Here we are again—the close of another year leaving us wondering how we can do better in the new year, personally and professionally. As your company’s HR manager, if you’re thinking how 2016 can improve your team’s success and stability, allow us to suggest some New Year’s resolutions!

To improve your team in 2016, resolve to:

1. Focus on employee health. You’ve heard that sitting is the new smoking: how inactivity leads to health problems and lost productivity. Research suggests that each health risk piled onto a person—everything from serious health problems to lost sleep or poor diet—robs a percentage of their potential productivity. And when just one person can have between 10 and 12 health risks each day, that makes for a lot of losses. So incentivize your employees to move with a wellness plan or an informal fitness program! Whether you encourage employees to walk at lunch, offer discounts on gym memberships, or hold standing meetings instead of sitting ones, every bit of activity contributes to employees’ overall health and the business’ overall productivity.
2. Improve HR staff’s skills. Professional development is an ongoing process for all departments, but it is especially important in Human Resources, where the rules and the people are always changing. Set up a solid continuing education plan to cover the basics (people skills, conflict management, and so on), encourage employees to use available tuition reimbursement plans, and offer timely training on changes in laws and regulations.
3. Revise the performance appraisal process. No employee likes reporting to the boss’s office for a data dump on their year’s work, nor is an end-of-year surprise useful for guiding performance. More frequent status and goal checks will do a lot more good than that annual data dump. Employees will appreciate the opportunity to reshape their goals and behavior throughout the year, with no surprises dropped at the last minute. As the HR manager, it’s your job to train leadership about the importance of ongoing performance feedback, and to lead by example.
4. Enhance or develop a social media plan. Yes, social media can be scary, and with the wrong content, it can be even scarier. But it’s time to put aside the fear and start developing a smart communication plan that conveys your team’s brand. Use social media to garner interest in the company and to attract fresh talent. Social media is too important an outlet to be stopped by fear of the unknown!
5. Look ahead. Study HR and industry trends, as well as current legislation, to anticipate and better prepare for upcoming changes.

How’s that for motivation? Try one or two resolutions or go big with all five; if you tackle a few resolutions early in the year, you can always come back for more. Here’s to a happy holiday season, and a stable and successful 2016!