The Good Old Days

Welcome to this week’s Discuss HR, the blog written by group members of Human Resources UK.

On Monday I managed to successfully navigate to London despite the fire outside Cheltenham train station, the faulty warning lights, the delayed trains and tubes and the sweltering heat to meet up with the rest of the Discuss HR writers.  We spent our time overlooking the Thames putting the world to rights, but more importantly we discussed the results of the recent survey and how we can implement this to the blog.

I am also delighted to announce that next week’s guest writer will be published author Janice Caplan who many of you will know.  So look out for her article on Thursday 11^th August.  In the meantime, today popular Discuss HR writer Dawn Clarke looks at whether HR has changed through her career, or whether it is her perception that has changed. (Ed Scrivener)

The Good Old Days …….

Is this the right view of how HR used to be?

I’ve been in HR for over twenty years now and about a year ago I decided to take stock of my life and in particular my career in HR.  We read so much these days about how HR must be strategic and ‘partner’ with the business and I have always agreed with this however when I think back to the ‘good old days’ ………  I do feel a little nostalgia.  Should we really feel bad about wanting to care for people as much today as we used to???  Many of us do what we get paid to do however is it what we actually believe in?  I wonder if there are any other ‘nostalgics’ out there?

When I first started working in HR I was an HR Officer (we didn’t have Advisors in those days).  I had recently completed my CIPD studies and landed myself a great job in a service industry.  I worked hard, learned a lot and had fun.  Redundancies in those days were almost unheard of in my sector, TUPE was not a significant issue on the HR scene and we really did spend much of our time with employee development and satisfaction.  It was a job seeker’s market and most sensible employers knew that and were prepared to invest in their people.  In some industries, the old ‘training boards’ still existed.  Mr Ulrich had yet to enlighten us with his Business Partner Model and we were called Personnel rather than HR.  I really did love my job and over time I worked for a few different companies and in the process worked my way up to HR Manager.  At this level I was more involved with the business side of things and started looking at HR from a slightly different perspective however I still loved my job and I got a real buzz from knowing everybody in the business.

I have always been a person to embrace change and was incredibly enthusiastic when I got the opportunity to use HR to make a difference to the business.  I got a real sense of achievement from improving ways of doing things, saving money and inputting into business strategy. 

My first experience with ‘globalisation’ was working for a company with ambitious growth plans and some of the growth was through acquisition.  My first experience of TUPE!!!  HR was still a great place to be for me because I was part of a successful, growing company.  As the Company grew and grew I started to lose touch with employees and decided that the company I had joined no longer existed and decided to move on.  That was about 10/12 years ago.

The last 10/12 years of my career in HR have been unrecognisable in comparison to the first 10.  In this hugely acquisitional business world, I have been acquired and disposed of and in the process of disposal have closed down one business completely.  Having been acquired for the purpose of the purchasing company taking on our European distribution channels, the employees were no longer required and I had to close the whole site down about a year later despite the fact that we were a very profitable business.  Some of the people I was responsible for had been in the business since they left school and knew nothing else.  Still I thought, this is business and people have to learn to manage change.  I did set up a very comprehensive outplacement programme with the management of personal change at the heart of it.  I really did feel for some of those people but I was still excited about working the business side of HR.

I then worked for a company with heavy Far Eastern competition and therefore a real business need to cut costs.  Improve processes by introducing lean and aggressively cut the overtime bill.  Again I completely understand the business imperative.  It was either make these changes or everyone would potentially lose their jobs.  So we did it.  Of course we had some considerable resistance but we were determined and we pressed ahead and to be fair most of the employees did understand the need for change even though they didn’t like it.  Survival of the business was the number one objective.

Is HR now too remote?

It was after this particular role that I started to question my choice of career.  At an intellectual level I understand the need and rationale about almost every redundancy I have had to make and I have always supported the businesses I have worked for.  I also believe that I have always done not just a good job but an excellent job.  However I started to question the human and emotional side of this thing that we call ‘business’ and wondered if I was a bit too good at my job.  Most of the people savings had come from me and they were substantial savings but then that was why I was paid ‘big bucks’.  I thought about the good old days and realised that I missed them.  Oh for those good old days that will never come back because business is only about one thing and we all know what that is.  It’s that thing that makes the world go around.  Have I become a cynic?  I don’t know, perhaps realism just gave me a really big kick up the backside.  The fact is that today’s business world is like a speeding (and perhaps out of control) train.  Can we still make money and treat people well.  Of course some businesses are able to do that so what makes them so different?  Maybe that’s another blog!

And me?  Well I will continue doing what I do because I’m good at it.  I will still give 110% commitment and will carry on doing what needs to be done to keep the business profitable because I also need to have a job.  I will however never lose the ‘compassionate/human’ side of myself and in many ways I hope that will help me to continue taking feelings and emotions into account when I have to make difficult people decisions. 

