Human Resources - It's Time For a Tune UP!

Ok – you have your business in place with staff, goals, mission statement, products and services for sale, management to guide, sales to promote and a target market of people to sell to. And through it all, for the sake of day to day operations, issues arise, jobs become available, health insurance questions are raised, workman’s comp comes into question, wages change, and payroll becomes a headache. In most companies, there are talented multitasking individuals who are quite skilled at juggling these tedious tasks. They are well known as the infamous HR people or the people of Human Resources. Now, some companies and businesses do not have a formal HR department or representative for public or internal staff to turn to. Generally speaking, most businesses with less than 150 personnel may not have such department or representative. However, the specific issues regarding day-to-day operations still continue and are usually dealt with by the General Manager/Store Manager of the business. However, my topic relating to Human Resources for this week, targets businesses who DO HAVE this department and one or more representatives of the department. The suggestions herein, can still benefit those manager’s who must multitask and wear the HR Hat for the sake of not having such a department.

Now, as a listed member of Linked-In, I’ve seen an outburst of frustrated consumers directly targeting negative connotations at those in Human Resources. I must admit, I happen to be one of them. In all fairness, the demand of Human Resources has increased tenfold as businesses and their means of operating and maintaining personnel has changed over the past 20 years. In fact, Human Resources across the board has incorporated the job task of not just maintaining employees, but also the job of maintaining departmental ordinances, permits, and operating licenses. Let’s face it; HR has a lot of responsibility. However, as the demand increases, the means to adjust how HR implements its programs must also bend with the times and see how its role in the public view has an impact on operations as well. Since the demands of HR increased, so has the means to tighten and revise rules, regulations and policies. HR has become the enforcer of these rules as they protect the assets of the company. Because of this, HR has developed a very rigid personality. Many companies allow their HR department to operate as the policing environment not realizing how they’re impacting both internal and external customers. Hence, if you follow what I write on discussions in Linked-In, you’ll see that I refer to HR people as policy spewing drones. HR has developed into a world all its own with representatives so stuck in ensuring that “I’s” are dotted and “T’s” are crossed, they’ve missed their value and impact within the “real world”. While the focus has been on tightening rules and regulations, so has the need to draw new sales, reinforce training and development and capitalize on new trends and ideas that increase the motivation in the workplace. Here are my tips to improving the department of HR and giving its presentation a makeover:

- HR stands for Human Resources and therefore must be Humane within their operations and be the trust of humans when called upon for their “resources”. Therefore they’re disposition should not enforce fear, rather envelope a welcoming environment.

- HR people are also PR people. Human Resources have their thumb on the pulse of operations at all times and therefore communicate with almost every living being that comes in contact with them. This is a prime opportunity to develop solid positive relations both internally and externally. The impression derived from HR will be a lasting impression. People within this department must follow a “guest service” mentality realizing that they are not just a representative of a department, but also a representative of a company who has every opportunity to set the mood and be the example of how staff members and potential employees should behave.

- HR should remain very organized in terms of driving consistency among staff members. Consistency plays a key role in ridding favoritism in the workplace. HR should define a disciplinary method that can be held for every employee within the organization. Plus, HR needs to enforce the standard with all management to ensure line level staff members receive the same discipline method across the board. To ensure this, HR should hold regular meetings with department heads and identify specific issues that may be of concern in effort to hold a department head accountable for his/her own disciplinary implementations.

- Annual reviews should be organized by people within HR – and done by personnel’s anniversary date. In addition, if your company or organization ties pay raises to annual reviews (which is highly recommended), then the reviews should be tied to a score board that can be applied to all personnel.

- HR should conduct regular on-site visits with various departments in effort to familiarize themselves with the ongoing operations. This way, people within HR have an improved understanding to operations when issues arise and can contribute preventive ideas to improve the given workplace environment.

- HR people need to identify and implement training and development plans with department heads to ensure employees at every level are given the opportunity to improve his/her performance. This includes working out budgets with department heads when the time comes to submit expectations to the company’s controller for review either quarterly or annually.

- Upon recruiting, HR needs to run more effective campaigns. Rule of thumb should be: weed through internal candidates for a specified period of time first before spending company budgets on expensive public ads. Once the period is over and a selection is not made, then the position should become closed to internal candidates while the position roles over to the public for view. Schedule campaign with hiring manager’s schedule – don’t run an ad just to collect resumes that will ultimately collect dust since the hiring manager took off on a two week vacation. Make sure hiring managers are prepared to interview before going public or specify to public when to expect interviews to start.

- Brighten up the HR office with motivational and encouraging messages with bright colors. There’s nothing more depressing to get the message of “you’re not welcomed” when walking into an HR office to see a bunch of black and white papers lining the wall that read, “don’ts”, “no’s”, “not allowed’s”, and “can not’s”. If you’re doing this to staff and potential candidates, then you might as well do this to your customers too at the main entrance.

These are just a few of the ideas that pop out at me when I deal with HR both as a potential candidate and as a director in charge.

Now for some fun, if you are used to hiring people – I thought I would add but a few funny things that was posted by Catherine Bergerat on one my groups in Linked In. The topic to the discussion was: “What do Job seekers do, that get’s you really upset?” For brevity purposes, ½ the answers are here. If you wish to read the rest, email me and I will send them to you. Enjoy…

1. what time is break
2. where is the bathroom
3. how many times a week can i go home early and come in late
4. hey do you want to car pool with me
5. how many drinks are we allowed to have at lunch
6. when can i take my first sick day
7. when can i take my first vacation day
8. if you get fired will they make me the boss
9. is my parking space close to the door
10. will there be cable TV in my cubical
11. when do i get to meet your family
12. what is your definition of casual day, do you want to hear mine?
13. are the bathrooms co-ed
14. are there any rules about violence at work
15. what if i know that i am smarter than you, is it OK to refer to as hey dummy in meetings
16. i know what you drive and where you park
17. do you mean convictions or just allegations
18. so for the drug test what kind of drugs do i get to take
19. so do i get a check every day or are you one of those places that makes people wait.
20. so where do you keep the beer at
21. where can my kids hang out when I bring them to work?
22. i see you have a gym, but i would prefer a fully stocked comp bar instead
23. so when you are not here, your office is mine. mi casa su casa!
24. You guys don't drug test, right?
25. if you see the police come and talk with me, don't be alarmed
26. do you have a no underwear day?
27. so where is the vault at, i might need a loan this week.
28. if you are stuck on an island what book would you want to read? the book that gets me off the stupid island!!
29. I see stupid people...then say there is one sitting in your chair!
30. i have people watching you

Have a great week and join me next Monday for more helpful operational tips.