HR: The Monster in the Office

Human. Resources.  Two words that strike fear into the hearts and souls of employees everywhere.  Take a random survey of the people around you.  What does HR mean to them?  Bureaucracy.  Policy.  Procedure.  Paperwork.  It doesn’t have to be that way!

HR departments around the country have garnered a bad rap.  Executives feel as though HR doesn’t understand the business side of things.  Employees feel as though HR is there for the sole purpose of horrifying performance reviews and citations.  One of my favorite sayings is “Perception is reality.”  If that is what is thought, that is what is.

But, what then SHOULD HR be?  Look at the two words: Human Resources.  HR is supposed to be for the benefit of the employees.  What do the employees need to make their jobs and work environment better?  What trainings and development opportunities can be delivered?  What reward and recognition programs can be implemented?  HR should be loved by employees, not hated.  What happened?

This might be an unanswerable question, but I have a couple of probable solutions.

1) Separate HR from compensation and benefits.  People will never feel as though they are being fairly compensated and those negative feelings will spill over into everything else HR does.

2) Make HR departments larger and give them more resources.  This might seem counter-intuitive – larger departments just mean more bureaucracy, right?  Not always.  Look closely.  Is your HR department so busy handling insurance and employee issues that they can’t focus on how to make things better?  After doing a little research, it seems an accepted ratio is 1 HR professional for every 100 employees.  I once worked for a company that had 3 HR professionals for 4,000 employees.  How could they ever be expected to do more than the minimum?

3) Change the HR culture.  Do they see themselves as being tyrants of standard operating procedure or as partners in strategic planning and decision-making?  Allow HR to take a day for team building and innovation.  Bring them in on important organizational decisions.  These people know more about your employees than maybe anyone.  Leverage that information to increase your bottom line.

Don’t turn HR into your organization’s version of a monster hiding in the closet.  Help them do what they are supposed to do: Invest in your organization’s people.