Why We Hate HR

Comments

October 3, 2007 at 5:52 pm

(1) Jill says:

As a human resources professional, one might be surprised to discover that 1) I “Googled” “why I hate human resources” and found the article Susan mentions above, and 2) I’m pretty much in agreement with it. I have a Bachelor’s degree in economics and a Master’s of Industrial Relations, and I have been in the “industry” for 10 years. I am disillusioned with the lack of HR practitioners who have either a “business” or “analytical” bent. Those who do seem to get frustrated and move into consulting. I could go on forever about my personal frustrations, but this is about the article “Why We Hate HR”. Although there are some good insights, the article is mostly one-sided, blaming the HR community as being inept, but what it doesn’t recognize is that human resources is a “function” much like “finance” is a function, and in order for it to be successful, it takes more than a group of HR professionals in an ivory tower pushing paper and talking about strategic HR amongst themselves. Executives, managers, and employees all have a role to play in ensuring an organization’s human resources function is successful. As an HR practitioner, I can’t count the number of times managers wanted to engage in HR related activities that would only result in disaster. Then they get pissed off at HR because they try to prevent that disaster. For example, the manager who wants to hire his best friend at a ridiculously high salary, or the supervisor who wants to unilaterally fire or transfer a poorly perfoming employee who he has never given ANY feedback to for 10 years. How can HR professionals be effective when no one wants to hear what we have to say? Maybe many of my colleauges could talk the talk, but couldn’t rub two brain cells together. But I know of some of us who are salient people with some great tools and ideas and no one will listen, including executive management. No one wants to be told or advised what to do. They want to do what they want to do and all they want is the HR person to endorse it. Perhaps this is another reason why HR professionals are relegated to administrative tasks, because that’s all people want them to do – i.e. “here, fill out this form for me, I have more important things to do…” No one says “help me get my team to perform better” because this would imply that the manager isn’t doing a good job, and he would never admit that publically. Let’s face it, HR has the pleasure of telling managers and executives how to behave properly if they want their staff to stay and perform. But people are people. They are sometimes control freaks, glory hogs, conflict-averse, etc. and don’t want to be told to act otherwise, especially not by HR…..

September 25, 2008 at 5:02 pm

(2) Wall st analyst says:

Here’s a dozy: NO matter how advanced our intelligence and skills, at some point a schoolmarm will decide our fate. I used to be a stock analyst at a large investment bank. When they first hired me out of grad school, the senior HR recruiter told me casually that she loved to hire young people from Anderson Consulting’s “Valuation Services” group. She explained, very satisfied, that because valuation (of companies and stocks) is what analysts do in research, the Anderson “valuation” hires came in with applicable skills. Indeed, there was a large colony of former Anderson people in the department, and over time I did get to know several. I should say, there were good people. One confided to me that HR’s regard for his CV was entirely misplaced, however, as what the Anderson Valuation Services group actually did was to value unusual items for estate tax purposes – he gave the example of sports memorabilia. When Wall Street analysts “value” a stock, of course, this involves company analysis and a mathematical relationship of forecasted company profits. It seems obvious to me that putting a price tag on a Mickey Mantle rookie card in no way resembles this, despite the similarity in name. It still galls me that the vaunted HR professional – this gatekeeper of my future – had an understanding of my skills as shallow as the paper my resume was printed on.

October 9, 2009 at 2:25 am

(3) Karen Peters says:

Sorry to have to correct you but there is no such thing as an “HR Professional”. Doctors, Town Planners and Teachers are Professionals but HR are not. It is very interesting to see how HR has sold itself and become good at marketing over the last few years. The sexing up of HR and quite incredible skills at marketing over substance has led to HR pushing itself into a position of being considered the key department in any company.

HR are there to try to prevent management from being sued and to remove recruitment responsibility for recruitment as much as possible from those who actually manage in a Profession. HR departments often work well beyond their remit in an attempt to justify their existence and risk getting caught out legally, as they are not Professional and are simply not properly trained to properly carry out semi-legal functions such as disciplinary hearings.

HR departments often carry out a murky function and work hard in an attempt to justify their existence.

This is not a Profession no matter how many times HR workers may try to justify their existence by saying it is.