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PapaHR · Mike Pritula Academy · Roles

HR Manager: Role Profile, KPIs and Interview Questions

This page covers the Human Resources (HR) Manager role, key performance indicators (KPIs), interview questions and onboarding. Use it to hire someone who can build your team and help managers support their people.

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Job profiles, hiring, onboarding and reviews are in PapaHR. Free for up to 25 employees.

  1. Take the profile below or build your own with the builder.
  2. In PapaHR the profile turns into a job ad, an onboarding plan and probation goals.
  3. After 90 days, review the person against the same KPIs and competencies.

Job profile

Why the role exists

Bring the right people into the business and help managers improve team performance.

Result in a year

Priority roles are filled against an agreed plan, new hires receive support and managers regularly discuss performance with employees. Employee records are current, reasons for leaving are understood and retention actions are agreed with the owner.

Place in the structure

  1. Reports toBusiness owner or company leader
  2. Direct reportsNone initially; a recruiter or HR assistant as the team grows
  3. Works withDepartment managers, Employees and new hires, Accountant, Office Manager, Information technology specialist, Candidates
Key result areas
  1. Recruitment — Hiring plan attainment on scheduleIllustrative target: 100% of planned hires start on time.
  2. Quality of hire — Probation period pass rateIllustrative target: 100% of new hires pass their probation period.
  3. New hire onboarding — Onboarding plan attainment on scheduleIllustrative target: 100% of onboarding tasks completed on time.
  4. Employee records — Share of error-free employee records100% of checked employee records are error-free.
  5. Employee retention — Quarterly employee retention rateIllustrative target: retain 100% of employees at the start of the quarter.
  6. Feedback and performance — Performance conversation plan attainmentIllustrative target: 100% of planned conversations end with agreed actions.
Requirements

Experience: Independently managing recruitment and onboarding in a small business.

Formal: Comfortable handling confidential information; relevant education is desirable.

Should know

  • Recruitment stages from hiring request to employee start.
  • Behavioural interviewing: situation, task, action and result.
  • Onboarding design and probation period assessments.
  • Ways to analyse departures and employee feedback.
  • Employee data storage and access controls.

Should be able to

  • Turn a manager's request into a clear role profile.
  • Assess candidates using evidence from past experience.
  • Maintain spreadsheets and check data completeness.
  • Discuss difficult situations without exposing personal information.
  • Justify recruitment and training costs through team results.
Competencies at three levels

Understanding business priorities

Directs time and budget towards people issues that affect business performance.

  1. Clarifies why someone is needed and what results the manager expects.basic
  2. Agrees hiring priorities based on the cost of unfinished work.solid
  3. Suggests redistributing work when another hire would not solve the problem.strong

Candidate assessment

Reduces the risk of hiring a good conversationalist without the required skills.

  1. Asks consistent questions against criteria and records evidence.basic
  2. Clarifies personal contributions and uses tasks to check uncertain answers.solid
  3. Compares interview assessments with new hire results and adjusts selection criteria.strong

Managing people processes

Prevents missed start dates, feedback and important employee record updates.

  1. Tracks tasks, deadlines and owners for each new hire.basic
  2. Spots delays early and secures decisions from those responsible.solid
  3. Simplifies recurring tasks and checks that processes work without reminders.strong

Working with managers

Helps managers make people decisions based on observations and results.

  1. Clarifies facts and records agreements after employee discussions.basic
  2. Helps prepare difficult conversations and agree next steps.solid
  3. Discusses management-related reasons for leaving with the owner and secures changes.strong

People data analysis

Distinguishes isolated problems from recurring causes of employee departures.

  1. Checks dates, statuses and record completeness before calculating metrics.basic
  2. Investigates gaps by vacancy, department and reason for leaving.solid
  3. Checks whether people decisions worked and explains small-team data limitations.strong

Confidentiality and trust

Employees need to know who may receive information about their situation and why.

  1. Checks document recipients and avoids discussing personal details with colleagues.basic
  2. Explains confidentiality boundaries and shares only information needed to resolve issues.solid
  3. Finds unnecessary access and establishes clear steps for handling sensitive concerns.strong
Builder

Build the profile for your company

Tick what this person does at your company. On the right is the ready profile: copy it or open it in PapaHR.

HR Manager

Bring the right people into the business and help managers improve team performance.

