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HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

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Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#91

Post by ryandrake »

QuinnyPig wrote: post #3

Done correctly, a lot of what HR does is never visible to the employee. “No, the law won’t let you do that” style correction before a bad policy can be implemented.

Yea, whenever these HR stories come up I always think to myself: who are all these people where HR is part of their day-to-day? Maybe I’m extremely lucky. Almost all companies I’ve worked for, I’ve interacted with HR twice: once on my first day where they hand me a bunch of papers to sign and once more on my last day when I turn in my badge. That’s it! Otherwise they are totally invisible, and I have no idea who they even are!

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#92

Post by solveit »

tehjoker wrote: post #63
MattGaiser wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unlike the serf, I can go find another Lord. I can pit the lords against each other for a better deal. I can try and become my own lord. HR has a lot fewer tools than the inquisition. Fear of lawsuits reduces their toolkit even further.

What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought.

Any different group with a semi-competent lord will absolutely destroy you and take your resources. You'll soon send around resumes begging for a lord to take you.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#93

Post by bww »

jiggawatts wrote: post #14

Many people think that they live in a free democracy. In reality, something like 50% of all working people are employed in a strict hierarchical organisation that is essentially feudal in its nature. Most employees are the equivalent of serfs, overseen by lords, with a king in charge. The common employees don't get a vote. Their managers are not elected. They don't get a say in policy. The managers in turn form a str…

A less dramatic way to put this might be: the person who is paying the bill is the person who gets to decide. In a large company this may be some manager who controls the budget your compensation comes out of. If you’re an independent contractor this is your client. If you’re hiring a person to paint your apartment, this is you.

Arguably, this is as it should be. Taken to its logical conclusion the alternative would mean that nobody is entitled to make a decision about anything without taking a referendum on the matter.

Reasonable people will be interested in informed input from the people they employ, but it should not be surprising that in the end the painter you hired doesn’t get a vote on the color you want your bathroom.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#94

Post by mym1990 »

umvi wrote: post #29
jiggawatts wrote: post #14

Many people think that they live in a free democracy. In reality, something like 50% of all working people are employed in a strict hierarchical organisation that is essentially feudal in its nature. Most employees are the equivalent of serfs, overseen by lords, with a king in charge. The common employees don't get a vote. Their managers are not elected. They don't get a say in policy. The managers in turn form a str…

Are we talking about work or life? Sure, private companies aren't democracies, but why should they be? Democracies are extremely inefficient. Imagine if Linux or Python projects were run as democracies and not lead by BDFLs? I can't imagine them being nearly as effective because democratic processes to get new features would always be gridlocked. Benevolent dictators are 10x, maybe even 100x more efficient than democ…

I would love to know where you're pulling the 10x or 100x efficiency stats on dictatorships, and what exactly are the sectors of the dictatorship that are more efficient?

Also, it seems like your definition of freedom has no responsibility attached to the actions. Yes, you may be able to do as you wish, but so can others onto you(especially if they have more leverage).

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#95

Post by [deleted] »

jiggawatts wrote: post #14

Many people think that they live in a free democracy. In reality, something like 50% of all working people are employed in a strict hierarchical organisation that is essentially feudal in its nature. Most employees are the equivalent of serfs, overseen by lords, with a king in charge. The common employees don't get a vote. Their managers are not elected. They don't get a say in policy. The managers in turn form a str…

[deleted]

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#96

Post by tshaddox »

toolz wrote: post #68
tehjoker wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if we tried to make it so there were no lords? Just a thought.

Is someone really your "lord" if you can just choose for them not to be your "lord" and freely choose for them to be your "lord" if they compensate you well enough for your liking? I'd suggest we already don't have lords and the analogy doesn't really hold.

If you must choose and serve a lord in order to survive, is it really worth bragging about your “freedom” to choose the least bad lord?

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#97

Post by choppaface »

When HR believes that their main job is to administrate, then they have failed the company. HR’s job is to fuel growth by finding ways to make teams more efficient, effective, and enjoyable. Lots of admin work, but also a lot of strategy. That can be relatively easy at very well funded start-ups, it can be very hard after the 2,000th hire, and impossible at any size if your underlying company culture and/or C-suite is broken.

A lot of the points in this article are valid and are worth understanding. We should take an equal amount of time trying to work on a vision for what HR should be. A lot of start-ups build the product but not the company. A good founder should have at the minimum a lucid vision for HR.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#98

Post by Sebb767 »

ryandrake wrote: post #91
QuinnyPig wrote: post #3

Done correctly, a lot of what HR does is never visible to the employee. “No, the law won’t let you do that” style correction before a bad policy can be implemented.

Yea, whenever these HR stories come up I always think to myself: who are all these people where HR is part of their day-to-day? Maybe I’m extremely lucky. Almost all companies I’ve worked for, I’ve interacted with HR twice: once on my first day where they hand me a bunch of papers to sign and once more on my last day when I turn in my badge. That’s it! Otherwise they are totally invisible, and I have no idea who they…

That might be the whole reason: Once you're interacting with HR, you usually do so because you have a problem (you did something wrong, there was a conflict with another employee ...). In those cases, you're far more likely to not have a good experience (I presume).

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#99

Post by napsy »

zerof1l wrote: post #81

Simple fact: HR is hired and paid by the company, not by you. Company's interests will always come before your interests.

The same can be observed for every person the company is hiring. But yet, there are exceptional employees who do really good work, even outside what is expected from them. I think it's fair that the same can be said for HR.

Re: HR is not your friend, and other things I think you should know

#100

Post by hirundo »

stretchcat wrote: post #38
hirundo wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Merriam Webster definition of resource: 1a : a source of supply or support : an available means —usually used in plural 1b : a natural source of wealth or revenue —often used in plural 1c : a natural feature or phenomenon that enhances the quality of human life 1d : computable wealth —usually used in plural 1e : a source of information or expertise 2 : something to which one has recourse in difficulty : EXPEDIENT 3 :…

It may be a valid use of the word resource, but it's still dehumanizing to think of people as resources.

It isn't dehumanizing to consider someone "a source of information or expertise". It's humanizing in that those are predominantly human things. And that's one of the primary senses of the word. It seems uncharitable to assume someone must mean some other sense.
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