Are my questions about HR or about capitalism in general?  In this brave new world where strategic business partnering is the new HR mantra I do wonder if I am the only HR person to question how we have developed as a profession and whether or not all progress is positive.  I hope I’m not!

About the author

Dawn is an experienced HR professional with strong development and internal consultancy experience.  She takes a practical approach to HR tunring strategic plans into operational reality.  Dawn has experience in a variety of industries with a track record of commercial success by engaging people and making work a fun place to be.  On a personal note she is a huge Liverpool FC fan, well someone has to be!

Email | LinkedIn

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Discuss HR is the blog for Human Resources UK, the leading LinkedIn group for those involved with HR in the UK.  Next week’s Discuss HR will be published on Thursday 11^th August and we are delighted to welcome guest writer and published author Janice Caplan.

Holiday Time

Another week, another Discuss HR, the weekly blog written by the members of Human Resources UK.

This week’s article is especially relevant.  It’s not about Australian oligarch’s dodging custard pies, or Lord Sugar’s complete lack of attention to absence management.  No, it’s about your holiday.  No doubt many of you are reading this in between the final tasks before you jet off for a fortnight, or if like me going to spend time at a wet camp site! Today Jill Hart-Sanderson looks at how to deal with the mountain of work that grows in your absence. (Ed Scrivener)

Holiday time

The start of the holiday...

The holiday season is now up on us and whether you’re rushing to get everything completed before jetting away to a sun kissed beach, or trying to figure out how you can run an efficient service with less than half of your team present, time pressures can start to build and build.

You know the story – you’ve saved hard and been looking forward to your annual two weeks of what should be a blissfully relaxing time. You’ve planned your workload but still find last minute crucial work landing in your in-tray. 24 hours before you jet off, you’re still trying to fit three weeks worth of work into three hours, and when you return you know you will have another three weeks of trying to catch up!

So what can you do? There’s been an ocean of books written about time management, and hundreds of theories and models to show us how to increase  productivity – but when the pressure is on, how many of us actually take the time to stop and look at what we’re doing?

Having the right mindset has a huge impact on how we use time. I’ve found by stopping and thinking about what tasks are in my own control and asking some pertinent questions really helps:

·         Which emails actually need my response?

·         What value will I get out of going to that meeting?

·         Could I use my answer phone so I’m not distracted when I’m in the middle of something?

·         Am I the right person to do the task or can I delegate it to someone who can do it better than me?

·         What’s the best use of my time right now?

·         Is this something that really needs doing – how will it affect the overall organisation if it doesn’t get done?

·         And for those outside my control - I can’t always change the situation but I can always change and choose how I feel about it and act upon it.

...the end of the holiday!

Another challenge for HR teams is how to get managers to set aside time for HR related tasks such as recruitment and employee reviews. I remember being given the responsibility of overseeing employee reviews for a large organisation, liaising with departmental managers to ensure they were completed on an annual basis. Initially I met some reluctance to the process from the managers, mainly as it was seen as very time consuming and not their core role. By streamlining the actual procedure and taking time to clearly explain the benefits to themselves, their teams and the overall organisation I was able to rapidly increase the number of reviews completed on time. I even persuaded one of the most reluctant managers, who initially said he didn’t have time to ‘do’ reviews, to use some of his time to help me refine the process before sharing it with the rest of the organisation.

By helping to build a culture of responsibility and understanding, with clear goals and expectations, people are much better positioned to make the right choices when time-pressed. By instinctively knowing what is urgent and important, and knowing that they’ll be trusted to make the right decisions when prioritising their work, people feel less pressured, in control, and able to work more productively.

What works for you when you are time-pressed? What are your top tips for taking control and getting what needs to be done – done?

About the author

Jill loves working with the team at Rambutan helping people to think, lead and communicate brilliantly in order to achieve business, team or personal goals. Before joining the Rambutan bunch, Jill was part of the HR Consultancy Team at University College London. Her previous management experience in both the public and private sector means she has seen how great HR support can make a real difference to individual managers and organisations as a whole

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Discuss HR is the blog for Human Resources UK, the leading LinkedIn group for those involved with HR in the UK.  Next week’s Discuss HR will be published on Thursday 28th July and will be written by HR recruitment specialist Ed Scrivener. 

Why performance review doesn't always work

Welcome to this week’s Discuss HR.  I would like to take this opportunity to thank all our readers for being so interactive with this feature.  We wanted Discuss HR to do exactly that and it is really pleasing to see all editions of Discuss HR still generating comments.  So thank you for reading!

