Yesterday’s Advisor was all about HR anti-patterns, or how not to manage people. Today we’ll look on the positive side—how to build bridges of trust—and at an extraordinary tool to help.
Businesses have built-in cultural gaps. HR is basically behaviorally based, while other managers tend to be bottom-line oriented. HR often wants to talk about resolving conflict, whereas management wants to know how to raise market share or cut manufacturing costs.
Those gaps don’t only exist between HR and other functions. They also differ from one another. For example, marketing differs from IT. Sales is miles from R&D.
How to Build Bridges
What can HR do to build bridges across these cultural gaps? Here are eight great recommendations, taken from BLR’s popular resource, Managing an HR Department of One. The book is especially designed for small HR departments, but this advice fits organizations of any size:
First, do the nuts and bolts of HR really well. You need to do an excellent job managing day-to-day HR operations, because the first exposure many managers have to HR is when they have questions about policy and procedure. Prove your competence on routine HR issues, and managers will start consulting you on larger business concerns.
Get rid of HR efforts that don’t add value. Validate every HR effort, from childcare centers to the employee newsletter, in terms of how they meet organizational goals. If you can’t articulate a program’s critical contribution to the business, get rid of it.
Develop relationships throughout the organization. Don’t wait for managers to come to you with problems. Seek them out and learn about their business issues. Get invited to department meetings. Volunteer for task forces. Ask a manager’s advice. Don’t sit in the office and wait for the phone to ring!
Managers of small HR departments have found the special help they need in a unique BLR product—Managing an HR Department of One. Examine it at no cost or risk for 30 days. Click for info.
Help managers become more confident in their HR roles. Most managers don’t know how to do such things as interviewing, hiring, or discipline unless you train them. When you do, that’s value-added for HR, and when managers become more competent at routine HR tasks, your time is freed up for more strategic work.
Speak their language. Managers care more about outcomes than about rules. You need to be able to present your point of view, talk about how what you want will benefit their bottom lines. And learn their vocabulary. If you want to be understood in France, you speak French. To be understood by managers, speak with the terminology they understand.
Be flexible. Good judgment requires context. Although HR has to establish policies, rules, and procedures to create an environment of fairness, HR pros need to understand that rules can and should be flexible when an individual situation calls for it. Managers want HR to tailor solutions to their particular needs, not offer one-size-fits-all programs.
Focus on the same goals. For managers to trust you, they have to know you’re working toward the same objectives they are. This means focusing on bottom-line goals such as customer satisfaction, competitiveness, and profitability. How can you ensure that you’re working toward the same things? Get involved in the business planning process.
Communicate … again and again. HR staffers must talk, work, and communicate with managers on a regular basis.
That’s Bridge-Building 101. Of course, bridge-building—important as it is— is only one of your myriad HR challenges, especially in a small department.
In the smaller organization you’ve got to do it all from succession planning to recruiting to recordkeeping to benefits. How can you handle it all?
We asked our editors if there was any special help directed right at the smaller—or even one-person—HR office. They came back with our recently published special program, Managing an HR Department of One. Here are some of the features included:
—Discussion of how HR supports organizational goals. This section explains how to probe for what your top management really wants, and how to build credibility in your ability to deliver it.
Feel like you’re all alone in HR? Take on a partner—Managing an HR Department of One. Examine at no cost or risk for 30 days. Click for info.
—Overview of compliance responsibilities. The BLR book contains a really useful 2-page chart of 21 separate laws HR needs to comply with. These range from the well-known Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and FMLA to lesser known, but equally critical rules such as Executive Order 11246. Also included are federal and state posting requirements. Proper postings are among the first things a visiting inspector looks for … especially now that the minimum wage will change repeatedly in the next 2 years.
—Training guidelines. No matter what your company size, expect to have to do training. Some of it is required by law. Some of it is just good business sense. Managing an HR Department of One walks you through how to train efficiently and effectively, for the least time and money.
—Prewritten forms, policies, and checklists. These are enormous work-savers! Managing an HR Department of One has 46 such forms, from job apps and background check sheets to performance appraisals and leave requests, in both paper and on CD. The CD lets you easily customize any form with your company’s name and specifics.
If you’d like a more complete look at what Managing an HR Department of One covers, click the Table of Contents link below. Or better yet, take a look at the entire program. We’ll send it to you for 30 days’ evaluation in your own office with no obligation to buy. Click one of the ordering links on this page, and we’ll be happy to make the arrangements.