Human Resources – the name of the organization that can strike fear in the heart of the business leader, individual contributor and job seeker alike. People only go talk to HR when they have a problem. People only get called by HR when they are in trouble. It is HR who identifies the talented individuals that would be beneficial employees through their talent acquisition responsibilities and it is HR who administers the lay-offs and exits those employees who are deemed to no longer be sufficiently beneficial to the company. It is quite possible that HR is the single most misunderstood organization in the company. Now why would you suppose that would be? Their name should say it all – Human Resources. They are supposed to be a resource for us humans right? Not so fast. On August 10, 1949 the Department of Defense came into being for the United States Government. Okay, so what, you might ask. Prior to that date the military enterprise for the United States was referred to as the Department of War. It was decided shortly after World War II that the government would try to avoid the word “war” pecause of its perceived negative connotation by the population, hence the change of the name to defense. Personally I think this is some pretty spiffy marketing on behalf of the government. This group did not make “defense” on other countries or peoples. They made “war” on them. They continued to perform the same functions after the name change that they performed before it. Despite having defense in the name, there did not appear to be a lot of defending going on. Which brings me back to Human Resources. Like the Department of Defense, and contrary to their name, Human Resources is not entirely about the humans that make up the organization. That would be only half the equation or less when it comes to describing their role. If you look at the roles that HR plays in the organization you would think that their name would more appropriately be Corporate Resources, or CR. Despite what people may think, or what their name might indicate, HR is there to look after the best interests of the corporation. That doesn’t mean that HR cannot or will not help people. They will, as long as it does not conflict with the interests of the corporation. If it is in the best interest of the company HR will absolutely be the individual employee’s advocate. For example, if someone has been discriminated against, HR will help them. Why is that? Some would argue that it is their moral responsibility. That may be partially true, but that is not the total reason. The full reason is that if the corporation does not adequately respond to complaints and charges by its employees regarding improper conduct either by the company or other individual employees in the company, the corporation will actually be in deeper trouble from a legal standpoint than if they did respond and took action. Rules have been put in place regarding how a corporation may conduct itself. This can include rules regarding both corporate and employee conduct, legal and safety responsibilities, fairness in hiring and firing practices, and a host of other topics regarding how employees may interact with each other while working at the company, as well as how they and the company as an entity may interact. It is HR’s primary responsibility to properly enforce these rules. If it is shown that HR did not fully or properly enforce these rules, the corporation can be at greater risk than if they were enforced. This puts HR in something of a precarious position. They must be an advocate for the employee with the issue, but they must continue to look out for the best interest of the company. If there ever is a question of which interest set is the most important, I would suggest you examine who is compensating HR to make sure of to whom their allegiance is. As another example I’ll look at that most unpleasant of business activities, the lay-off. If the business leadership has done their job appropriately well, most lay-offs will be avoided. When the leadership has failed and a lay-off is called for in order to reduce the size of the company, who gets involved? Human resources. They will administer the lay-off on behalf of the corporation to make sure that it is handled as humanely and correctly as possible. They will make sure that no specific employee demographic associated with age or gender or race, or anything else has been discriminated against during this lay-off. Are they doing this for the benefit of the employees? To some extent yes. Are they doing it for the benefit of the corporation so that the company does not find itself the defendant in an improper dismissal law suit? Absolutely. Even with all that in mind, that does not mean that HR will not help the individual. I have found HR to in general be populated with good people who do genuinely want to do a good job for both the people they work with as well as the company they work for. As I noted above they are charged with finding the most talented individuals to become employees of the company through their talent acquisition responsibilities. If you have an issue or a question they will want to listen and help you not only because they have to, but because they want to as well. In many instances HR finds itself trying to be the conscience of the corporate management in trying to translate quantitative corporate performance metrics and actions into qualitative human terms that can be accepted and implemented by the employees. Understand that it takes a special sort of person to be responsible for listening to and responding to each individual’s issues and complaints in an organization. In today’s litigious world, it is almost to the point where if an individual feels they have been discriminated against, then they have. It is a time where it may be improper to repeat a joke that you have heard on the public airwaves of the radio in the office, as someone could potentially find it offensive in some way and complain about the environment that it has created. Remember, accepted societal norms for social behavior may not be acceptable to each individual in the office, and it is HR’s responsibility to sort them out. Human resources takes both its corporate responsibilities as well as its employee advocacy seriously. Despite the fact that HR is paid by the corporation, and is responsible for looking after the corporation’s best interests, they will still do all they can for the individual employees. Just remember that they are doing it both because they want to for the employee and because they have to, for the company. As Juliet told Romeo, “What’s in a name?” When it comes to the Department of War and the Department of Defense there is probably not a whole lot of difference with the possible exception of some good public relations work. It is a good idea to remember the same public relations spin may be at work when looking at the Human Resource department in your organization, and understanding their Corporate responsibilities. They are the acknowledged company advocate of the individual employee and they usually do take that responsibility very seriously, but they are there primarily to protect the company from both itself and the improper behaviors of its employees as well.
