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HR Hatred

  • 20-05-2016 12:37PM
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,455 ✭✭✭


    So,

    Thought id start a thread...

    just wanted to get peoples experience in dealing with HR

    I do work In HR so am biased to a point obviously.

    but id love to hear the good the bad and the ugly of your experiences.
    this might need to be moved to work and jobs from problems so Mods feel free to move.

    Im genuinely curious, as ive moved though the working world, ive done a bit of everything, ive been fired from a job (within my probation so technically not fired i suppose...), completed a jobbridge worked in recruitment (high class human trafficking), worked as a consultant, seen good and bad HR. Ive also had proper jobs, bar work ,pealing potatos and debearding mussels, working in hotels as a chamber maid etc etc. Ive had experience as a fixed term worker, seasonal worker, scut worker and manager.

    Do people think that HR serve a purpose? Do we hate HR or do we love them?

    If they do is it for the business or the employees or both?

    Whats the worst and best thing youve seen HR do?


«1

Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,934 ✭✭✭MarkAnthony


    I know it's a minor thing but it's a pet hate of mine. I can never understand why the department is call Human Resources. To me it sums up what I think of HR - I'm a resource, not a person.

    I used to work for companies where it was Personel (sp?) - seemed a much nicer way of putting it.

    Anyway that's one of my many pet hates against HR :pac:


  • Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators, Regional North East Moderators Posts: 10,886 Mod ✭✭✭✭PauloMN


    My overall experiences with HR have been negative. I've dealt with HR as an employee with no reports, and as a manager with reports. In my experience, HR always seemed to just reinforce the company standpoint on something, and certainly were not an independent body in any sense of the word. It seemed to me that HR were just like any other employee ultimately in that they would have to toe the party line, even in cases where it was blatantly wrong.

    Glad I don't work in a large company with HR anymore.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,706 ✭✭✭✭Mrs OBumble


    When I was a union delegate, I copped soon enough that HR were using me as their proof-reader. However I also came to understand that sometimes they "accidentally" left documents in the photocopier which were quite handy for me to have found, and that this mutual accommodation did lead to a better environment for everyone.

    I've seen a company where there was no HR: there was a payroll function which did the bare minimum of pay and tax compliance, but all people management and people-development was the responsibility of line-management. That company had a conscious strategy of expecting to be in the Labour Court a few times every year when a managed fcuked up. PITA of a place to work if you got a bad manager, great if you got a good one.

    The funniest is when you meet people who say they want to work in HR because they like people. When really HR is about budgets / profit (maximizing the companies benefits from what is spent of people), and minimizing the legal risk to the company.


  • Users Awaiting Email Confirmation Posts: 950 ✭✭✭mickmackmcgoo


    Most HR departments are just an extension of the plant manager/ company manager etc. 99% of the time they take the company line and position. They blindly support managers and team leaders etc. A good HR or personnel manager should not be biased . Employee welfare should be a priority in any well run business. Too many companies have HR people who have business degrees and then specialise in HR but someone who has been an employee and a manager would have a better understanding of conflict situations and all round fairness.
    The jargon used by modern HR people is so annoying . Lots of it taken from handbooks and Amercianised. Ridiculous job adverts and asking crazy questions in interviews don't help either. I have encountered some very good HR people and some terrible ones who are power crazy


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,488 ✭✭✭mahoganygas


    A lot of boards users give off the impression that they like to stick it to the man.
    Be that politicians, their boss, the police, teachers, tv licence inspectpors etc.
    Any person with a perceived role of authority in society.

    When you work for large companies in Ireland such as a multinationals there is often no fatcat boss sitting up in the office overlooking their minions on the factory floor. Due to intricate management reporting lines it's often hard to single out a single person in charge of the company.

    But HR is the face of the company. Its a person you can see and sneer at and give out about. They always side with the company so that must mean that they are against me.

    This attitude stinks.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,455 ✭✭✭livedadream



    The funniest is when you meet people who say they want to work in HR because they like people. When really HR is about budgets / profit (maximizing the companies benefits from what is spent of people), and minimizing the legal risk to the company.


    This! :D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D:D

    love it when someone goes Oh i get on really well with people/or im a people person i love interacting and solving problems HR is perfect for me.

    eh,,, no.

    in general (dependant on the org)As HR you dont really interact with people that much, unless someone's ****ed up. and in general everyone is either scared of you, hates you or avoids you,

    if you love spreadsheets and money and planning and strategy HR is for you.

    as part of my job i speak to students in TY and whenever i ask what do HR do its oh they do the fun stuff planning the Christmas party and stuff.

    eh no thats sports and social we dont even get to enjoy the parties :-( no one wants to have a few drinks and sit with the HR Heads :-(

    i do know people (les say some of the more 'experienced' HR Heads) that miss it being called personal management though

    my org has HR broken down into Strategy and Support

    Talent Management/ Admin functions Training etc
    Then Strategy


  • Posts: 5,250 ✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    I think most frustration with them is not understanding their role - they are there for the company's benefit - not for yours.

