Is your HR Department scary? Do you wander down the hallway afraid of what you might find? Do you ever look into the offices of your colleagues, and think “happy halloween, this is really scary?” Do you wake up in the middle of the night worried about whether the workers in your company are going to go on strike? Did you forget to fill out the paper work , and you missed a deadline? Is your company in compliance? Are your employees harassing one another?
These questions are scary. The answers can be even scarier. What’s scarier are blogs, and consultants that use these questions to strike fear into your hearts. That is my pet peeve! Consultants who use FEAR AS A SALES TACTIC. It’s manipulative. It’s unkind. That’s just an opinion I know many of my colleagues won’t agree.
One of the questions I used to ask on sales calls was, “what’s keeping you up at night?” and “what’s the result of doing nothing?” Certainly those are valid questions, particularly if you can then lead your potential client to a solution. However, in my heart, I believe a good HR Consultant is one who provides a solution without manipulation tactics, or fear. A good consultant is ethical, competent, and offers outstanding results.
Halloween is fun. But HR can be scary enough. Let’s leave the scary sales tactics to the used car salespeople please.
HR can sometimes feel like one big haunted house. Employees not in HR, sometimes never know what to expect. They have a look of terror on their when entering a meeting with HR, sometimes leave crying, sometimes leave smiling.
That is the outside view of HR.
The view from HR looking out can be much scarier, as you mention. Delivering solutions to people who feel “things are working out great”, are not easy and let’s face it, most people are stubborn and hate change. I think more people should take your approach and rather than work with fear, work with internal/external clients to help see what the benefits are, how work can be made more efficient, and locating the problem points.
Great post here! Hopefully your HR Halloween is full of many treats (not too many tricks).
I completely agree. I’ve been on both sides of the desk, and I know how it feels. I am grateful you visited my blog today Rich.
I’m not in HR. I can’t fill in the blanks
Rather than a long rhetorical into I would rather have seen an example of the problem and an alternate approach.
Who warns you that your workers might go on strike and then tries to sell you something? I’d like to hear that story.
@animal, I agree with your feedback. However, I used to work for a management consulting firm. The President of that firm headed up the “union avoidance division.” We were inundated with CEOs and HR Directors calling our offices at all hours crying for help. I didn’t give long winded examples today because last night I attended a lecture by @blogher, and she suggested we keep our posts short and concise. This blog is new, and I am learning. I will stumble as I grow, and I can only benefit comments such as yours. Thank you so much for visiting my site.
good post, margo. you know who else is guilty of this approach? attorneys. i really dislike employment attorneys who are afraid to take an aggressive stance on an issue which clearly has strong employer defense. rather than stand behind that defense, the approach is to focus too much on “worse case scenario”, “sky is falling”, etc. risk is risk, it shouldn’t incapacitate us! thx
I’m sure HR can be a scary place when it comes to delivering bad news or wielding the axe. In my former role i had to handle all of the difficult disciplinary sessions, death in service and other tricky situations. this was shared with the responsibility of surprise promotions, training, management development and other initiatives, occasionally i dropped in to branches just to say “hi”.
Not surprisingly, every time i turned up the room went silent. Everyone expected a problem when i arrived, and the need to keep this information confidential made the situation quite lonely at times as i had to be permanently on guard over what i said. It’s great to be part of future strategy when things are going well but when your holding forward plans in your head about cuts and closures while drinking with those effected at a company event, listening to future hopes and plans while knowing you may be the one who will be dashing them soon is really hard. Sitting down with a new trainee and telling them they are not going to cut it is equally hard, but it goes with the responsibility and territory.
Sometimes when conducting performance reviews you need to tell hard truths. To dress them up is wrong to the employee your talking to. The correctly delivered honesty can scare them in to action. Asking about the future and pointing out the consequence of not delivering is exactly what is needed. Appropriate fear can be a great motivator in these situations provided you follow it with a real solution to solve the problem.
HR is not always a great place to work but if you do it well and deliver bad news with compassion and honesty then you can sleep well at night knowing you did the right thing even if it is the hard and scary thing!
I counter all the bad stuff with the good. how many people have you hired, helped, developed, counseled, supported and helped in your career. Some will even remember the part you played and thank you for it. HR was only a part of my job, but i got the most satisfaction from managing people in to the business through tough performance management when all the talk was of managing them out. To achieve that i had to paint a bleak picture of what the future could be in order to scare them in to action. Not advocating bullying, but i would always favour hard honesty over a dressed up sugary message to get the best results.