Category Archives: Responsibility
Surprises
As we enter the fourth quarter and approach the end of a year, greater attention will be focused on the business performance financials. We see this type of focus at the end of every quarter to a certain extent, but at the end of the year it peaks. Sales commissions and staff performance bonuses are paid based on annual numbers. Personnel ratings and reviews are conducted based on annual numbers. Business forecasts are to be completed in preparation for the next year during this time period as well. Predictability of business performance is now at a premium. It is also the time when businesses most try to avoid surprises. Surprises are those unexpected events that materially affect both the performance and the measurement of the performance of the business. Surprises can be viewed as both positively impacting and negatively impacting to the company. However when surprises are viewed against the three basic limitations that all businesses must deal with, Resources, Money and Time, we see that at the end of the year, time is in very short supply when it comes to dealing with surprises. That means that incremental money and / or resources will be expended on surprises, both good and bad ones. Good surprises usually come in the form of unexpected sales and revenue opportunities. A large un-forecasted order can come in. A product shipment scheduled for next year can be pulled forward into this year. Good surprises are normally associated with opportunities to increase the top line and via the financial flow through, increase the bottom line as well. However, even good surprises normally come with an additional cost. A large unexpected order will stress both the supply chain and production capabilities for delivery. Overtime and expedite costs may be required to meet the year end time frames. In short, because there is now limited time, it will take incremental resources and money to deal with even good surprises. No business leader wants to deal with problems, but if they are going to have problems, these are the types of problems that every business leader wants to deal with. Bad surprises on the other hand are normally associated with issues that unexpectedly reduce sales or revenue, or alternatively increase business costs or expenses, and again via financial flows reduce the bottom line business performance. Expected orders being cancelled or not materializing would be the primary example of a top line bad surprise. A reduction in sales will turn into a reduction in revenue, and all other things being equal, a reduction in predicted earnings. Top line bad surprises normally come about as a result of an overly optimistic sales team, or a sales team that is under engaged with the customer. Either way, it was not clearly known that the customer was not going to be buying, when everyone was predicting that they were. When the business is counting on the sale, the sales team needs to be fully engaged with the customer, as well as possibly a little conservative in their forecasting. It is far better to present the good surprise of an unexpected sale and the problems it presents than the bad surprise of the loss of a sale that was counted on to make the yearend forecast. Other types of bad surprises can affect both the top and bottom lines. Component shortages can cause unexpected production limitations precluding shipment and revenue recognition, changes to government regulations can add unexpected costs to products and unexpected legal or labor provisions can eat directly into margins to name just a few, are just a few examples of bad surprises. The point here is that these surprises are issues that can and should have been readily identified as potential risks to the business. If they are risks, then the need a risk mitigation strategy if they occur. If they are not identified, then the business team needs to understand why they were missed and take corrective actions, as well as examine the business for any other unidentified potential risks. If they were identified and mitigation was neglected, then the business team must address this management failure appropriately as well in order to avoid future similar situations. Again in either event, it is the business leaders’ responsibility to identify and either avoid or mitigate these types of bad surprises. Predictability of business performance is a key to the business’ success. As the end of the business year approaches it takes on a heightened importance. Good surprises can help bolster the numbers coming into the close of the year, but even good surprises usually come with the requirement of increased resources and financial costs since there is usually limited time to deal with them. Bad surprises on the other hand can cause problems with the business’ financial performance that there is not sufficient time for the business to recover from before the year ends. Bad surprises are normally the result of human error where either sales’ over optimism or management’s lack of attention to fundamental business practice has contributed to the business failure. In either instance the “surprise” needed to be identified well in advance of the event occurring so that the business could more accurately predict how it was going to perform.