    Working in accounting in a multinational I have a lot of interaction with HR. There are frustrations but I tend to smile, nod, agree and then ignore them unless they are doing something wrong.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,743 ✭✭✭Wanderer2010


    Like any job there are good and bad people in the role but I had to make a complaint of bullying against my boss a number of years ago and although my union reps were fantastic, HR treated me with nothing but disdain from the start to the end of the process always making it look like I was the sensitive one and he was oh so hard working and patient. ANd in the end he kept his job and not even a disciplinary and I was moved to a different area, so in effect he got away with it.

    I know HR say they need to protect both the employee and the company but I have never ever once heard of a case in Ireland where a boss accused of bullying was fired for his/her behaviour. Its always the person who complains who ends up suffering.


  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 51,685 Mod ✭✭✭✭Stheno


    I worked in a place once where they called HR Human Corpses :D


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,301 ✭✭✭Snickers Man


    Most HR departments are just an extension of the plant manager/ company manager etc. 99% of the time they take the company line and position. They blindly support managers and team leaders etc. A good HR or personnel manager should not be biased . Employee welfare should be a priority in any well run business.
    PauloMN wrote: »
    In my experience, HR always seemed to just reinforce the company standpoint on something, and certainly were not an independent body in any sense of the word.


    You people have no idea what the function of HR is supposed to be.

    I've seen a company where there was no HR: there was a payroll function which did the bare minimum of pay and tax compliance, but all people management and people-development was the responsibility of line-management. That company had a conscious strategy of expecting to be in the Labour Court a few times every year when a managed fcuked up. PITA of a place to work if you got a bad manager, great if you got a good one...

    ....HR is about budgets / profit (maximizing the companies benefits from what is spent of people), and minimizing the legal risk to the company.

    This person does.

    The HR department is employed by the company therefore it acts in the interest of the company. That's its job. And ultimately its return on investment to the company is the amount of money it saves fighting lawsuits or minimising strike days caused by disgruntled workers.

    The former case is more usual in the US when people prefer using lawyers to sort out their individual grievances rather than trade unions. The latter case is more common here where we elevate trade unions to positions of great statutory influence.

    You think a HR department is there to kiss you better when you fall and get bruised? Only if you can otherwise sue the company for it.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 26,706 ✭✭✭✭Mrs OBumble


    In fairness, one way of managing a company is to have some people assigned to work on employee welfare and development. In cases where people are a scarce resource (hard to replace skills, knowledge and relationships), then it actually is good business to pick people up and make them feel better when they fall over.

    But this is not motivated by any intrinsic concern for human welfare.

    It's just about the costs of replacing a broken person, and the PR risk of getting a reputation as a bad employer.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 33,518 ✭✭✭✭dudara


    We have an excellent HR department where I work. They're really focussed on learning and development and are a really good business partner.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,341 ✭✭✭Iseedeadpixels


    Not a fan of them at all as they always back the higher ups, one company I was a section manager and I was falling out with my direct manager who expected too much and was constantly sacking my staff and replacing them with people with no experience or little to no English, all this came to a head with the head of HR acting in mediation.....she sided with my manager and tore strips into me, she decided she wanted to see me in action for herself and "politely" reminded me she was the number 1 and I was to listen to her......even though she had never done my job, come closing time shes pointing the finger at me blaming me for the fact the staff got nothing done and that I now had to stay back, I laughed and reminded her shes number 1 and walked out at closing, I handed in my notice the next day. A few years later I'm working in a completely different sector and low and behold she gets the job as head of HR, management decided to send our department to another Country for financial reasons(and nothing to do with the fact that our department scored them the lowest on the company survey:rolleyes:) and again she sided with them and was extremely rude to us when we asked questions or any form of help in securing a new role in the company rather than a bottom of the barrel call centre job they wanted us to take, as you can imagine my notice was handed and happily working away from said HR.

    As mentioned above they are company people who don't care for staff and are more interested in pointing the finger at easier targets.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,455 ✭✭✭livedadream


    dudara wrote: »
    We have an excellent HR department where I work. They're really focussed on learning and development and are a really good business partner.


    glad to hear not everyone hates us!

