent in 2017, 7.4 percent in 2018 and 9.5 percent in 2019.
14.4 percent are extremely challenged by using predictive analytics and artificial intelligence with respect to recruiting and hiring, versus 9.6 percent in 2017 and 9.9 percent in 2018.

Managing benefits is another significant challenge – indeed, 16.2 percent of respondents rank benefits as their number one challenge. Regarding health care specifically, 50 percent of respondents feel extremely challenged by health care costs and 27.2 percent feel extremely challenged when it comes to preparing for the future of health care and the Affordable Care Act.

Other key survey findings relating to benefits:

16.1 percent are extremely challenged by adjusting benefits for a generationally diverse workforce or different groups of employees, versus 4.8 percent in 2017, 9.7 percent in 2018 and 12 percent in 2019.
14.4 percent are extremely challenged when it comes to determining which voluntary benefits programs provide the best ROI, versus 3.6 percent in 2017, 6.3 percent in 2018 and 10 percent in 2019.
12.6 percent are extremely challenged by aligning benefit offerings with business objectives, versus 6.6 percent in 2017, 8.8 percent in 2018 and 12.8 percent in 2019.
10.2 percent are extremely challenged by communicating benefits to the workforce, versus 6.2 percent in 2017, 10.8 percent in 2018 and 15.3 percent in 2019.

"In addition to the rising cost of benefits, employers must address the needs of different generations and provide benefits that each group finds useful," Zoller says. "For example, older workers may be more interested in long term disability and younger workers may want benefits such as day care and gym memberships. Today's employers need to strike a balance and determine which benefits are most valuable and attractive to its workforce."

HR professionals are also extremely challenged with managing employee engagement, morale and satisfaction (34 percent), employee retention (31.2 percent), creating a succession plan (30.4 percent), training and upskilling current employees (27 percent), managing performance and professional development opportunities (25.5 percent) and aligning compensation strategies with business objectives (16.9 percent).

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