Being Difficult
This may come as a surprise to many of you but I have occasionally been referred to as “difficult”. Fortunately, I don’t think my wife reads my articles so I don’t have to worry about her corroborating such a description. I did however go out on www.websters.com and look up “difficult” and found (at least) 3 definitions for difficult that it seems people want to apply to me: hard to deal with or get on with, hard to please or satisfy, and hard to persuade or induce. It seems that different people may have different views and standards as to how business needs to be conducted. I guess that you can paraphrase the old adage by saying “difficulty is in the eye of the beholder”.
Conducting business is the process of dealing with, and getting on with people. You can’t be successful, or accomplish your tasks and goals unless you can deal with and get on with people. The question seems to arise in exactly how you are supposed to deal with people. We should look to try and deal with most everyone in business the same way. That includes those that we report to as well as those that report to us. We need to try to take those items that we have responsibility for and do the right things for those responsibilities.
That may not mean that we can take the easy, quick or popular steps for everyone involved. Having a consensus is a good thing, but the responsibility for leadership cannot lie with a group. It may also mean that we have to tell people things that they may not have wanted to hear, both those that we report to as well as those that report to us. We are knowledge workers, and if our knowledge indicates that an unpopular direction or a contrary position is needed, then we need to give voice to it.
I don’t think that it is hard to be pleased or satisfied. We must take our word and commitment in business to be our bond and a display of our character. We must expect that others who deal with us to do the same. When a goal or make a commitment gets set we have to try to do all that can be done to achieve it. If the goal is achieved make sure that the team shares in the acknowledgement, and if it is not we leaders should take responsibility for it as it was our commitment and goal. We can give explanations, but we can’t give excuses.
I look at the effort and approach that people use in meeting their objectives and commitments. I have found that hard work invariably will lead to achievement. I like to be around and work with people who take that approach to their work. I think that if we can say that if we are satisfied with the effort the team has expended, we can be reasonably satisfied with the performance, even if the objective was not fully accomplished. If the expedient approach was taken and the goal not met then there can be further cause for concern.
I don’t think I am exceptionally hard to persuade or induce either. I can be persuaded, just make sure to bring the data and the metrics. If it cannot be expressed in numbers, it is probably just opinion. Opinions are not necessarily persuasive. Financial data is the international language of business. Show someone what they can make, save or improve financially and numerically, and just about anyone can be persuaded. Show them how the business can be improved so that they can adopt your position. Leaders don’t have the market cornered on good ideas, but we should know how to distinguish a good idea from most of the others that come around by using the available data.
Asking questions does not make someone difficult. Asking difficult questions does not make someone difficult either. We have to move and adapt to the conditions quickly, but more importantly we have to do the right thing. It may have been a long meeting or conference call, and the end solution may be in sight but that doesn’t mean that there will not be other aspects of the solution that will still need to be addressed. I have heard it said in these types of meetings that “silence is assent”.
I also suspect that most of the people, who have said this in meetings I have been in, were actually looking for silence not questions.
We are working and living in difficult times. The demands on our time, our teams, and our businesses continue to get tougher not easier. Businesses and business leaders are continually being challenged to do more, usually with less. The pressure to provide the quick and expedient solution also continues to grow. Sometimes the expedient solution is the right solution, but how will you know unless you press the issue, ask the difficult questions, demand to see the data, get the objectives set and hold those responsible to perform, in order to make sure that the right thing does in fact get done. If these are the characteristics of a “difficult” person then in these difficult times I would think that we all need to be “difficult” people.