So to the point at hand, this week Dawn Clarke returns and looks at the fear of giving and receiving constructive feedback.  The article is particularly relevant for me as I have to give constructive comments on a daily basis, but I know I am also not very good at receiving them! (Ed Scrivener)

Why performance review doesn’t always work

The HR department has designed a structured and supposedly objective framework for reviewing employee performance.  Managers have been trained and employees have also been briefed as to how to get the best out of the process.  All the paperwork has been explained to everyone who will be involved and as the Head of HR I am looking forward to a successful outcome.  Managers can look forward to improved performance as a result of the performance review and employees will have the opportunity to discuss their work and career aspirations.

Heaven! 

Well, not exactly.  I have yet to implement a framework where it all goes to plan and almost always find that the HR team will be ‘chasing’ managers for their completed paperwork.  Maybe it’s the formality of the whole process that turns people, managers and employees, against it.

Frank was slightly over-zealous with his feedback

Whatever the real reason, it would appear that performance review is a task that the majority of managers absolutely hate.  How many times have I heard ‘I’m too busy, I don’t have time’.  And it’s not just managers – employees either dread the meeting or treat it as a bit of a joke.  From the employee side I hear comments such as ‘it doesn’t matter what I say, it will still be what my manager says that gets written down’ or ‘can’t be bothered, it doesn’t achieve anything’ and even ‘my manager doesn’t like me so he’s just going to use the opportunity to pick on me again’.

The fact is that most managers are not comfortable giving objective feedback and they fear provoking a defensive response from the other person.  This is perfectly normal because the natural response to an attack, whether it is real or perceived, is to run away or attack back.  An innocuous comment made by the manager is perceived as a ‘threat’ by the employee and so the manager reviewing the performance finds him/herself being ‘attacked’ in return.  Alternatively, not engaging in the process is akin to the ‘running away’ response.

I believe it is this fear of conflict that is the key reason that many decent managers will often avoid giving honest feedback and of course this defeats the whole purpose of the process.  Whenever the employee’s performance is rated as less than the best, or less than the level at which they personally perceive their contribution, the manager is viewed as unfair or even punitive. Disagreement about contribution and performance ratings can create a conflict ridden situation that festers for months and many managers will prefer to avoid conflict that will undermine work place harmony.

However, if we don't know how to give constructive feedback we reduce our effectiveness as communicators.  Many people do not like to give negative feedback because they are afraid of a scene.  They are afraid of conflict and of what the other person might say back to them or might say about them at some future date.  The key to success is not to avoid such communications, but to become more effective in these communications by developing skills which can facilitate this process.

So what’s the answer to this perennial problem?

Many companies do train their managers in giving feedback however what does not happen so often is the training of employees in ‘receiving’ feedback.  Receiving feedback is an important part of the whole interaction and so training the ‘receiver’ is as important as training the manager if we are to ensure that the process adds value. 

Whenever I have had to work on a performance management project, I always make sure that individuals are trained in how to receive feedback without becoming defensive.  These are normally awareness sessions lasting about an hour so they don’t take up too much time away from the workplace.  I don’t go into lots of detail, rather I focus on a few key principles:-

• I encourage employees to see feedback as an opportunity to grow and improve.

• We discuss the natural response to a perceived attack is to counter-attack or opt out – just making them aware of this significantly improves the interaction

• If they don’t agree with the feedback, ask in a non aggressive way for more details

• Replay the scenario to the manager using your own thought processes – explain why you are doing it that way

The most important one I pass onto managers is that before you are able to confidently give feedback, you must learn how to take it and I take them through the points above.  If you can handle receiving feedback, you will be far more effective in giving it.  Being able to take feedback and learn from it is a vital part of self-development and in so doing the manager may learn from those he works with how to make things within the team better. 

Of course the big issue for me is around managing expectations.  A performance review cannot solve all problems or make everything better as there are limitations as to what can and cannot be achieved.

One thing is certain in terms of performance review.  It will never be effective until it is embraced by all parties and seen as a value add activity in that both parties feel that they get something out of it.  The challenge for HR therefore is not chasing the paperwork but working to facilitate the process so that it really does add value and this can be a time consuming activity.

I would be extremely interested to hear from anyone on this blog who has been involved in a truly successful process.  Is there a quicker way of achieving success?

About the author

Dawn is an experienced HR professional with strong development & internal consultancy experience. She takes a practical approach to HR turning strategic plans into operational reality. Dawn has experience in a variety of industries with a track record of commercial success by engaging people and making work a fun place to be. On a personal note she is a huge Liverpool fan, well someone has to be!

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Discuss HR is the blog for Human Resources UK, the leading LinkedIn group for those involved with HR in the UK.  Next week’s Discuss HR will be published on Thursday 16^th June.