The Evolving Role of HR in Engagement: Strategies for a Thriving Workforce

Many organizations worldwide had to adapt to a new normal this past year, and it wasn’t easy on most. People lost jobs, were forced to work in unsafe conditions to keep a roof over their heads, and had to keep working like it was business as usual while dealing with unimaginable loss and suffering.   

HR was at the helm through all of this, steering the ship through these murky waters. Now, they face the new challenge of getting employees to start working at the office again. Once again, HR is responsible not only to ensure that productivity levels are maintained but also to make sure that they are meaningfully engaged with the organization’s activities. 

They’re now also the ones who are responsible for hiring the manpower organizations lost in the past year and for streamlining the employee onboarding process and HR’s Role in it. 

But before we delve deeper into HR’s Role in maintaining employee engagement and how it’s evolving, let’s talk about employee engagement in hr. 

What is employee engagement in human resource management? 

In the context of human resource management, employee engagement goes beyond job satisfaction or surface-level happiness. According to Forbes, it’s the emotional commitment an employee has toward their organization’s goals and values. This commitment drives motivation, discretionary effort, and loyalty—key drivers of productivity and retention. 

Employee engagement in human resource management is now a strategic pillar that influences every stage of the employee lifecycle—from onboarding and learning to recognition and retention. 

What is the Role of HR in employee engagement? 

HR's Role is to ensure employee engagement throughout the times. Employee engagement itself is a relatively new phenomenon. Before the 1990s, HR was all about employee satisfaction and not much else, and no mind was given to whether the employee cared about their organization or not. 

HR's main focus has always been getting results from the workforce, but experts now reckon that this needs to change. 

In an interview with Forbes Magazine, Lindsay Lagreid talked about the need for HR to take a more employee-centric approach to matters in the future. She and her team at Limeade Institute have sizable research supporting the fact that successful companies are ones who care about their employees as people. According to Lagreid herself, “HR is the architect of the employee experience and needs to act as the unrelenting advocate of the employee voice to leadership.” 

Nowadays, it's getting harder and harder for employers to retain talented personnel. This is because people don't just look for a stable job they can work at for life anymore. 

They're looking for growth, challenges, a rewarding career, and most of all, they're looking for a happy life. If their job is in the way of all this, they might consider drastic changes in their life. 

Let’s break down the core areas that define HR and employee engagement in today’s context: 

1. Hiring with purpose and cultural alignment 

Modern HR teams are no longer just filling open roles—they're curating experiences from day one. By hiring talent that aligns with the company’s purpose and values, HR lays the foundation for long-term engagement. 

Recruiting isn't just about skills; it’s about identifying individuals who resonate with the organization's mission and are likely to thrive in its culture. 

2. Designing meaningful onboarding experiences 

Effective onboarding is one of the first opportunities HR has to engage employees. It's where employees learn not just what to do, but why their work matters. 

Human resources professionals must ensure that onboarding is structured to communicate the organization’s vision, showcase leadership accessibility, and encourage early connection with peers—all of which contribute to engagement from the start. 

3. Empowering managers to drive engagement 

While HR designs the engagement strategy, it's often managers who implement it. That’s why human resources and employee engagement go hand in hand with leadership enablement. 

HR needs to equip managers with data, tools, and training to recognize efforts, facilitate meaningful conversations, and foster team cohesion. When managers are supported, they become the frontline champions of engagement. 

4. Creating opportunities for growth and purpose 

One of the primary reasons employees disengage is a lack of growth. HR plays a vital role in building clear career paths, promoting internal mobility, and offering learning opportunities that align with both business goals and employee aspirations. 

Moreover, by connecting day-to-day tasks with organizational impact, HR helps employees see purpose in their work—an essential component of engagement. 

5. Measuring and acting on employee feedback 

Data-driven HR functions rely on continuous listening. Tools like pulse surveys, engagement assessments, and eNPS scores are key to understanding how employees feel. 

The HR role in employee engagement includes analyzing this feedback and driving actionable change. It's not enough to collect data—HR must act on it, close feedback loops, and communicate progress. 

6. Recognizing and rewarding contributions 

A well-structured recognition and rewards program can significantly boost morale. HR should create frameworks for peer-to-peer recognition, milestone celebrations, and values-based acknowledgments. 

Recognition doesn't always have to be monetary. Personalized appreciation, public acknowledgment, and meaningful gestures can go a long way in building trust and boosting engagement. 

7. Supporting well-being through holistic initiatives 

The lines between work and life have blurred. As a result, human resources employee engagement strategies now include mental health resources, flexible benefits, and wellness programs. 

When employees feel supported as individuals—not just workers—they are more likely to stay engaged and productive. HR plays a pivotal role in designing benefits that meet the diverse needs of a multigenerational workforce. 

Evolution of HRs role in employee engagement 

An HR is a facilitator between workers, managers, and executive leadership. So HR teams have a critical role to play in maintaining employee engagement. 

1. Manager's duty 

Something like employee engagement was always present in all organizations - it showed itself in the way many managers handled day-to-day affairs in the company and around the office, in the way they made sure all the employees were happy and cultivated a close-knit team that relied on each other to make things happen. 

This has always been the norm in great and successful companies. Still, now that it's been given a name and people realize how essential it is to success - especially post-lockdown when employee retention is harder than ever—HR has started to get involved. 