Followers
I think we have all heard the old saying “Not everyone can be a leader.” I don’t know if I fully agree with that or not. I do however think that everyone can be, and to some extent is a follower. It seems recently that being a follower has acquired some negative connotation to it. But think about it. Unless you are the CEO of your own (private) company, you have to follow someone else. If you don’t chances are that you probably won’t be around there for too long. Being a follower doesn’t make anyone any less of a leader. In fact if you are able to follow in an open an honest way, it probably makes you a better leader. Leaders need to lead by example. If you can take an order or a directive whether you fully agree with it or not, and follow it and complete the task, you are demonstrating the type of behavior that you will expect from your team. You may have disagreed with the decision, but that does not relieve you of the responsibility of accomplishing the assigned objective. Being a follower doesn’t mean that you have to agree with every order or that you may not have a different opinion from your leader. A healthy organization has diverse opinions and views. It helps prevent mistakes. No one person has all the answers. Because of this a good leader cannot be afraid to learn a new answer from one of their followers. Good leaders need to expect and encourage differing points of view. Good followers need to present them for consideration. It is how good followers in turn become good leaders. Good leaders and good followers need to understand that differing opinions before decisions are good for the organization. This type of healthy friction needs to occur throughout the organization. As the decisions are made, and handed down from leaders to followers, who in turn become their teams’ leaders, directional alignment needs to happen. If you have had your input and say on an issue, but a different course of action from your proposed one was decided on, it is now time to be a good follower. You will now in turn need to work with your team, align them in the creation and implementation of a plan to achieve the assigned goal. To do anything else would be dissention, and that will be harmful to the organization. You can have multiple opinions from followers in a healthy organization, but you can’t have multiple directions emanating from each leader in the organization.
Another Conference Call?
Is it just me, or have conference calls become so pervasive that they are beginning to hamper a team’s ability to get things done? Perhaps I am dating myself, but I do recall when conferencing circuits and services were expensive and were reserved for important topics and meetings. With the increase in the availability of conferencing capabilities, it seems that both the number of conference calls and the number of attendees in the conference calls have skyrocketed.
Conference calls are useful leadership tools. They provide the opportunity for a great deal of information to be exchanged in a short period of time. They provide a forum where issues and concerns can be identified and dealt with quickly. They also seem to provide the opportunity for the dreaded “group think”.
With everybody on the call, and with everybody expounding opinions, eventually a group solution can evolve, unless the call is well managed and led. It is natural to try and take all opinions into account. However too many diverse ideas and inputs can have a tendency to conflict and weaken a direction instead of strengthening it. A leader must remember his responsibility to lead on a conference call, instead of allowing the call to take on a direction of its own.
Conference calls can also have the affect of distributing risk associated with decisions and responsibility. The idea here is that if everyone on the conference call agreed, then everyone shares the responsibility for the outcome. If the outcome is good, this is fine. If the outcome does not produce the desired results, then having everyone share the responsibility for the decision is the same as having no one having responsibility for the decision.
I am a proponent of the association of responsibility and authority when it comes to decision making. That means that the leader is vested with authority to make the requisite decisions, and is held responsible for the results their decisions create. It seems the trend in conference calls is for the decision to be moved from the leader to the conference call attendees. This may result in a decision eventually being made, but it also results in no one having responsibility for the results that are created.
Conference calls can be excellent tools for leaders to use in order to make intelligent decisions. It seems that instead of being a means to an end that they have in fact become the end themselves. Instead of being a tool to enable a decision to be made, that they have become the decision forum itself.
As long as the leader understands their responsibilities, a conference call can be a good tool. However it seems that the trend today may not be in that direction, and every time I get another meeting notice I can’t help but think – another conference call?
Make Music
I would like to think of myself as something of a musician. I have actually been up on stage at a few venues (including The Hard Rock Café) and performed in various bands and even got paid for doing it. I guess that minimally qualifies me as a professional musician.