And yes, as a last thought, HR do have to be the policeman of the corporation. It is not stooped in the 80′s whatever some might say who want to paint a picture of a rosy HR world. Being the messenger of what can’t be done, or how it needs to be done to protect the company often means the messenger gets shot. That is scary!
Take the good with the bad, your far from dead, great HR has never been more needed!
@BillBoorman
Margo interesting thought provoking piece however why people may be afraid to look into offices of colleagues is because they are no longer there. They have gone to the great beyond of HR. While I agree with Bill’s comment that HR is needed I don’t believe it is needed the way it currently exists. A reinvented HR is what is needed an area that adds something to a company besides payroll, people who have creative ideas and know how to lead not how to be led.
If HR continues down the path it is heading then by this time next year you can write a blog post HR R.I.P.
Your comment is poignant indeed. It’s too the heart of the matter in fact. Last night Steve Boese hosted his popular blog radio show “HR Happy Hour” where he asked the question, “Is HR Dead?” It was a vigorous debate. And while I believe our industry is limping, in the words of comedy group Monty Python It’s not dead yet. The recession is what’s killing the soul of America. People haven’t just lost their jobs, and their homes, they are losing hope. Forget the American Dream. Every day citizens are looking around asking themselves, “what happened to my company, my job? Paul, did you ever think you’d see the day where we’d be even having this dialogue. Frankly, I never thought I’d find myself listening to a blog radio show discussing whether or not HR is Dead. I wonder what Steve Boese thinks? Perhaps I will ask him.
Brilliant Bill. I couldn’t have said it better. As an HR and Organization Development practioner, I heartily agree. One of the hardest parts of HR is holding up a mirror and inviting people to take an honest look. People can only grow if they have an open mind, and they become willing to change. Of course, the operative word here is willing–followed by change. If people aren’t willing to change, they will become one of the felled branches you describe. The spirit in which the post was originally written was that of halloween–and of course–the scare tactics vendors use to sell us stuff. Stuff we may need, and often stuff we don’t. I use the term stuff perjoritavely of course, because sometimes salespeople are disingenous, preying on the vulnerability of their potential customers. This post was aimed at them. The point is this: if you have a product, a tool, a process, you don’t need to use scare tactics to bully people into buying.
As always Bill, it is good to hear from you.
Margo, Thanks for asking me to review your blog and leave a comment. I like your proactive style. Ask and you shall receive (most times).
Enjoy the “time of year” theme, in this case “Halloween”. It’s a great approach to grab readers’ attention to make a personal connection. (Another example, “Top 10 New Years’ Resolutions.”)
Love the language you use, mixing it up with HR – “scary”, “middle of the night”, “Is your boss a nutjob?”. Great question: “What’s the result of doing nothing?”
Agree fully that a good consultant (internal HR or third party recruiting) is one who “provides a solution without manipulation tactics or fear.” The best in recruiting / staffing / HR are consultative, keen listeners who offer collaborative solutions. Those who demean and reprimand have no place in HR positions. Let us all be upbeat, “can-do” and offer positive, constructive feedback.
I appreciate your positive feedback. Thank you.
Margo, HR has been faltering long before the recession. It has been building for many years and has now just peaked. For too long HR professionals where satisfied with the status quo and going along with the mainstream thinking of the company. They delivered news whether good or bad whether they were compassionate about it or not they never really looked for ways to change things for the better. Now that companies are looking at where to cut cost and what jobs would least affect a company HR has become the chopping block for many firms because they have become followers rather than leaders in a company. They have made themselves dispensable.
I think there has been too much introspection over the last few days Margo!
HR is about the people…and without the people there is no business…so first things first, define what the people need and go tell the business leaders what they’ve got to do and what the cost of NOT doing it is.
I speak to HR professionals all day long..and you know what?? They totally believe in what they do and what difference they can make.
I’ve just had a fantastic day…a Halloween day at work. Fun & games this morning, and more party this afternoon. Everyone is happy, and ex-colleagues returned for drinks and said how much they missed the company and the people. HR organised this…the directors left it to HR to put together a day that would make people proud to be there…and they delivered. No-one worried about what we used to do…but were focused on what we do now.
HR makes the difference and you should all be proud of that. You’re not policemen, you’re not gatekeepers, you’re not dead…you are the future of the business and without you the employees have no engagement, no development and no focus.
And without that…there’s no business! I hear senior HR people complain about not having a seat at the top table…well don’t wait, just knock that door down and tell them why they can’t survive WITHOUT you being at the top table!!
I love your enthusiasm and postive attitude Mervyn. Happy Halloween Indeed!