The truth about HR people

I have this love/hate relationship with HR people. On one end, they are the perfect team to implement processes, maintain a tight grip on salaries and ensure that everything is done according to the rules. On the other end, they have a life of their own and they tend to impose their own biased perspective to CEOs. Let me give you an example.

Hewitt Associates, another collection of HR minded people, recently polled a couple of companies in Canada to determine the "best employers" in the country. Amazingly enough, the greatest company of all time is not in the list. First, read about their work here and check out the so-called list here.

So according to these "experts", MickeyD is a better employer than CGI. Sure, it takes less time to go at McD from a burger flipper to night manager than from a distinguished CGI consultant to a distinguished CGI director. Go work under the golden arch, please.

Hewitt has some good points through. Money quote: One of the determinants of engagement is a willingness to remain with one's current employer, so when there are fewer options, many employees are glad to stay put and hang on to the job they have.

In other words, your job sucks but since there are less and less options, you simply accept the fact that your professional life is a black hole and your subconscious takes care of the rest. You lower your expectations about your current job to sub-ground levels, and disappointment vanishes.

Yet another good nugget:

Organizations with high engagement stated that their employees exhibited the following behaviours during the recent downturn:

• Support for improving productivity. Employers reported, for instance, that employees endorsed the introduction of new technologies and processes. They were ready to make changes to help improve the business.
• Willingness to make trade-offs. In several cases, for example, employees opted for reduced salaries and/or hours of work for all staff rather than see some co-workers laid-off.
• High trust and confidence in leaders. Employees really believed that their leaders were the right people to confront and overcome the challenges faced in tough times.

The balance of power between employees and leaders is a delicate one. If employees gain too much power you end up with unions and your organization enters a vegetative state. If leaders have too much power you... well you achieve control and this is the path to profitable growth.