Beware of Human Resources
The Conference Board, best known for the Consumer Confidence Index and the Leading Economic Indicators, empathically states that job satisfaction is declining in the United States. Less than 50% of the US workers are satisfied with their employment or employers.
It cites a number of reasons for this downward spiral, but barely touches on the one element which seems the most obvious. People don’t trust the companies that employ them and they don’t feel secure. It has become an adversarial relationship. This trend started about the time Personnel Offices were renamed Human Resources, and became the labor purchasing departments.
This reclassification puts the value placed on employees in perspective. They are commodities. Employees are strictly overhead, as disposable as paper clips. And like the corporation’s other suppliers, they are subject to change with little or no notice. There is no loyalty. Corporations have squandered it.
Today, the Human Resource department’s primary responsibility is to protect the company’s reputation and financial interests. HR is bound by the hip to the legal department and the dictates of upper management.
There is nothing humane about Human Resource departments.
They function as a shield against any potential, external publicity from questionable or unethical corporate policies and decisions concerning personnel. Secondly, they form a bulwark against government intervention in employee disputes and possible government fines. In effect, they are in charge of maintaining the black hole of silence.
Human Resource personnel are not objective arbitrators. Their careers depend on eliminating problems, not solving them. It is easier, less expensive and more expedient to terminate the problem. The perfect resolution is convincing an “employee in dispute” to simply quit, rather than face the consequences of staying.
In today’s marketplace, government intervention is a two edged sword. If an employee files a grievance with a government entity, it becomes public knowledge, which marks the individual as a trouble maker. If the employee is then dismissed before a ruling, other companies will shun the job seeker. This is illegal, but it’s nearly impossible to prove why a specific rejection occurred.
It is not above a Human Resource department to set the stage to help the company manufacture evidence of incompetence and challenge general performance. Here is a common tactic. Non-exempt employees, those paid an hourly wage, are vulnerable to a perfect stratagem—forcing them to work off-the-clock, which is working extra time without being paid.
A marked employee, deliberately over-loaded with work, has three options to protect the family income: 1) work off-the-clock to compensate for the increased work volume, or 2) ask for assistance, or) find a new job. The employee can be fired for the first, condemned as incompetent and fired for the second, or resign, losing benefits accrued by longevity.
Even if the employee wins the dispute in court, his/her career is finished at that corporation. There is no winning, there is no loyalty, and there is no friendship. It’s just business.
It cites a number of reasons for this downward spiral, but barely touches on the one element which seems the most obvious. People don’t trust the companies that employ them and they don’t feel secure. It has become an adversarial relationship. This trend started about the time Personnel Offices were renamed Human Resources, and became the labor purchasing departments.
This reclassification puts the value placed on employees in perspective. They are commodities. Employees are strictly overhead, as disposable as paper clips. And like the corporation’s other suppliers, they are subject to change with little or no notice. There is no loyalty. Corporations have squandered it.
Today, the Human Resource department’s primary responsibility is to protect the company’s reputation and financial interests. HR is bound by the hip to the legal department and the dictates of upper management.
There is nothing humane about Human Resource departments.
They function as a shield against any potential, external publicity from questionable or unethical corporate policies and decisions concerning personnel. Secondly, they form a bulwark against government intervention in employee disputes and possible government fines. In effect, they are in charge of maintaining the black hole of silence.
Human Resource personnel are not objective arbitrators. Their careers depend on eliminating problems, not solving them. It is easier, less expensive and more expedient to terminate the problem. The perfect resolution is convincing an “employee in dispute” to simply quit, rather than face the consequences of staying.
In today’s marketplace, government intervention is a two edged sword. If an employee files a grievance with a government entity, it becomes public knowledge, which marks the individual as a trouble maker. If the employee is then dismissed before a ruling, other companies will shun the job seeker. This is illegal, but it’s nearly impossible to prove why a specific rejection occurred.
It is not above a Human Resource department to set the stage to help the company manufacture evidence of incompetence and challenge general performance. Here is a common tactic. Non-exempt employees, those paid an hourly wage, are vulnerable to a perfect stratagem—forcing them to work off-the-clock, which is working extra time without being paid.
A marked employee, deliberately over-loaded with work, has three options to protect the family income: 1) work off-the-clock to compensate for the increased work volume, or 2) ask for assistance, or) find a new job. The employee can be fired for the first, condemned as incompetent and fired for the second, or resign, losing benefits accrued by longevity.
Even if the employee wins the dispute in court, his/her career is finished at that corporation. There is no winning, there is no loyalty, and there is no friendship. It’s just business.
Labels: Conference Board, Consumer Confidence Index, Leading Economic Indicators
posted by David at
8:20 AM
