4 Ways To Make HR Your Friend
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What’s the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything?
For Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy fans, it’s 42. But from a career point of view – it’s building a great relationship with HR!
In most organisations (increasingly so in the large ones) the HR department’s sphere of influence is vast – yet most people are unaware of how many decisions HR influences. They have a hand in recruitment decisions, talent and succession planning, discussions on secondments, leading restructures and providing development to name a few. HR can really help you with your career.
HR often have the ears of the senior management, and this makes it possible for them to support your career development. Best of all – most of the time, HR want to be involved in helping you to drive your career or to manage your team more effectively. Working with people-focused managers makes HR’s job easier.
The problem is, many of the people I see in organisations deride and complain about HR and make their life difficult. Which, when we consider the above, is at best career naivety, and at worst could be career suicide. And it’s not petty spite – with the best will in the world, if their experience of you is that you are difficult and boorish – how confident will they feel that you would be diplomatic, politically aware and engage well with Directors? Therefore when they are asked for a recommendation for someone to work directly for the Board on a project – are they likely to put your name forward? (For that matter, if you never speak to HR, will they think of you?)
So what can you do?
This week take one action to build your relationship with HR and become a known supporter. How clear are you on the people agenda for your organisation? What are the key people concerns and priorities? How could you help HR progress this agenda? Once you are a known supporter, you can think about how you could enlist their help with your career.
For Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy fans, it’s 42. But from a career point of view – it’s building a great relationship with HR!
In most organisations (increasingly so in the large ones) the HR department’s sphere of influence is vast – yet most people are unaware of how many decisions HR influences. They have a hand in recruitment decisions, talent and succession planning, discussions on secondments, leading restructures and providing development to name a few. HR can really help you with your career.
HR often have the ears of the senior management, and this makes it possible for them to support your career development. Best of all – most of the time, HR want to be involved in helping you to drive your career or to manage your team more effectively. Working with people-focused managers makes HR’s job easier.
The problem is, many of the people I see in organisations deride and complain about HR and make their life difficult. Which, when we consider the above, is at best career naivety, and at worst could be career suicide. And it’s not petty spite – with the best will in the world, if their experience of you is that you are difficult and boorish – how confident will they feel that you would be diplomatic, politically aware and engage well with Directors? Therefore when they are asked for a recommendation for someone to work directly for the Board on a project – are they likely to put your name forward? (For that matter, if you never speak to HR, will they think of you?)
So what can you do?
- Analyse your current relationship with HR. Ask yourself how well you know your local HR person? Have you ever met your Head of Learning and Development? Do you know your HR Director’s name? Do any of them know you?
- Think about how you can help them. HR are always looking for volunteers to help with selection processes, graduate programmes, attending training programmes, running pilots (and more). When HR are testing things out, it’s very easy to get involved. You can help shape some big organisational decisions whilst building your relationship with their department.
- Understand that people matter. One of the best ways to show you’ve got potential is to be seen as a “people person”. Given that HR are the “people department”, if you can align yourself with them you’ll quickly mark yourself out as someone who understands the importance of an organisation’s people.
- Value HR’s Time – HR will quite often help you directly with pushing your career forward, and it’s really helpful to if your aspirations are known to them. But don’t go to them with a completely blank page – that’s frustrating for them, makes it look like you are approaching your career in a half-assed way, and is a big ask – it gives that impression that you don’t value their time.
This week take one action to build your relationship with HR and become a known supporter. How clear are you on the people agenda for your organisation? What are the key people concerns and priorities? How could you help HR progress this agenda? Once you are a known supporter, you can think about how you could enlist their help with your career.