By Bart Tkaczyk
Human Resource Management (HRM) has been around for decades. Apparently, same goes for organisation-wide issues such as toxic workplace culture, inequality in the workplace and sexual harassment to name a few. With these problems continually hitting organisations, how can HR demonstrate its greater value to the organisation to boost its timeless distinction and relevance?
Although Human Resource Management (HRM) is not the basis of all business activity, it is the basis of all management activity.
Having said that, HR has suffered from a major identity crisis – for decades. In fact, Peter Drucker, a management guru, described HRM, or “personnel management” as it was known in the 1950s, as a “trash can activity”, embracing a range of unrelated, low-level management operations that are shunned by higher-status management specialisms.1 Of note, HRM replaced the term “personnel management” in the 1980s when HRM courses began to be delivered as part of MBA curricula at business schools in North America.
With so many particularly nasty problems hitting organisations nowadays, such as toxic workplace culture, inequality in the workplace and sexual harassment, how can HR demonstrate its greater value to the organisation today?2,3,4 HR strategising may be the answer.
HR Strategising: A Mini Case Study
Writing down an HRM strategy document is not an unhelpful act. Yet, in today’s more complex, more ambiguous and more resource-constrained times, constant strategising is a lot more crucial to driving performance and achieving organisational success than just producing a physical document entitled “HRM strategy” that, in many organisations, is merely a “dead document” more often than not.
At a management consulting firm in North America, HR has never lost its relevance. As a matter of fact, it has chosen to become a truly iconic function. HR strategising has always involved continuously – and critically – reviewing and reflecting on the question: What exactly are the intentions of our enterprise, formed or formulated, toward the management of our people that are implemented at the philosophy, practices, and policy (3P) levels?
Let’s now look at some of the signature elements they have crafted that help deliver on their strategic people management promise.5,6,7
Strategic HRM at the Philosophy Level
Case in point: Leading by using culture to maximum advantage.8 “Nine times out of ten, we hire people who are “positive energisers”. We’ve realised that happy consultants are better at building and sustaining high-quality connections both at work and outside the office, and being great with people is key in consulting. In fact, not only do positive energisers perform better, but those who are closely connected to a positive energiser perform better too”, shares the Chief HR Officer (CHRO).
Evidently, culture is big there. While some companies hire for job fit, they hire for organisational fit. Selection is always a social, “two-way” process. If somebody joins the enterprise with a remarkable skill set, yet not a great culture fit, the organisation will not be happy (such staff will not be high-performing, plus they may be breaking the norms), and the employee will not be on top of the world either as they may feel unrecognised.
Culture is all about execution, and so culture and strategy need to be aligned. There are three strategic HRM efforts taken for energising culture for “positively deviant” performance, that is to say, performance far above the norm:
• Principle 1: Select consultants for “culture fit” first – this will affect how the firm thinks, feels, behaves and performs. Make sure they can contribute to the culture too.
• Principle 2: Socialise positively, and provide the recruits with diverse Learning and Development (L&D) opportunities; for example, by means of “reverse mentoring”.
• Principle 3: Offer a “total reward” package. When designing reward strategies, go beyond tangible/financial or transactional rewards (e.g. base pay, shares-based schemes, pensions, etcetera). Rather, incorporate all management initiatives such as relational rewards (e.g. career development) or communal rewards (e.g. employee voice, or recognition for a job well done) that may add higher value to the experience of working in the firm.
The bottom line is, positive employees will energise the workplace – promoting high-quality links at work. Negative ones will de-energise it – promoting low-quality connections.
Strategic HRM at the Practices Level
Case in point: Reverse mentoring. Mentoring is about creating and sustaining a partnership that helps your mentee to continuously learn and develop. Although formal mentoring is not very popular (ATD research finds that only 29% of organisations have a formal mentoring program in place), it does matter (6 in 10 participants indicate that their formal mentoring programs help to meet learning goals to a high or very high extent).9
Reverse mentoring is a powerful HR practice. Therein, a male CHRO is mentored by a female middle manager so that the CHRO can gain a direct insight into the career barriers and major challenges that women leaders face at work.
