Let’s Let HR Do What HR Does. They’re Good At It.

            There’s been a lot of pressure in recent years for HR professionals and HR departments to abandon (often through outsourcing) their traditional administrative roles in favor of a strategic partnership involving a more holistic approach to human resource management and strategic alignment. From a theoretical perspective this might make some sense, especially when you start attempting to align HR with other organizational theories like High Performance Organizations (HPO) or High Performance Work Systems (HPWS). When we start drawing HR into these models they start to look more strategic, but has their role really changed? Perhaps we don’t need to rebrand HR as a strategic partner, because they already are.

By Holly A. Bell

From HR Theory…

            There are some pretty practical reasons why those in the HR field want themselves to be viewed as strategic partners. Outsourcing of many HR functions is a looming threat to HR.  A survey by the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM), found that 53% of firms outsource at least one HR function. One problem is that HR’s effectiveness is not measured anywhere on the balance sheet, so managers have a difficult time assigning value and simply views HR as one more cost center. The trouble with cost centers is that they are in perpetual need of cost savings, and outsourcing provides the needed relief. It doesn’t help that HR often reports to finance so they are forced to be pursuers of efficiency rather than value. I get it, no one appreciates HR. And yes, this is a problem.

The reaction to this lack of respect for HR has been for academicians in the field to launch extensive descriptive and quantitative studies on the value HR adds to organizations and how they can better be utilized as a strategic partner. One of my problems with this theoretical effort is the literature itself. In many ways it is often so philosophical it is useless.  There’s nothing like having an article seeking solutions to the struggles and ambiguity of HR developing their proposed solutions in an ambiguous manner. For example, one article by Helen Francis entitled Discursive Struggle and the Ambiguous World of HRD suggests HR departments use an approach to human resource development incorporating critical discourse theory “rooted in the view that the social world is essentially socially constructed rather than ‘given’ and that discourse plays a central role in the social construction of realities”.  She also suggests using the concepts of “sensemaking”, “intertextuality”, and “thinker performer”. Well, that certainly clears up how I can utilize HR as a strategic partner. S. Sambrook in an article entitled Critical HRD: A Concept Analysis uses “language analysis” to describe and define each word in ‘critical human resource development’ as well as how their meanings change when the words are used together. I would describe it as a case study in rhetoric, not HR. Other academicians realize I might not be smart enough to figure this all out and suggest adding scholar-practitioners into HR departments to help bridge the gap between theory and practice. No thank you. Ignorance may truly be bliss in this case.

…to HR Practice

HR’s primary administrative functions have been things like recruitment and retention, compensation and benefits administration, employee advocacy, and policy/legal compliance. Granted globalization, increased competition, technological changes, and the demands from political, social, and economic events have caused the ways in which HR approaches these functions to change over time. What concerns me is that we are now asking HR to take on an entirely new level of employee nurturing, specifically in the area of employee development. We seem to be asking them to help employees find self-actualization through their jobs on a deeply philosophical level.  We are asking HR to bring employees to the point of: “I am employed here, therefore I am”.  But is this really the best strategic role for HR?

I admit I have been a critic of HR and this new movement. Primarily because I have observed what appears to be HR trying to come between managers and their employees. Or, perhaps I perceive distrust on HR’s part regarding the skill and integrity of managers when it comes to employee development. One of the justifications for moving employee development primarily to HR has been the shift in the employer/employee relationship from “paternal” in nature to a “partnership”. In other words, managers are no longer able to nurture and develop employees in this new environment. Personally, I see a partnership with management as a great foundation upon which to build employee development. Some of the developmental activities HR academicians have suggested be handled strategically by HR include identifying employees’ knowledge, skills, competencies, and attitudes required for their current and future job assignments, yet aren’t managers in the best position to identify these things and aren’t they already doing this? In HR’s efforts to become “boundaryless” they may end up being intrusive, while at the same time justifying large HR departments during times of increased outsourcing.

At the beginning of this article I mentioned that I thought HR was already performing a strategic role in their primary administrative functions. As a result outsourcing those functions and trying to prescribe a new role for HR might not be in the best strategic interest of the organization. To demonstrate I will impart a personal example. During my time at a Fortune 500 company one of my roles was to manage departments that administered group and individual pay-for-performance programs, incentive programs designed to utilize front-line employees as sales partners, and performance review design and implementation. I did not work in HR, but was part of the divisional planning and administration department. Under the new strategic role prescribed for HR they would own and operate these programs.

This would be a bad idea for several reasons. First, while HR is a centralized organization, most successful human resource performance and development programs need to be department specific and a centralized company-wide strategy would not be effective. That doesn’t mean there aren’t company-wide efforts like compensation and benefits administration that should be administered by HR, but more strategic front-line programs need to be designed by individual divisions and departments using HR as a consultant to ensure legal and policy compliance and alignment with the company’s strategic mission. We can’t expect HR to be subject matter experts regarding the operational management of all the diverse specialties and sub-specialties in an organization. Also, as managers have to administer these programs, involving them in their development will go a long way toward getting their buy-in.

So how did HR engage strategically in the development and administration of these programs where I worked? The first thing they did was determine what skills and experience were needed to develop the programs. They realized they didn’t have either the operational knowledge or the program knowledge (from the standpoint of operational specific pay-for-performance and incentive programs). Once they determined the knowledge, skills, and abilities needed and analyzed what they didn’t have internal to HR, they did what they do best as a strategic partner: They found the best human resources to design, implement, and manage the programs. They hired a departmental manager who had strong operational knowledge and experience and an outside consultant who was an expert in the field of pay-for-performance and other incentive programs. This is the most productive and efficient strategic contribution of HR, matching human resources with the organization’s goals and objectives. We can’t possibly expect them to do it all, but this is what they’re good at and how they contribute strategically. Frankly, if I were in HR I would be offended that this strategic significance is not recognized. They don’t need to reinvent their role, just help senior management understand their strategic contribution.

A second reason the redefining of the roles of HR might not be appropriate goes back to my concerns about intrusiveness and the appearance of taking over the manager’s role in employee development. Rather than creating a power struggle with management, perhaps HR should partner with them and help managers become better employee developers. After all, an employee’s direct supervisor is the person who best understands the employee’s strengths and weaknesses and the training needs of their department. This strategic alliance between management and HR would go a long way toward solidifying the transformational role HR desires to have on the workforce, without undermining the authority of management or their relationships with their employees. The partnerships between employees and employers that are being formed in contemporary organizations serve as an excellent foundation for helping employees determine their own strengths and weaknesses, development needs and opportunities, as well as where they fit in the overall organization (if at all). It also takes pressure off HR to be the great philosophical coaches of employees trying to bring them to the point of “I am employed here, therefore I am” and moving them to a realization that “I am empowered to develop here, therefore I am”.

So let’s not throw out the baby with the bath water when it comes to HR. Let’s let them do what they do best by matching human resources to the strategies, goals, and objectives of the organization, and not expect them to be experts in all areas of strategic implementation. We do a great disservice to the HR profession by not recognizing their strategic importance in their current administrative role. I’m guilty of this myself. But then again, I reflect, therefore I am.

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Image courtesy of Michal Marcol