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Thread: No Company Should Have a Human Resources Department

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    Default No Company Should Have a Human Resources Department

    June 23, 2017

    No Company Should Have a Human Resources Department

    By Theo Caldwell


    It is a linguistic irony of the modern corporation that those most desolate of resourcefulness and human rapport occupy its Human Resources department.

    Consistent with the culture of perverting language and policing words, "Human Resources" is one of those modern terms of which the intended and practical meanings are exact opposites.

    If you work for an organization large and unfortunate enough to have a dedicated "H.R." division – and even, perhaps, if you have been a member of that mirthless, officious cohort – you know of what I write.

    Moreover, though your conditioned response is to consider H.R. a necessary evil – after all, someone needs to hire, fire, and ensure that the company avoids legal disputes arising from personnel issues – you sense, on some level, that life would be better if the entire bureau simply did not exist.

    Developed in the 1980s to protect corporations from the sudden ubiquity of "sexual harassment" cases, Human Resources departments have persisted and metastasized such that the current generation of workers cannot imagine a world without them. But, like so many cost-driving, self-perpetuating, control-seeking entities one finds in both the public and private sectors, scrutiny yields that not only are they not good at what they do, but what they do is not good.

    Regarding hiring, it is not uncommon for HR personnel to have no training or experience as to the revenue-driving aspects of the organizations for which they work. This is to be expected, since H.R. is, as noted, a cost-driving enterprise, the make-work nature of which provides, at best, a thin prophylactic against legal trouble.

    But consider the bounded rationality of an H.R. person working for, say, a software or engineering company, tasked with laying out the qualifications and sifting through the résumés of applicants while lacking expertise in that field. Certainly, he will receive guidance from the department head seeking a new employee, but the deficit of knowledge regarding the actual job dictates that the H.R. person does not know what to look for.

    This is how you get nonsense prerequisites for posted positions such as "minimum 5 years' experience" or "English or journalism degree required."

    As to the former, perhaps one applicant served five years in a cubicle, accomplishing nothing of consequence for a competitor, while another evinced prodigy-like skills in a shorter period of time and wishes to bring them to bear for you. Thanks to a reasonable-sounding yet arbitrary number devised by H.R., the company will most likely hire the lummox and let the superstar slip away.

    Pertinent to the latter (and I admit I benefited from this in my early career), jobs that involve writing or media are often gate-kept by requirements of degrees in English or journalism. Once again, this evinces a misunderstanding by H.R. personnel as to how things work.

    One's capacity for writing financial or news copy, for example, is not aided in the slightest by an English degree's obligations to read Moby-Dick or The Faerie Queene. And as for a degree in journalism, suffice it to say sheepskin of this sort makes four years of gender studies look like time well spent.

    But again, to an H.R. person who has no idea what his company does or how it makes money, this sort of thing seems perfectly sensible.

    To whatever extent Human Resources brings imagination to bear, its operatives discover uncharted ways to infuriate and enervate. No better object lesson exists than the H.R.-developed online application process.

    Profiles must be created – complete with unnecessarily complicated passwords that incorporate upper- and lowercase letters, at least one number, special characters, and an emoji of a smiley whale – before carefully crafted résumés are deconstructed and supposedly "populated" into H.R.'s preferred form.

    Invariably, such programs make a dog's breakfast of the applicant's curriculum vitae, such that even the most suitable candidates become frustrated at having to correct and readjust every field. Indeed, the more extensive their experience, the more irritating and time-consuming is this process.

    Moreover, the applicant is robbed of the opportunity to present himself as he would like, since H.R. has prioritized its own convenience by making the process uniform. At what point does a qualified candidate with other options begin to make assumptions about the organization and question his desire to be part of it?

    Likewise, Human Resources' involvement in the termination of employment, whether the person is leaving of his own volition or not, brings out the automaton-voiced worst of H.R. people.

    The "exit interview" of a voluntarily departing employee – supposedly undertaken to find areas for improvement within the organization but more properly understood as scanning for potential legal liability – is a nonsense conversation between a person who is dishonest about its purpose and one who no longer cares.

    Conversely, the unnecessarily obnoxious, key card-snatching, security perp-walking type of employee termination, designed by Human Resources and punctuated by one of its number uttering passive-aggressive, lawyer-approved disclaimers, is a rare moment in which the minatory nature of HR is laid bare.

    Notwithstanding its ineptitude and menace evident at the commencement and conclusion of employment, the greatest organizational damage done by Human Resources occurs during the time in between. It is unhealthy, on a day-to-day basis, for a coterie that is uninvolved and disinterested in the actual business of an organization to monitor and police those who are working to make it a success.

    H.R. types might insist there is a constellation of other, wonderful things included in their work, but make no mistake: their primary purpose is to keep an eye on you. This is undertaken with scrupulous adherence to the shifting mores of political correctness. This is how you get "mandatory diversity training" and, true to H.R.'s roots, zero-tolerance policies and terminations for behavior fitting the eternally elastic definition of "harassment."

