Now can we get on with life?
Rick pointed me to his post called HR - too wimpish to drive organisations
It's true. I am quite sick of HR striving to "be a business partner", "getting a seat on the table" etc etc.
In my view there are only two "businesses" in organizations: making and selling. Everything else is "support", that includes everything from marketing to customer support to quality to top management :-)
However, I don't see other parts of an organization whining about "How can we strategically partner with the business to add value" in industry talk forums.
Instead of doing so, HR must concentrate on its core responsibilities: acquiring, developing and motivating exceptional talent, for today and for tomorrow. If the nature of work is pathetic, it's not in HR's hand to change that. If the employees don't see a long term future for themselves in the organization it's not totally HR's fault too.
So can we forget the big things and just focus on the core areas?
this is great!kudos to you gautam for catching the bull by the horn.i have seen HR guys carrying this lament and undignifying themselves.while all others in organisations are quite clear about their field and indeed make efforts to enrich their knowledge,most HR professionals keep deploying their native intelligence and talents.i have worked with HR groups and i ask a simple question "what is your mother science?",very few have an answer to it.HR texts (mostly set in the american context) offer action solutions but fields such as org theory and the basic social or behavioural sciences are rarely tapped by the HR professional.we all say knowledge is power,how does the HR community use this for itself ?secondly while HR keeps organising and managing developmental work for others in the organisations, i have come across very few that do the same for themselves.i believe that HR ought to be the holders of valid and uptodate knowledge,understanding of people and collective processes which it must deploy for the good of the organisation including the people,as individuals as well as a community.this will however require HR to powerfully deploy its audit as well as advisory roles.focussing merely on managing systems is not enough,it will inevitably lead to a sense of low power.cheers
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link Gautam.
ReplyDeleteSushanta - what do you mean by 'mother science'? Are other business functions (marketing, for example) any clearer about their 'mother sciences'?
On one level I agree with you -- there are functions that are support oriented. However, other support roles have moved into the top ranks. For example there are VPs of Marketing and CMO (Chief Marketing Officers) and there are VPs of Technology and CTOs (Chief Technology Officer) and CIOs (Chief Information Officers). Support does not mean that they are not future facing roles. Anything that impacts the functioning of the organization can be a part of the overall strategic vision.
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