    L and D became a huge thing during the recession the compaines that invested are doing well and compaines that didnt not so well...

    personally i think it pays to invest in staff and in general they stick around longer.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9 Diggg


    Where I work everyone in the HR Dept is basically the owner's lackey, so they dont help that much, they usually put out that we - shop floor staff and part timers- are at fault, and if resolutions are reached they are never implemented. We've all been promised contracts going on 8 months but to no avail :(


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,168 ✭✭✭Ursus Horribilis


    I don't hate HR but I don't trust them. They're fine if you want a form filled out or have a general query. When it comes to getting their hands dirty, they back off and hang people out to dry. If I had a problem in my team or department, I'd consider going to them a last resort.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 113 ✭✭ASoberThought


    I've only seen one HR department that functioned well.

    Most of the time they don't have a clue.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,920 ✭✭✭TG1


    I work in hr. I get frustrated because things are only brought to my attention when the s*** has hit the fan and its to late to sort like rational adults. Then you have the employee giving out that we didn't deal with it properly.

    Likewise things like recruitment recs and forms only get to my desk when they were needed a week ago. I can't do everything instantly and then have line managers giving out that we don't know our backside from our elbow.

    Communication is the main problem in a lot of organisations I think, and its a two way street, not just hr to the employee....


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 11,496 ✭✭✭✭Collie D


    Interesting thread. Have never made any secret of the fact that that I have never seen HR as "real work" so good to see a few HR people on here give their own view.

    In my own place - head office of a company that has grown hugely in my decade there - they're not even called HR any more. I agree with the poster above who disliked being a resource. But this name change fuelled my suspicion that our HR department are a "management speak committee" who spend their day throwing money at expensive outside consultants to give courses in leadership or some other nonsense where everyone attending is more worried about the backlog they face when they get back than silly role-playing.

    I would love to tell you the new name of our HR but think it makes me too identifiable. Trust me though, it's a good one


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 53,028 ✭✭✭✭ButtersSuki


    I'd love to say what I truly feel about HR, but I can't as I fear the repercussions. Given I'm on a fairly anonymous internet portal I think that adequately sums up my levels of faith and trust in both the people that work there and the department itself.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 192 ✭✭LadyBetty


    Well after many years of working in multinationals, and currently in a smaller Irish company, I am left with the impression that HR staff are generally ditzy, fake (HIIII HOW ARE YOUUUU?) and a bit thick (they can't spell). They usually wear lovely clothes, I guess that is a good thing?

    There are exceptions of course, but I am astonished at how some of these people become HR management on big salaries - I work in Finance so am privy to this information - when they can't spell or fill out a form properly.

    For example just this week a HR girl updated my annual leave form as I took 1 day off recently. She put down that I took off 2 days (not even including the actual date I was off), spelled my name wrong and the date at the top of the form was out...by a few years. I mentioned these errors & was met with a blank face.

    Her manager asked me for a particular file, I emailed it and promptly got a phonecall telling me the print was "TIIIIINY" and she couldn't read it - asked could I change the print settings. Err firstly she never said it was for printing out or I would have checked print preview but secondly, it's a two second job & could she not do it herself. She is a HR manager, this is hardly setting a good example of the "can-do" attitude they are so fond of talking about.

    Stupid dopey stuff like that makes a joke of the HR function and as another poster mentioned above, busy employees with deadlines to meet could do without hours of daft role playing disguised as training.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,358 ✭✭✭✭jimmycrackcorm


    My impression is that unless there is a recruitment campaign under way that HR spend their time coming up with schemes for "performance management" just for the sake of something to do.

    In my own company HR were forced to do away with external psych tests for candidates because we lost a few ideal people who simply said they had twenty plus years of experience, why do we need to do this and got jobs with other companies without that nonsense.

    They just invent stuff to do to feel a purpose for not having stuff to do most of the time. Ours have a weekly slot they email around for people to come talk to them. No other department does that because they are too busy actually doing productive work.

    HR is something that should be outsourced in every company and only brought in when you actually need it.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,434 ✭✭✭northgirl


    Stheno wrote: »
    I worked in a place once where they called HR Human Corpses :D

    We had Human Remains :pac:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 21,274 ✭✭✭✭Eoin


    I've not had any problems with HR - they were really useful when I was managing and recruiting people, and also for me as an employee. It's a mostly thankless job where a lot of people who don't understand why and/or what they do just think it's waffle or busy-work.
    Most HR departments are just an extension of the plant manager/ company manager etc. 99% of the time they take the company line and position. They blindly support managers and team leaders etc. A good HR or personnel manager should not be biased .

    Bit of a sweeping statement there. There's often a lot of tough conversations between HR and managers/supervisors that people are unaware of.

    Representing the company's interests and looking after the employees are not
    necessarily mutually exclusive.
    HR is something that should be outsourced in every company and only brought in when you actually need it.

    You'll probably find you'll need to bring in lawyers rather than outsourced HR.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 370 ✭✭Stepping Stone


    I have worked in places where HR were professional, knowledgeable and generally great. My current employer seems to have exclusively hired the absolute worst people possible to work in HR. Everyone is frustrated by them.

