Yes, you heard us. It really sucks. At least, that’s what we hear from a lot of people who are building businesses.
And, it does – suck that is. We know the people parts of your business can be more challenging than anything else you deal with in business. If you stop and think about the most painful things you deal with in your business, it’s all about people isn’t it? We know.
Entrepreneurs in particular think HR sucks. And, they should. Let’s face it, when you think about HR in general (human resources – sheesh, we wish we could come up with a better name than that ourselves), the whole notion doesn’t really give you a warm fuzzy does it? Rather, it makes you think of all that corporate BS and the negative no, no, no you’ve been accustomed to whenever you’ve had to deal with the dreaded HR department.
Yup, it sucks. Which is why we really enjoyed the post on LinkedIn this week by Bernard Marr “Why we no longer need HR Departments.” We share his view when it comes to what HR should look like, but we particularly enjoyed the stir it caused among HR professionals who apparently went immediately on the defensive when it was felt that Bernard’s comments hit a little too close to home. Their comments actually made me, well, ticked off if you want to know the truth. So, compelled to put fingers to keyboard, I wrote the following to my supposed HR brethren, who systematically whined and complained in their commentary about the article about how oppressed, underfunded and under-appreciated they were. And, I can’t apologize to them, though to the casual reader, I do feel obliged to apologize for them.
Our Open Letter to Bernard Marr’s Critics
“It has really been fun watching the responses to this post – and I must confess I’m pretty shocked at how deeply ingrained the traditional view of HR has been reinforced in the comments. HR isn’t about hall-monitoring compliance, nor is it only there to try to protect a company from liability. Granted, those pieces are elements of what HR has and will likely still be responsible for. But, If you can keep yourself from getting yourselves all whipped up into a lather over the titles in the article (inherent problem it seems with traditional HR practitioners), and pay attention to the message, then maybe you could see the sense Bernard is making – despite the fact, as one or two of you have so graciously pointed out, that he is a “consultant” – perish the thought.
Our world view is that yes, as HR folks, we’re charged with taking care of the compliance and liability issues associated with protecting the companies we support. For those about to whine about consultants again, we’re working for smaller companies as their whole HR Department, practicing HR that contributes to their bottom line. But, liability and risk avoidance is maybe 25% of what we do for companies. And, therein lies the issue. I’ve seen a lot of comments complaining about underfunding and under resourcing, and lots of comments about how big a job avoiding liability can be – and it will always be underfunded and under resourced until the business supported by that HR sees the business of HR as a value add as opposed to a necessary evil. Why would a company invest in a function that doesn’t contribute any more than covering its behind?
I’ve also seen a lot of comments about people not understanding what HR does – frankly, I don’t know what
they do either – because if compliance and all that risk aversion only takes us non-traditional HR folks 25% of our time, what is everyone else in HR devoting the remaining 75% to? And, I’m not being mean spirited, but that is the small box that HR traditionalists have managed to force themselves into. And, that’s why I enjoyed the article Bernard. It’s an uphill struggle convincing anyone, given the horrendous reputation that HR has created for itself, that well done people work is a secret weapon. Building the common language that represents company culture, then teaching everyone in the organization to use it is intentional, belief
based, purpose driven and frankly, hard work. But it’s the best work HR, if that’s what you choose to call it, can do – and it doesn’t pick sides. A healthy organization is one where everyone understands what’s needed to be successful, top down and bottom up. And HR (or whatever the heck you want to call it) should be both the facilitator of the discussion and the conduit of change. It’s really pretty hard to defend the lack of progress the HR profession has made to be a contributor to business results.”