Is Your HR Team at Capacity?
Keri Wozniak
How to Spot the Pressure Before It Breaks Your Business
We hear it all the time. HR teams are being asked to do more with less—especially in small and mid-sized organizations. Whether you have a solo HR generalist juggling everything from onboarding to compliance, or a small team navigating organizational change, the pressure can quickly become unsustainable. And when HR is stretched too thin, the consequences ripple across the business: compliance risks rise, employee engagement drops, and strategic initiatives stall.
Outsourcing HR work is always an option to help support your situation. But before you can decide what kind of outside support you need, you have to understand your team’s current capacity. That starts with assessing your span of control.
Assessing Your Span of Control
Take a close look at your HR team’s structure and workload. How many people are on your team? What are their core strengths? Are they spending time on the right things—or just trying to keep up? Are there gaps in expertise that are slowing down progress or creating risk?
For organizations without a dedicated HR team—or with just one person managing it all—the need for outside expertise is even more critical. In these cases, HR responsibilities often fall to office managers, finance staff, or executives who may not have formal training in employment law, compliance, or talent strategy. This can lead to inconsistent practices, missed deadlines, and increased legal exposure. Bringing in external support ensures that essential HR functions are handled correctly and professionally, even when internal capacity is limited.
Understanding your team’s capacity and limitations helps you identify where external support can have the greatest impact—whether it’s filling a temporary gap, providing specialized knowledge, or accelerating a critical project.
The Hidden Cost of HR Burnout
But beyond project needs, there’s a deeper organizational risk to consider: HR burnout and turnover. When internal teams are consistently overextended, it leads to stress, disengagement, and ultimately, attrition. High HR turnover disrupts continuity, delays initiatives, and increases the cost of rehiring and retraining. For small organizations, losing even one HR professional can be a major setback. For mid-sized companies, it can stall momentum during critical periods of growth or change.
By identifying potential needs early and budgeting for external support, you position your HR function to be proactive rather than reactive. This approach helps you avoid burnout, reduce risk, and achieve better outcomes for your people and your business.
Looking for more support to expand your HR capacity? Download our free whitepaper: Rethinking HR Capacity: External Support as a Strategic Advantage.