    Glomming on to an organization's hull, Human Resources exerts a kind of parasitic authority, since it is neither assigned (inasmuch as H.R. exists outside the traditional chain of command) nor emergent (no one looks to H.R. people for guidance simply because everyone respects them so doggone much).

    Consequently, as outsiders with opaque power and picayune priorities, H.R. personnel are often oddly behaved (admittedly, there may be a chicken-and-egg scenario at work here). Again, supervision by peculiar people who do not understand or care if you are good at your job is not conducive to esprit de corps.

    Perhaps most chilling are those moments when H.R. attempts to show its "fun" side. If you wonder what the Human Resources folks do when they are not alienating applicants, calling security, or sending stern memos about wearing open-toed shoes or labeling your lunch – this is it. That cartoon alligator holding a badminton racquet on the flier announcing the first-come, first-serve giant hoagie party in the break room at lunch – that was your H.R.'s associate's morning.

    Related, if you are employed someplace where company time and resources are consumed to make a zany video about the people who work there, you need to find another job at once. In seriousness, you must commence sending out résumés the moment you are finished reading this essay.

    The healthy growth of an organization is measured, in part, by its ability to decentralize. Human Resources is antithetical to that. Even a large corporation consists of smaller, interdependent entities, the managers of which, with developed skills pertinent to their fields, know what they need.

    As the employment market shifts, with job changes and contract work becoming more common, one hopes Human Resources, that malignant misnomer of the modern corporation, returns to the abyss from whence it came.

    http://www.americanthinker.com/artic...epartment.html

    I always said HUMANS are not RESOURCES. Coal and iron ore are resources.
    ”The trouble with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.” - Margaret Thatcher

  2. #2
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    As per the thread title........neither should the US Commerce Department, but American parents just can't resist signing away their offspring to the God of STATE.

    It is not what should or should not be in existence; it is how we should or should not engage our corpus to it.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Samuel Adams View Post
    As per the thread title........neither should the US Commerce Department, but American parents just can't resist signing away their offspring to the God of STATE.

    It is not what should or should not be in existence; it is how we should or should not engage our corpus to it.
    Sadly, privileges and entitlements trump freedom, in post FDR Amerika.

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    The term, "human resources", reveals what the think of you.
    Pastor Guest

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    Hey,

    In the company that I worked for, for 28 years. It started out really good. Employees were considered assets to the company. Therefore, a high standard was set to be employed. Some HS grads got jobs, but they really looked for 2+ years of college. And this for production (factory line) jobs. Promotions came from within. You could start out as a line worker, and become plant manager.

    And these people were screened, employed by HR. And HR was more like a liason, between employees, and management. Working for both sides to accomplish a goal.

    The result was employees who contributed to the welfare of the company. The employees designed methods and machines, that made production easier, and faster. And the company returned this benefit through paid health benefits, all were salaried employees, sick days, raises and good bonus', for production, and reduced cost.

    That worked out so well, that it was really difficult to get a job there-no openings. No one quit, or was fired, and that covered 1000 people.

    Then we got a new CEO from outside of the Company. He, and those who followed, considered employees as a liability, a necessary cost for doing business. Instead of an asset. And to cut costs, and liabilities, he cut our health benefits, retirement benefits, no raises for 5 years, out sourced jobs to contractors, to name a few things. When he did this the upper half of management quit. He replaced them without those from the outside, with the same view.

    In return the company got less production, and the idea for new methods and machines dried up.

    Now: The outsources jobs were first filled with people who didn't speak English. So an extra employee was hired to translate. Not to mention the line went from 6 to 18 people. One day none of them showed up. Which was filled with prison work release. After a couple of shankings taken place on the line, they stopped that. Now those 18 jobs are filled by regular American HS drop outs. Who don't show up on weekends.

    The company has a standing opening of better than 100 positions which they cannot fill. They will hire 10 people to start one day. Only 5 show up, out of those, 3 quit the first day, the other 2 in a month.

    Why? Any body will do. They pay them less than flipping hamburgers, And you stay at that rate for 3 years. Minimal heath care and vacation days. The out sourced employees get paid even less, and since they are temp help, get no health care and no vacation days. Since they are temp help, if the plant shuts down for a week, they get no unemployment benefits.

    And HR doesn't care what you do, have done or might do, all they want is a body. And they act like the hammer for the company.

    And they still can't get no bodies. And wonder why the plant is in such bad shape.

    HR simply does what they are told. They carry out the philosophies, and agenda, and goals of upper management, which is namely the CEO (Bezo's-WaPo).