    It takes them approximately 6 months to get around actually placing job ads that were signed off on 6 months before. The interviews are maybe 3 months later and the job offers can be 4 months after that. Managers are frustrated, staff are frustrated but HR are busy eating cake and going on training. Contracts are wrong, names, locations, job titles, contract details, regulatory issued incorrectly.

    L&D is beyond a joke. I turned up for training to a hotel at 9 one morning. Our trainer had been told 8:30 at a different location. Some of us were told 9, some 9:30. They sent out separate calendar invitations, so not just a typo. I turned up to another one where our trainer asked how we had gotten on with the prep work that she had sent to L&D for us. They hadn't sent it on, so that turned into a two day thing.

    They came around to talk us through the new system for performance reviews. The numbers were all wrong but they put up a good fight when it was pointed out to them.

    You just couldn't believe how hopeless this lot are. Managers openly bitch about them to staff. If you go to their floor, they are constantly celebrating something with cake. This really pisses people off, because they go out and buy it, then skive off to eat it during work time. Teams are down staff members for about a year cos they are incompetent.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,275 ✭✭✭bpmurray


    I think HR teams are usually focused on doing this correctly. One place where they *always* fall down is when they're trying to introduce something that has numbers in it. It seems like HR folk are all utterly innumerate. Rolling out schemes to engineers who do understand numbers just make the HR folk seem like morons.

    So here's a tip: before rolling out anything which has any digits in any part of it, have an engineer (or some other numerate type) correct the idiocies first!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,260 ✭✭✭Irish_Elect_Eng


    LadyBetty wrote: »
    Well after many years of working in multinationals, and currently in a smaller Irish company, I am left with the impression that HR staff are generally ditzy, fake (HIIII HOW ARE YOUUUU?) and a bit thick (they can't spell). They usually wear lovely clothes, I guess that is a good thing?

    There are exceptions of course, but I am astonished at how some of these people become HR management on big salaries - I work in Finance so am privy to this information - when they can't spell or fill out a form properly.

    For example just this week a HR girl updated my annual leave form as I took 1 day off recently. She put down that I took off 2 days (not even including the actual date I was off), spelled my name wrong and the date at the top of the form was out...by a few years. I mentioned these errors & was met with a blank face.

    Her manager asked me for a particular file, I emailed it and promptly got a phonecall telling me the print was "TIIIIINY" and she couldn't read it - asked could I change the print settings. Err firstly she never said it was for printing out or I would have checked print preview but secondly, it's a two second job & could she not do it herself. She is a HR manager, this is hardly setting a good example of the "can-do" attitude they are so fond of talking about.

    Stupid dopey stuff like that makes a joke of the HR function and as another poster mentioned above, busy employees with deadlines to meet could do without hours of daft role playing disguised as training.

    I have worked for companies with quite good HR processes. (Usually from European HQ companies) and More Classic (US style) HR, but one thing has struck me is how little IT skills any of my HR Partners have had!

    From struggling with the use of conferencing and other communication tools, inability to set up a Wiki or run an online survey, to extremely poor MS Office and basic email communication skills. This is even from highly educated, HR PG Diploma & Masters level employees.

    Anyone have any idea why this is the case?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,467 ✭✭✭Musicman2000


    I have worked for companies with quite good HR processes. (Usually from European HQ companies) and More Classic (US style) HR, but one thing has struck me is how little IT skills any of my HR Partners have had!

    From struggling with the use of conferencing and other communication tools, inability to set up a Wiki or run an online survey, to extremely poor MS Office and basic email communication skills. This is even from highly educated, HR PG Diploma & Masters level employees.

    Anyone have any idea why this is the case?

    Unfortunately highly educated means nothing if they can't use the basics tools in every day life .


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,149 ✭✭✭youcancallmeal


    Every time I deal with HR people I just keep reminding myself that their first priority is to look after the companies interests and not mine. Obviously that is not going to be the case in every scenario but I find it best to keep it forefront in my mind anyway


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,743 ✭✭✭Wanderer2010


    Every time I deal with HR people I just keep reminding myself that their first priority is to look after the companies interests and not mine. Obviously that is not going to be the case in every scenario but I find it best to keep it forefront in my mind anyway

    Exactly. They are, in affect, an extension of the company procedure book, a human form for all the company rules and policies on the page, not to mention they also function as a shield for bullying or incompetent managers when brave employees make a complaint and they are also very knowledgeable in all the psychological ways in which to make a complainant doubt themselves or feel inferior (position of the seats in meetings, asking to "clarify" written complaints, being abrupt in tone etc theres an art to HR trust me). Remember, HR hired a lot of these bullying managers so if they agree with your complaint, they are effectively saying they cannot hire people who are fit for the job. I wouldn't trust any of them.


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