HR2BE

Every journey has a beginning; A single step taken, over the bridge between Then and Now, that challenges the adventurer to continue what has been started and to go forward and explore, learning new things and to share those experiences with those of like mind. We know this as easily as we know the back of our own hands. As Children, we learned it through the fairy tales and adventure stories that we read. As Adults, we learned through our own actions and experiences and in turn became defined by the journey that we have taken so far. Not only does every journey have a beginning but they also have a past; light or dark; long or short; sweet or sour. A past that defines the reasons for the journey itself.

The past behind this journey is simple enough. As I said in my first post, until recently I was the HR Director for a large multi-national (Fortune 500) in Australia & New Zealand. Over the years prior to being appointed to the role, I had steadily been building a model in my mind for HR that I hoped would enable the function to become a true business partner, not just a token voice at the table or, worse, viewed as a bureaucratic necessity. Though in itself, that is exactly the perception we continually have to challenge. The model itself centres on trying to balance the schizophrenia that HR practitioners feel between Process / Compliance and Strategic partnership and engagement. The only real way to achieve this is to realise that HR, as a function, needs to be operated as a business with all HR practitioners adopting a commercial focus.

If we look at HR as a business, then certain things become clear. A successful business with multiple complementary product lines has a solution oriented approach to providing services to the customer; it undertakes detailed and regular reviews as to who are their customers and what are their needs; and it regularly reviews its products and demonstrate the cost of delivery of a service as well as the net benefit of that service to a customer. It is evident that if you look at HR, it has multiple product lines or, better still, call them Lines of Business. These range from Recruitment through to HR Business Partners; Training to Compensation; and Benefits and beyond. Within each of those Lines of Business, there are multiple product offerings whether that be as simple as an Advertisement for recruitment, or as complex as Change Management for organisational restructure.

If we do not change our way of managing HR and how we deliver services to the Businesses that we support, we will always be viewed as the Bureaucracy or the Process Police. At best, we will have pockets of true partnership but no real coherence in the model and solutions that are used to supplement that partnership. Change must come to HR or what remaining value we have will steadily erode and we will, once again, find ourselves as a sub set of Finance or, even worse, Facilities! Of course, these are all just my thoughts and they may be wrong. Having put the model in place once, there are certain things that must be true and in place in order to stand a chance of success and therefore this model may not suit every organisation. However it is not just a model, it is about cultivating true partnership through commercial bias and demonstrated successful delivery of business enabling solutions that speak loudest. I hope you travel with me and help me develop the ideas further as we go.

Why HR2BE?

Of course, every model needs a label. Mine has HR2BE. On one level it stands for the delivery of HR solutions and services to the Business and the Employees. On the other level, it stands for the potential in HR to truly become a recognised business function. One that when realised has the same level of impact, influence, partnership and respect as any other part of the key business functions.

And Finally...
I leave you with a quote from John Steinbeck to think about when you consider the journey that HR must take to realise its full potential:

"A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you can control it"

All the best

Jim