“The ‘reverse mentoring’ practice is extremely effective because it improves on the career mobility – for example, by reducing internal promotion biases, it helps more women into senior roles. Every organisation needs to smash any glass ceiling patterns”, evangelises the Head of Diversity.
Strategic HRM at the Policy Level
Case in point: Consider some “intra-office dating” policy – potentially amorous “workers may ask out a co-worker just once. An ambiguous response such as ‘I’m rather busy tonight’ counts as a definite ‘No!’”, explains General Counsel.
Instances of making unwelcome sexual advances in the workplace have been a growing problem.10 Courts rule that there are two patterns of sexual harassment: “quid pro quo harassment” (form of sexual harassment in which sexual favours are requested in return for job-related benefits), and “hostile work environment” (a more subtle form of sexual harassment deriving from off-color jokes, lewd comments, and so on).
By way of illustration, among other things, the dating policy playbook at the management consultancy recommends:
• “Romances with higher-ups/subordinates aren’t a good idea at all.” This may fuel rumors about somebody “sleeping their way to the top”.
• “Peer-dating is acceptable”. The best situation is peers in two different departments with individual career plans.
• “HR should step in when: (a) individual or collective performance is affected, (b) when confidentiality is breached, or (c) when other employees complain.”
• “Come forward”. Employees are supported to “come forward” when they feel that sexual harassment is happening from an office relationship break-up.
• “Sexual Harassment 2.0”. Any unwanted sexual advances via any technology (in the workplace or outside the office) should be immediately reported/disclosed.
• “No public displays of affection (PDAs) in the office”.
Irrespective of the case, sexual harassment is illegal, and the enterprise is responsible for controlling it.
Take-Away Message
Ultimately, to get its mojo back, HR needs to constantly strategise – at the philosophy, practices, and policy (3P) levels. By doing so, it can boost its timeless distinction and relevance, which in turn, could build its scaling power – and become universally recognised, even iconic. HR had better level up and get transformed into a trusted business partner or else it will not be at the table – the board table, period.
About the Author
Bart Tkaczyk, Fulbright Scholar at the University of California at Berkeley, Course Leader (mbasprint.com), management thinker and writer, is in the business of energising extremely good leaders around the globe to aim even higher. On Twitter @DrBTkaczykMBA.
References
1. Heery, E and Noon, M. (2008). Trash Can Activity. A Dictionary of Human Resource Management. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
2. HBR Podcast. (2018, May 3). Toxic Workplaces. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review. https://hbr.org/podcast/2018/05/toxic-workplaces.html
3. ILR Review. (2017). A Special Issue on Inequality in the Workplace. ILR Review, Vol. 70, Iss. 1. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University, ILR School.
4. SHRM. (2018). Workplace Harassment Case Studies & Research. Alexandria, VA: Society for Human Resource Management. www.shrm.org/ResourcesAndTools/hr-topics/employee-relations/Pages/Workplace-Harassment-Case-Studies.aspx
5. As a snapshot of the consulting industry, see Tkaczyk, B. (2017). “A Balanced Approach to Professional HRD Consulting: Lessons from the Field”. Global Business and Organizational Excellence (GBOE), Vol. 36, Iss. 4, pp. 6–16.
6. For sample consulting methods, see Tkaczyk, B. (2017). The Practical Rigor of Management Consulting: Methods, Frameworks, and Impact. Alexandria, VA: Association for Talent Development.
7. For more insights into the consulting industry, see Tkaczyk, B. (2018). “Business Leadership for the Management Consulting Industry: A New Model for the Greater Good”. Rutgers Business Review (RBR), Vol. 3, No. 1, pp. 53–66.
8. Chatman, JA and Cha, SE. (2003). “Leading by Leveraging Culture.” California Management Review (CMR), Vol. 45, No. 4, pp. 20-34.
9. ATD. (2017). Mentoring Matters: Developing Talent with Formal Mentoring Programs. Alexandria, VA: Association for Talent Development.
10. Pearce, JA. (2010). “What Execs Don’t Get about Office Romance”. MIT Sloan Management Review, Spring, pp. 39-40.