Duties
  1. Agree staffing needs and hiring priorities with managers.
  2. Define role outcomes and candidate selection criteria.
  3. Post vacancies, interview candidates and arrange meetings with hiring managers.
  4. Agree candidate offers within the approved budget.
  5. Coordinate new hire starts and track onboarding plans.
  6. Update employee records and pass changes to the accountant.
  7. Help managers set goals and give employees feedback.
  8. Investigate reasons for leaving and propose retention actions.
  9. Arrange training for specific work tasks.
  10. Report hiring, onboarding and employee movement to the owner.
  11. Find external recruiters for hard-to-fill roles.
  12. Set up employee referrals for candidates.
  13. Help define job levels and progression criteria.
  14. Collect employee suggestions for improving work processes.
  15. Arrange internal meetings for a distributed team.
  16. Set up absence tracking and holiday handovers.
  17. Coordinate handovers and access removal when employees leave.
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HR Manager KPIs

  1. Hiring plan attainment on schedule — On-time employee starts / planned starts × 100%. Mistake: Counting accepted offers as starts or changing the plan after missed deadlines.weight 25% · month
  2. Probation period pass rate — Hires passing probation / hires whose probation period ended × 100%. Mistake: Excluding early leavers; recording probation period passes without manager assessment.weight 20% · quarter
  3. Onboarding plan attainment on schedule — Onboarding tasks completed on time / tasks planned for period × 100%. Mistake: Marking training complete without checking whether the new hire can perform the task.weight 15% · month
  4. Share of error-free employee records — Error-free records / checked records × 100%. Mistake: Checking completed fields but missing outdated job titles, managers and employee statuses.weight 15% · month
  5. Quarterly employee retention rate — Quarter-start employees remaining / quarter-start employees × 100%. Mistake: Masking departures with new hires or retaining employees regardless of performance.weight 15% · quarter
  6. Performance conversation plan attainment — Conversations with recorded agreements / planned conversations × 100%. Mistake: Counting calendar invitations without discussing performance and next steps.weight 10% · quarter
Calculator

Work out the KPI bonus

Enter how much of each target was met, in percent, and the bonus at 100%. You can change the weights.

KPIWeight, %Achieved, %Share
Hiring plan attainment on schedule
Probation period pass rate
Onboarding plan attainment on schedule
Share of error-free employee records
Quarterly employee retention rate
Performance conversation plan attainment
KPI total
Bonus
Sum of weights

The weights are an example. They should add up to 100%.

Interview questions

Scorecard

Run the interview and get the result

Score each answer from 1 to 5 and the total is worked out by competency. Keep this page open on your phone during the interview.

Understanding business priorities

Describe competing urgent hiring requests. How did you prioritise them, what did you do and how did this affect the business?

✓ Listen for: Specific vacancy impacts, agreed priorities, personal actions and results.

⚑ Red flag: Prioritised whoever complained the loudest.

Tell us about proposing an alternative to hiring. How did you investigate the need, persuade the manager and evaluate the outcome?

✓ Listen for: Workload analysis, an alternative solution, manager agreement and evidence of impact.

⚑ Red flag: Refused to recruit without understanding what work was going unfinished.

Candidate assessment

Describe a candidate the manager liked but you doubted. What did you check and what was the hiring outcome?

✓ Listen for: Role criteria, interview evidence, verification method and final decision.

⚑ Red flag: Relies only on intuition or personal rapport.

Describe a hire who failed their probation period. How did you examine your assessment and change your selection process?

✓ Listen for: A missed signal linked to performance, personal responsibility and assessment changes.

⚑ Red flag: Blames only the new hire and leaves selection criteria unchanged.

Managing people processes

Describe a new hire's arrival when the team was unprepared. How did you recover onboarding and prevent a repeat?

✓ Listen for: Missing preparations, task owners, personal actions and changes to future starts.

⚑ Red flag: Sent a reminder and considered the job done.

When a manager delayed an probation period assessment, what did you do and what decision did the new hire receive?

✓ Listen for: Decision deadline, evidence gathering, manager discussion and feedback to the new hire.

⚑ Red flag: Expected the new hire to chase their own review.

Working with managers

Describe a manager asking to replace an underperformer. How did you investigate causes, arrange a conversation and check the result?

✓ Listen for: Expectations, performance evidence, employee support and a reasoned outcome.

