Your Corporate Strategy: It Just Doesn’t Matter? Part 11
As part of a culture change a first
step in re-connecting the workforce/employees with the employer is
personalizing their value and worth as individually and collectively unique as
possible. Anyone and everyone is a
human… a homo sapien. To emphasize the personal, Human
Resource/Human Capital functions must become People and Talent functions. Many comment a name change doesn’t change the
function….but the HR function needs to become more pro-people in order to make
the most of our Talent assets by making the workforce a positive
pro-company/organization force. To think
HR business as usual is OK is like the ostrich who thinks they
can’t be seen by sticking their head in the sand.
In fact, by using People and/or
Talent Resources or People or Talent Capital, we would better describe our
people as the assets they really are and we purport them to be, rather than
“humans”. We are way past due for a
culture change within HR! This applies
equally to SHRM and many other current professional HR organizations. We are all PEOPLE, individual persons, and
People are our Talent!
More modern People and Talent
organizations use these more descriptive, friendlier and people oriented terms
versus human(s). Most larger and progressive
organizations tend to use Talent when talking about recruiting as Talent
Acquisition or separate the two into management and leadership acquisition and
(people) recruitment when it is applied to more repetitive hiring. Under Talent Management is Talent
Acquisition, coupled to Training and Development within Centers of Excellence
or a company University, and some sort of Succession Planning and Management
and/or Leadership Development. However,
many if not most progressive companies still use “Human Resources” as a
description of location processing paperwork, hires, new hire orientations,
discipline, performance, firing, etc.
In general Human Resources functions
within these types of larger organizations do the valuable and required nuts and
bolts work we depend on in our day to day employee business dealings. Why not name them for what they do - People
Services Department? This also means instead of a Chief Human Resources Officer
(CHRO) we will have a Chief People Officer (CPO), Chief Talent Officer (CTO) or
Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), a combined title. This should extend throughout the department: VP of People or Talent, Director of People or
Talent, People Manager, etc
According
to Joyce L. Gioia’s, “What Will Human Resources Look Like in the ….Future?” , HR
will be responsible for the candidate and employee experience.
http://www.workforce.com/article/20130403/DEAR_WORKFORCE/130409988/what-will-human-resources-look-like-in-the-near-future
Many companies have already arrived
and currently accomplish this task.
Engaging and training people for the employee experience has become or will our
most critical duty. I believe re-naming
and re-titling the functions to accurately describe what we do and who we
personally support and value, individually and collectively, is an essential first
step!
Next: Can the employee
- employer disconnect be solved?
Your Corporate Strategy: It Just Doesn’t Matter? Part 9
I believe there is a
direct correlation between the prior list of 9 reliable major reports/statistics
and employee dissatisfaction, disengagement and anger with employers. I also believe there is a direct correlation
between the lack of private sector growth, profits and, consequently, job
growth. I believe we will find the same
70-90% of employers who are in violation of DOL and employment laws are the
very same employers whose employees are unengaged, dissatisfied and angry. At 70 - 90% non-compliance how could they not
be?
If even 70% of employers are in violation of employment
laws (let alone 90%), how could one possibly assume their company wasn’t one of
them? Surprisingly, almost all ignorantly
do!! Remember,
ignorance is never a legitimate legal defense, and bad policies resulting in
violation of employment laws are never legally defensible. –John Hagen The ongoing and accumulating pro-employee
Federal and civil rulings, fines, judgments and awards is fast becoming the
employer’s worst nightmare!
As I quoted Mike Myatt previously, “So, for all those employers who [think they] have everything under control, you better start re-evaluating.”
This lack of company growth and profits, coupled with a
company’s anti-employee, internally disconnected, counter-productive work
environments (and probably illegal practices), directly contributes to the
majority of unengaged, dissatisfied and angry employees. Business is experiencing lackluster growth
due to the inability of the unemployed to find a decent job and the currently
employed to see real wage growth and/or get ahead. Instead people are falling further behind
because of inflation, lack of real wage growth and the ability to get ahead
while companies and shareholders push for greater productivity, greater profits
and higher executive pay and bonuses. All
this while costs and prices continue rising, real wage growth is non-existent
and positive employee relations, perks, benefits and reasons for staying have
evaporated.
Of course this premise assumes the company’s products or
services depend on sales to working people for its revenue stream. Most of us know this to be true. Even companies depending on business to
business (B2B) sales are most likely affected by the same lack of consumer
spending from their customers.
Our workers are our and your customers, not some nameless shadowy
group. They do the work in our
companies which in turn allows them to buy our products and services. Employment downsizing, streamlining and multi-functioning that cripples maximum effectiveness, lack of coherent hiring practices and poisonous management as a primary cost control point for increasing profit and/or shareholder return results in a reduction in your buying (customer) base. This becomes a negative sum game where there is only one winner - the survivor!!! This is a business model failure!!!
Once again, in these times of slow recovery, how
can any business , or our country afford…. $2 Trillion in employment churn and
training……when the waste, wasted effort and negative impact to the bottom line can
be changed?
Next: Are HUMAN RESOURCE(S) and HUMAN CAPITAL -
demeaning terms?
Strategy Doesn’t Matter? Part 10
These terms
replaced “Personnel” and stuck. We describe great people, a great person,
a great group of people, a people person, a talented person, a talented group
or talented group of people. We don’t say they are a great human (human being sometimes), great humans,
great group of humans, a human person, a talented human, talented humans or a
talented group of humans.
There are over 6 Billion humans on this
planet. To endow our people and teams with the collective “human”
title, while technically accurate, is definitely not individualized, unique or
warm. To me it describes a sheep view of people and those charged with
their activity. This perception is also how many view the HR function,
including many in top leadership positions. As Steve Jobs is quoted, “I’ve never met one of you who didn’t suck. I’ve never known
an HR person who had anything but a mediocre mentality.”
Ouch!! However, Jobs was never one to sugar coat his
thoughts. Whatever genius you ascribe to Steve Jobs, the Apple brand
changed the personal communications world. His vision, focus, timing and
user friendly products put Apple at the top of the heap. He drove Apple
to become what it is today. Vision, artistry, focus, forced labor and
relentless competitiveness and determination were the hallmarks of the Apple
innovation.
Not many people’s vision has had such a profound impact on
life in such a short period of time. It is no wonder his view of HR was
so degrading. That was his personality. Since HR/People and Talent
operations must deal with the ever growing maze of regulatory requirements and
organizational issue, most daily routine functions must have paled in
comparison to the Steve Job’s Apple product's vision.
However, Jobs found a Chief Talent Officer he approved of
and hired….Daniel Walker, now CTO at JC Penney under CEO, Ron Johnson, although
not for much longer I presume. He must have found someone who was
the opposite of his stated HR views. Although Apple was/is at the leading
edge of change (the fringe and not mainstream) in how Human Resources
fundamentally works, how it is organized and how it impacts an organization…and
profits, they are not alone, just not main stream.
Is being a part of
main stream HR part of the problem?
Next:
Can we change the perceived Human Resource
Focus?
