Key Responsibility Area (KRA)

What is KRA?

It helps define the expectations of the employer from a specific job role. It clarifies the employee what is expected of their role at the company. Without KRAs, an employee may feel lost or demotivated to perform.

It also plays an important role in increased employee satisfaction and is used as an outline based on which an employee’s performance review can be done. It is usually well-defined and easy to measure for the employer. This helps the employee perform better by providing a ready reckoner about what is expected by the employer.

How important is it to have KRAs in place?

It is important for both the employer and employee in many ways. Some key points on the importance of KRA in the workplace are as follows:

• Provides structure to job roles:
  It is required to provide the proper structure to various job roles in an organization. Without KRAs, there would be a lot of duplication of effort, making the entire system less efficient. It helps the employer allocate responsibilities based on the strengths and skills of each employee. These are helpful in employee engagement and retention.
• Helpful in driving growth:
  It supports the employees to bring growth to an organization. Without it, the employees would not be able to collaborate with a common goal to drive the revenue and profitability of the organization. KRAs not only provide structure to employee efforts but also add up to the growth of the organization
• Easy to measure:
  These are crucial for any organization because they make it easy to measure employee productivity. It is essential to have KRAs in place to enable seamless performance review.
• Motivates employees:
  It is important in providing the right motivation to employees in their workplace. Without KRAs, an employee feels lost and quickly loses motivation to achieve company goals. It gives the much-needed structure so that employees can perform their best and achieve success for the organization.

What is the difference between key responsibility areas (KRA) and key performance indicators (KPI)?

Key responsibility areas (KRA) and key performance indicators (KPI) are two distinct measurable units that are helpful in their ways of driving the growth of the organization. However, these are uniquely different from each other. KRA is an outline of the job role, which is helpful for the employee to understand the employer’s expectations. On the other hand, KPI is the employee’s actual performance, usually measured as a numerical score and tied to the organization’s overall vision.

KRAs are usually shared before the start of the job at the organization. KPIs are measured after a specific period to assess the employee’s performance.

Key responsibility areas are always set at an employee level, whereas KPIs are set at an organization level, departmental level, and then at the employee level. For instance, revenue targets, profit targets, sales targets, etc., are all part of KPIs.

What are some examples of KRA for HR Managers?

The KRAs for an HR Manager would include the roles and responsibilities for the job. It varies in different companies. It would need to be a SMART goal, i.e. goals that are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Reliable, and Time-bound. The following are the KRA for HR Managers:

• Lead talent acquisition:
  The talent acquisition function for an HR manager would include KRAs like reducing the fulfillment time, reducing the cost per hire, improving the quality of hire, and increasing the employee productivity rate in the organization. These are some metrics on which the employee can be judged based on their efforts.
• Contribute towards capacity building:
  Another important KRA for an HR Manager could be contributing to capacity building. This can be done by initiating training and development programs in the organization, better succession planning, skill development, and recruitment effectiveness. Working in these areas would help the HR manager build capacity.
• Develop people engagement programs:
  One of the most crucial KRAs for an HR manager in an organization is developing people engagement programs. An HR manager can focus on team performance, employee productivity, employee retention, net promoter score, employee turnover, talent retention, etc. These activities are specific and easy to measure. HR Manager also has a vital role in driving rewards and recognition in the organization.
• Work towards HR excellence:
  Apart from driving employee productivity, an HR manager has an equally important role in driving HR excellence at the organization. By keeping the diversity score high, increasing culture satisfaction, reducing the cost of HR services, enabling high technology adoption, and compliance with all laws, an HR Manager’s performance can be enhanced.
• It is a critical component of every job role. Without a KRA, it would become challenging for HR managers and top management to handle performance management and drive company growth. At the same time, KRA provides a guide to the employee on the role expectations and channels the employee’s energy towards achieving company goals.