Human Resources - A New Perspective

When I read this article on work place harassement (archive - my immediate thought: woah - why isn’t HR doing a better job of protecting females in the company? The majority of HR workers I know are… females!

So, even when harassment happened AND HR can do something to protect themselves (or even their compatriots) - why did the harassment continue?

I always considered Human Resources a department for us, the individuals. You know, they’re humans and resourceful. (At least I did until I came up with this line)

After frustration with different interactions with HR - I have to wonder, in the companywho did they really serve??

If I shift my perspective of Human Resources of who they serve, thinking about the company instead of the individual…

💡

Yes, if HR is there to protect the company (from Humans) - and they utilize policies (a Resource) - that’s who they ultimately serve!

Hence, even when the company’s own CEO harassed employees - HR did little or even made sure the CEO has protection!

HR wants to make sure the company moves on!

From the linked article:

We can expect to see HR deploy new techniques aimed more at protecting companies than at protecting employees.

🤯

Given that perspective, now I see that I asked too much from HR before, because what I asked was not their real job (and probably everyone else in the company would lump any diificult conversations they didn’t want to do onto HR).

I depended on HR to deliver a difficul conversation - in retrospect, I wish I just did it because the end result would be the same, except the news would come from me, not “HR”, as that’s the manager I want to be - the best manager you ever had.

Now I won’t be putting down Human Resources so much, instead, give them empathy, because they are working with the toughest and best resource of all:

Humans.