⚑ Red flag: Opened a vacancy without checking expectations or previous feedback.

Tell us about employees leaving because of a manager's actions. How did you discuss this with the manager and what changed?

✓ Listen for: Verified facts, a calm discussion, agreed changes and follow-up checks.

⚑ Red flag: Shared named complaints unnecessarily without discussing confidentiality boundaries.

People data analysis

Describe an employee turnover metric that misled the team. How did you check the data, explain the cause and change the decision?

✓ Listen for: Team size, measurement period, reasons for leaving and the revised decision.

⚑ Red flag: Compares percentages without knowing employee and departure counts.

Describe an onboarding change whose impact you measured. What data did you collect, what did you do and what did you conclude?

✓ Listen for: Comparable new hire groups, performance results, limitations and the next step.

⚑ Red flag: Treats the number of meetings as proof of successful onboarding.

Confidentiality and trust

Without names or personal details, describe a sensitive employee concern. How did you decide who needed information and help resolve it?

✓ Listen for: Confidentiality boundaries, minimum necessary sharing and a practical outcome.

⚑ Red flag: Reveals a former colleague's personal details during the interview.

Describe colleagues having unnecessary employee data access. How did you discover the issue, restrict access and verify the fix?

✓ Listen for: Specific access, root cause removal, recipient checks and future handling arrangements.

⚑ Red flag: Kept shared access because managers found it convenient.

Score at least one answer and the result shows up here. ·
Track candidates in PapaHR

Test task

First priorities for a small business's sole HR Manager · 2 hours

Practice scenario: a company has 35 employees, three open roles and two new hires starting next week. Managers call every vacancy urgent, new hires have no assigned buddies and recent departure reasons are undocumented. Prepare a plan for your first two weeks: questions, priorities, people to involve and expected outputs. For one vacancy, define the expected outcome and questions to assess it. Draft a new hire's first-week plan and propose three people metrics with formulas and data sources. Turn missing information into questions; no real employee data is needed.

How to assess it

  • Priorities reflect business losses and new hire start dates.
  • Missing information becomes questions; assumptions are clearly labelled.
  • Actions have deadlines, owners and verifiable outcomes.
  • Selection criteria test the work the person will do.
  • Onboarding includes practice, a buddy and checks of task mastery.
  • Metrics are calculable, with data sources and limitations identified.

Ready job ad

HR Manager at [company name]

Help [company name] hire, support new starters and improve team performance.

What you will do

  • Agree role profiles and hiring priorities with managers.
  • Manage recruitment from hiring request to employee start.
  • Coordinate onboarding with managers and buddies.
  • Keep employee records current.
  • Help managers discuss team performance and development.
  • Investigate reasons for leaving and propose retention actions.

What we need

  • Experience independently managing recruitment and onboarding.
  • Ability to assess skills through questions about past experience.
  • Ability to agree tasks and deadlines with managers.
  • Confidence working with spreadsheets and employee data.
  • Ability to maintain confidentiality and discuss difficult situations.

What we offer

  • Pay: [salary in US dollars and payment terms].
  • Hours: [schedule]; working arrangement: [office, remote or hybrid].
  • Location: [city].
  • Team: [headcount]; reporting to: [manager's job title].
  • Recruitment and training resources: [budget and tools].
  • Development: [training and progression opportunities].

In PapaHR this text becomes a job opening with a careers page and a candidate pipeline.

90-day onboarding plan

Before day one

  1. Agree role priorities and probation period outcomes.Manager
  2. List open roles, incoming hires and current people tasks.Manager
  3. Prepare system access with appropriate employee data restrictions.IT

Day one

  1. Explain company structure, departmental objectives and staffing budget.Manager
  2. Introduce department managers and arrange initial meetings.Manager
  3. Check access and employee data storage arrangements.New hire

First week

  1. Discuss vacancies, new starters and team challenges with managers.New hire
  2. Check employee records and upcoming start dates.New hire
  3. Approve hiring priorities and onboarding responsibilities.Manager

30 days

  1. Agree profiles for priority roles and launch recruitment.New hire
  2. Introduce onboarding plans for upcoming new starters.New hire
  3. Approve metric definitions, baseline values and targets.Manager
  4. Fix critical gaps in employee records.New hire

