Our Real Job in HR
Posted on Monday, September 17, 2007 by Frank RocheWhat’s our job in HR? Certainly it involves transactions. That’s a gimme. But what else?
Are you in sales? Marketing? Operations? Are you the CFO of people? (If living, breathing human beings are called “human capital” by business managers, do you manage your finance by G&A, short- and long-term investment, etc, just like your CFO works on the money?)
Knowing what your real job is makes all the difference. I’m not talking about coming up with silly titles. (Please, don’t call yourself the CFO of Human Capital. Please.) That’s cute, but you don’t see business managers doing that. I’m talking about knowing your real business purpose. When you can start framing your job that way, you move quickly from “staff” to someone who adds value. Isn’t that what “having a place at the table” is all about?
Rob Robson
Sep 20th, 2007
I think that’s right.
I guess the transactional stuff is the “hygiene factor” in HR. You have to do it, but it doesn’t really make people value you more…
I was discussing with an “HR Business Partner” that similarly to HR’s job being to build human capital, the leadership’s role from a human perspective is to develop social capital, while the experts (this was in IT) who didn’t want to take on management roles needed to be able to build the intellectual capital of the organisation…
Frank Roche
Sep 20th, 2007
Rob, that a very interesting take on the jobs and how they are involved in building value for the company. The transactional stuff is the “hygiene factor,” they best that can happen is that HR gets it right, otherwise it’s all downside. Thanks for the good definition here. That’s excellent.
Scott McArthur
Sep 26th, 2007
For me HR should be about about creating “meaning” for the workforce – both internal and external. More from me on this very soon Frank.
Frank Roche
Sep 26th, 2007
Scott, I’ve been following you on this one. That’s a great take on it.