Evaluation Time...Delivering as a True Business Partner

From Little to Big

Yesterday employee A was tearfully telling me that  two coworkers of hers were gossiping about her professional attitude. As a manager you will find her a highly engaged employee. Co-workers evidently found that attitude at least annoying. Three days before that employee B was physically aggressive and rude toward another one who just wanted to show cooperation. Employee B seems to be unable to take criticism,  and delivers results at the expense of both coworkers and proper procedures. There is worse: somebody from somewhere in the organization has decided that employees are not allowed to see the HR rep during working hours! A drastic measure to counteract abuses? Where did go the open door policy? And we all know the latest news about the tragedy in Connecticut. For HR there is not always an easy answer nor a clear-cut explanation. But beyond our labyrinth of procedures we have to find answers to safety and risk management in the workplace because "little things become big" as employee A pointed out to me.

Forget about Pettiness..Go to the Core of the Issue

So, I understand and agree that if we listen to all pettiness and stories we will never get things done. Oh sure, we all have some other things to do, bigger fish to fry, particularly at this time of the year. But I am asking you: what would be your achievement if you ignore what makes your organization what it is? After all, that is all the fibers of HR. Are you prepared to have a small matter become huge and a safety issue or a major risk issue? Are you ready for the company to loose business because one employee keeps on breaking procedures to reach personal goals in an unethical fashion? Am I exaggerating? At the very least, you would be facing high turnover and low morale, consequently low productivity. So much for HR metrics and company scorecard. My philosophy is: let's have one person in the HR department be the ears and eyes of HR so that we can screen information and process it as needed. Let's read behind small issues and get to the core of it.  Bypassing procedures once could be insignificant. It takes different proportions when that act is repeated three to ten times during the course of the day and four to five days a week during 52 weeks. Let's understand why sometimes, if not often, it is not always about small matters.

Focus on the Importance of Human Capital

 

Maybe it is a training issue, or an employee morale issue, or worse: a bad hiring. How about process improvement hampered by individual stubbornness and ego? Let's train managers so that they can handle issues arising in their departments in a proper fashion, so that they can make the right hiring decisions, improve process, methods, and productivity. Let's train on how to make truthful, honest, unbiased annual evaluations. Maybe we need to have our evaluation criteria revised? ....And this time of the year, let's evaluate ourselves and our companies. Let's be a real business partner, not just a follower, or the one who brings the bad news. The time is over for the carrot and stick method.  It takes many skills to run a company and HR skills is one of them. So, lay your HR skills out, deliver as a business partner. After all, human capital is major in any organization, and bringing out the best of it in many facets is what is HR about.