60 days

  1. Review recruitment delays and the quality of initial candidates.New hire
  2. Collect feedback from new hires and their managers.New hire
  3. Agree actions addressing departures and onboarding difficulties.Manager

90 days

  1. Present recruitment, onboarding and employee data review results.New hire
  2. Check managers' completion of agreed people actions.New hire
  3. Assess the probation period and approve next quarter's priorities.Manager

Probation period goals

  1. Establish recruitment for priority roles.Illustrative target: by day 30, every priority role has an approved profile, timeline and selection stages.
  2. Make new hire starts predictable.Illustrative target: everyone starting after day 30 has an onboarding plan, buddy and scheduled feedback meetings.
  3. Make employee data useful for decisions.Illustrative target: by day 60, all records are checked, critical errors corrected and metrics calculated from verifiable records.
  4. Help managers address causes of employee losses.Illustrative target: by day 90, agree three actions addressing identified issues, each with an owner, deadline and outcome check.

Career path

HR Assistant

Maintains records, schedules interviews and prepares starts using an existing plan.

To move up: Manage recruitment and onboarding independently, demonstrating accurate records and reliable delivery.

HR Manager

Runs core people processes and agrees decisions with managers.

To move up: Improve recruitment and onboarding, establish feedback and analyse reasons for leaving.

Senior HR Manager

Handles complex employee situations, improves processes and supports less experienced colleagues.

To move up: Present a credible people plan and budget, and learn to delegate team tasks.

Head of HR

Owns the HR team, budget and people priorities of a growing business.

To move up: Extend responsibility across departments after demonstrating results at the current scale.

Questions for a 1:1 meeting

  1. Which open role is disrupting work most, and what help do you need?
  2. Where are managers delaying candidate decisions, and what must we agree?
  3. Which new hires lack support, and how does this affect their work?
  4. Which reasons for leaving recur, and what management actions could address them?
  5. Which employee data is still too unreliable for decisions?
  6. Where do employees struggle to get clear feedback from their manager?
  7. Which people tasks should we postpone to focus on more important results?
  8. Which difficult conversation needs my support, and what should we prepare?

Mistakes in hiring and managing

  1. Hiring an HR Manager without agreeing the role's boundaries.
    Better: Define priorities, authority, budget and responsibilities that remain with managers.
  2. Judging candidates only on friendliness and a good impression.
    Better: Examine specific recruitment, onboarding and difficult conversation decisions from past experience.
  3. Expecting every role filled without hiring manager involvement.
    Better: Agree feedback deadlines, interview participation and responsibility for candidate offers.
  4. Treating every departure as the HR Manager's personal failure.
    Better: Review causes, management decisions and actions to retain employees the business needs.
  5. Measuring work through events held and spreadsheets completed.
    Better: Check actual starts, new hire task mastery and managers' follow-through on agreements.
HR in money

What a bad hire costs: HR Manager

The same calculation as in PapaHR «HR in money»: the cost of hiring plus the salary for the months the new hire worked at half capacity.

One leaver
A year

In the first months a new hire delivers about half the result, so the company pays the other half of the salary for learning. In PapaHR the calculation uses your real leavers.

Questions and answers

What does an HR Manager do in a small business?

They coordinate recruitment, onboarding, employee records and feedback. Priorities are agreed with the owner: hiring during growth or investigating departures when people keep leaving. Managers remain responsible for their employees' work and results.

How does an HR Manager differ from a recruiter?

A recruiter focuses on finding and assessing candidates and getting them to their start date. An HR Manager also coordinates onboarding and helps managers support their teams after hiring. One person may cover both roles in a small business.

When does a business need a dedicated HR Manager?

Consider one when recurring recruitment, new starters and employee issues consume too much management time. Repeated candidate dropouts, struggling new hires and unexplained departures are other signals. Base the decision on workload and the cost of mistakes, alongside headcount.

Which KPIs should an HR Manager have?

Choose metrics for current priorities: timely starts, successful probation periods, onboarding and data accuracy. Agree targets before the period starts and review hiring and retention results with managers. Mark a metric as not applicable if there is no data to calculate it or no relevant probation periods have ended.

Can an Office Manager move into HR without a relevant degree?

Start by scheduling interviews, preparing new hire starts and maintaining employee records. Then learn candidate assessment, onboarding and difficult conversations with guidance from an experienced colleague. Use a practical assignment and work results to assess readiness for an independent role.

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