    O, and the CEO that started all this. He was caught embezzling 250 million dollars, and fired. But they still kept his policies in place-great idea.
    Wise Men Still Seek Him

  6. #6
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    Quote Originally Posted by Samuel Adams View Post
    As per the thread title........neither should the US Commerce Department, but American parents just can't resist signing away their offspring to the God of STATE.

    It is not what should or should not be in existence; it is how we should or should not engage our corpus to it.

    CONSENT makes the law......and you're guaranteed an unlimited right to contract


    STOP making deals w/ the devil !!

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    Quote Originally Posted by ku commando View Post
    CONSENT makes the law......and you're guaranteed an unlimited right to contract


    STOP making deals w/ the devil !!
    Tell that to PC-NOT.

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    "Human resources" has an Orwellian ring for sure.

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by CaryC View Post
    Hey,

    In the company that I worked for, for 28 years. It started out really good. Employees were considered assets to the company. Therefore, a high standard was set to be employed. Some HS grads got jobs, but they really looked for 2+ years of college. And this for production (factory line) jobs. Promotions came from within. You could start out as a line worker, and become plant manager.

    And these people were screened, employed by HR. And HR was more like a liason, between employees, and management. Working for both sides to accomplish a goal.

    The result was employees who contributed to the welfare of the company. The employees designed methods and machines, that made production easier, and faster. And the company returned this benefit through paid health benefits, all were salaried employees, sick days, raises and good bonus', for production, and reduced cost.

    That worked out so well, that it was really difficult to get a job there-no openings. No one quit, or was fired, and that covered 1000 people.

    Then we got a new CEO from outside of the Company. He, and those who followed, considered employees as a liability, a necessary cost for doing business. Instead of an asset. And to cut costs, and liabilities, he cut our health benefits, retirement benefits, no raises for 5 years, out sourced jobs to contractors, to name a few things. When he did this the upper half of management quit. He replaced them without those from the outside, with the same view.

    In return the company got less production, and the idea for new methods and machines dried up.

    Now: The outsources jobs were first filled with people who didn't speak English. So an extra employee was hired to translate. Not to mention the line went from 6 to 18 people. One day none of them showed up. Which was filled with prison work release. After a couple of shankings taken place on the line, they stopped that. Now those 18 jobs are filled by regular American HS drop outs. Who don't show up on weekends.

    The company has a standing opening of better than 100 positions which they cannot fill. They will hire 10 people to start one day. Only 5 show up, out of those, 3 quit the first day, the other 2 in a month.

    Why? Any body will do. They pay them less than flipping hamburgers, And you stay at that rate for 3 years. Minimal heath care and vacation days. The out sourced employees get paid even less, and since they are temp help, get no health care and no vacation days. Since they are temp help, if the plant shuts down for a week, they get no unemployment benefits.

    And HR doesn't care what you do, have done or might do, all they want is a body. And they act like the hammer for the company.

    And they still can't get no bodies. And wonder why the plant is in such bad shape.

    HR simply does what they are told. They carry out the philosophies, and agenda, and goals of upper management, which is namely the CEO (Bezo's-WaPo).

    O, and the CEO that started all this. He was caught embezzling 250 million dollars, and fired. But they still kept his policies in place-great idea.
    This has been repeated thousands of times across this country................ it is real, and more than a few of us have lived it, THANKS Cary!

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by PatDaly View Post
    This has been repeated thousands of times across this country................ it is real, and more than a few of us have lived it, THANKS Cary!
    Thanks Pat. It's so sad in many ways.

    It hurts the company. One of the line workers designed a machine that revolutionized part of the production. The company brought their engineers in, and built the machine. I'm sure they are using it in all three plants now. Those ideas have dried up, it's all for No. 1 now. The potential in the minds of the workers will continue to go untapped. And so will the revenue from cost saving and increased production.

    It hurts the employee. The idea was take care of the company, and it will take care of you. When the idea above was implemented, the employees neither paid any premiums, or health care costs, including prescriptions. Covered by the company. They did ask a lot for us to be frugal, and wise with it. FOR LIFE.

    Retirement was a continuation of pay, for life, and then to the spouse for life.

    Production rates were decent, but if you wanted to work your butte off you could make some really good money. Lots of folks worked thru breaks, and lunch to make it.

    All of that has gone away. Some of the employees have been replaced with robots, others with temp help. The amount of production going out the back door is roughly the same, and costs are about the same. 18 people at 10.00 an hour with no benefits, compared to 6 people at 20.00 an hour, with benefits and a desire to help the company be more productive.

    And one might think that robots are the way to go. No sick time/leave, never late, no days off, no health care, no retirement yada yada. But they do break down, a lot. And because they are robots there is an up tick in maintenance personnel, and education, thus higher pay. And most times an engineer has to be called in. And with robots there is never any thoughts, or mind on how to do things better, faster. It's just the same thing over and over.

    Had an extremely good thing going for all involved. Now they wonder every year if this will be the last.

    And they can't figure out why?
    Wise Men Still Seek Him

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