Now, HR is tasked with ensuring that the managers are empowered to cultivate the conditions necessary around the workplace to encourage employee engagement. 

2. HR and how it evolves 

Amid these changing conditions, HR needs to shift strategies. As we mentioned before, it now needs to focus more on what the employees need to stay engaged and happy and advocate for them with the higher-ups rather than for the higher-ups and get the results they want from the company's workforce. 

In that light, let's discuss all the things that HR will need to adapt to and what HR needs to do to ensure employee satisfaction. 

1. Recruiting 

Put more focus on hiring the right kind of employees - the ones who would find the job interesting, or who got into this line of work out of a desire to do this for a living. Alternatively, you can hire employees that identify with your organization's message and whose personal lives align with their goals. 

2. Job enrichment 

Take steps to make the job fulfilling and meaningful. This involves making employees feel a sense of purpose and need, stating their needs clearly, and cultivating fair values in the office. Employees should trust and identify with the work culture and its role. 

3. Take regular surveys 

You must run an employee engagement survey every year rather than employee satisfaction and rethink your strategies based on the results. Instead of focusing on what the employees need to do, what upper management wants them to do, HR should now focus on what employees need to be more engaged and what the company can do to facilitate these changes. 

Investment decisions and any changes in the workplace should be made based on these survey results. 

4. Training and onboarding new employees 

When new recruits reach this stage, HR would now need to tell them how they fit into the company and how their contributions are important and make their roles seem meaningful to the employees. Emphasize how they're a vital part of furthering the organization's mission and take steps to follow through on these promises and claims. 

Strategies for the HR to evolve in the modern landscape 

Strategic Role of HR in Modern Workplaces 

HR is no longer just about policies, payroll, and compliance. It’s about engineering employee experience, advocating for people, and enabling business growth. Post-pandemic, as the workforce seeks flexibility, purpose, and well-being, HR must take a people-first approach. Here's how: 

1. Hire with purpose & cultural fit 

Strategy: Move beyond CVs and skills—hire for mission alignment and cultural fit. Look for candidates who resonate with the organization's purpose. 

2. Create a human-centric onboarding experience 

Strategy: Replace transactional onboarding with meaningful, connection-focused onboarding. Introduce them to your values, team culture, and leadership early.

3. Foster a culture of continuous listening 

Strategy: Use regular eNPS, pulse, and lifecycle surveys to understand evolving employee sentiment. Act on feedback visibly to build trust.

4. Empower and equip managers 

Strategy: Enable managers to be the frontline ambassadors of engagement. Equip them with tools to recognize, coach, and connect with their teams.

5. Build recognition into daily workflow 

Strategy: Recognition should be frequent, timely, and meaningful—peer-to-peer and top-down. Link it to core values and key milestones. 

6. Offer purpose-driven growth & learning 

Strategy: Provide internal mobility, learning budgets, and mentorship programs. Align employee aspirations with business goals. 

7. Enable flexible and equitable rewards 

Strategy: Recognize diverse needs with a flexible, global rewards ecosystem. Incorporate experiences, perks, charity, and lifestyle benefits. 

8. Promote well-being & financial wellness 

Strategy: Support the whole human: mental health, family needs, financial stability. Make well-being integral, not optional. 

9. Build belonging through communication 

Strategy: Create a transparent, respectful workplace culture with open dialogue. Celebrate milestones, wins, life events. 

How Empuls supports HR in driving engagement 

Following is Empuls can drive change for your organization. 

1. Hiring, onboarding & alignment: Empuls supports cultural onboarding through social intranet, town halls, org charts, and AI assistant “Em” to guide new joiners. Share vision-aligned content and create engaging onboarding experiences​. 

2. Surveys & feedback: eNPS, pulse & lifecycle surveys to listen across the employee journey​. AI-driven insights help HR and managers act on real-time feedback​. 

3. Empowering managers: Managers receive nudges and insights to recognize team members, close recognition gaps, and drive inclusive engagement​. 

4. Growth & motivation: Set up structured reward cycles, gamify experiences, and link recognitions to core values, KPIs, and milestones​. Drive performance through learning incentives, peer-to-peer recognition, and service awards​. 

5. Recognition & rewards: Supports 15+ award types, including spot, jury-based, milestone, team and peer awards. Offers a global rewards catalog: 1M+ choices from gift cards, experiences, charity, merch, and more​. 

6. Perks & well-being: Empuls helps stretch paychecks via: 

• Salary advance & early wage access 
• Exclusive perks & discounts (6,000+ brands) 
• Tax-saving & fringe benefits through Lifestyle Spending Accounts​​. 

7. Communication & belonging: Empuls’ social intranet fosters transparent communication, community groups, polls, celebration boards, and feedback loops​. 

Empuls is purpose-built to help HR evolve from a compliance-focused function to a strategic engagement partner—empowering them to design employee experiences that drive loyalty, performance, and well-being. Schedule a call now! 

Conclusion 

HR departments in companies worldwide are now dealing with a workforce that has drastically different approaches to work and their careers than the workforce did two decades ago. 

Employee engagement is more relevant now than ever, with increasing competition and pressure on organizations to do better, and how vital employee engagement is in this struggle.   

Gone are the days when the end goal of HR was to ensure mere employee satisfaction, and new HR approaches and policies need to reflect this. Still, with the help of some retraining and an adaptive attitude that focuses more on employee wellbeing, this won't be too hard to achieve! 

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