Every now and then however I have had the pleasure of associating with “real” musicians. These are the people who have “the” talent. They can play. I understand music theory and application. I enjoy practicing, learning new works and with time can master most techniques, but I recognize that in some instances I really don’t have “the” talent that will elevate me to the exalted levels of a “real” musician.
I have also learned that I don’t care.
You need to enjoy making music. It is something I want to do. I have found that I would rather be the weakest player in a very good jazz combo than the best player in a garage rock band. I have been both. Being the weaker player in the better group doesn’t embarrass me. It motivates me. I find I work harder, to get better, to not let down my band-mates, and that the final product that we produce is always better.
You also learn that being a musician requires a certain amount of interpersonal skills. I have been in a few bands that were pretty good, but could not survive more than a gig (performance – I have to use band “speak” lest people think I am really not a musician) or two simply because they could not get along. The band needs to understand the personal arrangement in much the same way as they have to understand the musical arrangement. Not everyone can be “the” leader, and not everyone can solo at the same time.
It is said that the band “Cream” (Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, Jack Bruce) were three virtuosos soloing all the time. They were great, and in some cases spectacular, but they couldn’t hold it together either, and quickly broke up. They have reunited some forty years later for a few concerts, but think of all the spectacular music that didn’t get made.
I found that bands I was in, where the members brought down their personal desires to solo and lead made better music. The final product (at least for me, and I think them too) was ultimately much better, and much better received by the audience. There is a time and a place to step forward, but not everybody can do it at once.
You want to be in with musicians that smiled. Making music is fun. You are getting to do something that not everybody gets to do. It should be a pleasure. It is something to enjoy. If you are not having fun, if you can’t find the enjoyment, even in the practice and the mundane aspects of making music, than you shouldn’t be doing it.
I do have fun. I hope my kids see that I do and that they do too, some day. I was well out of college before I learned to enjoy it, but I did.
I play the bass. As I said I would like to call myself a bass player, but that might insult some of the bass players out there who can really, really play. I know my role. The bass is a transition instrument which helps connect the melody (guitars / keyboards – chords) to the rhythm (Drums – beat). I try to be the best bass player I can within the group, whether I am playing a simple repetitive riff, or improvising a walk through changing keys and chords. I enjoy them both.
There is a musician joke that holds very true for me. Who is the guy standing around with all the musicians?…..The Bass player.
I also practice the bass. I try to learn new songs, new styles, and new techniques. The Jazz group I am currently in is playing several old standards, but in varying new and different styles. Old standards that were written to be played as a “swing” sound new and are interesting to play as a “Tango” or “Bossanova”. It seems that with music you can continue to take the old and make it new again. It helps keep you, the music and the band refreshed.
I would like to thank the other members of the band I am in. Gene (keyboards), Jay (Guitar), and Billy (Drums) – Thanks. I am having a ball. I hope you guys will continue to let me play in the band.
I guess a lot of the same ideas associated with making music would also apply to business, wouldn’t they.
Don’t Send an Email
Technology is a good thing. We have all come to depend on it to get our jobs done. It has helped remove both time and space from our work and has enabled us to do things in minutes that used to take days or longer. It can however become a crutch. It does not alleviate the responsibility you have for seeing to it that the job is completed.
There was a recent situation where an assignment was given to a staff member. He was the owner of the assignment and had the responsibility to get the assignment completed. Some time later the deadline came and went. When queried about the topic his response was the ever more common:
“I sent out emails requesting help, and I am still waiting for the responses…”
Sending out an email is not the same as completing the task. It does not transfer the responsibility for completing the task to the person you are sending the email to. In short, in today’s busy, high stress, under staffed business world, emails are easy to “miss”, especially when you are requesting time and effort that we all feel we have little enough available to do our own work.
A better solution, if help is needed, is to call. Make contact. Exchange information real time. If the person needed is local, get up and go see them. Once you have the required information, or achieved closure on a topic, then send an email confirming what was discussed, what the solution was and what the steps are moving forward. That email requires no active response from the recipient and enables everyone to get on with their respective jobs.
“Sending an email” does not get the job done. Make the call. Get up and make the visit. Take the initiative and get the job done.