As the new HR manager, you discover the HR department is allowing managers to ar

Question

As the new HR manager, you discover the HR department is allowing managers to arbitrarily remove certain key job requirements (because the candidate does not possess them), even thought they are stated in the job description, in order to hire a "friend" or a recommendation from a current employee. Are there any legal or ethics issues here? How should you handle this with the rest of the HR department? How should you handle this with the managers in this organization? this is for a Human Resource class

Explanation / Answer

Lower morale. When employees perceive that there is favoritism in how they are treated by management, a sense of unfairness creeps in. It raises the question, “Why didn’t I get that project/promotion/corner office?” This brings down company morale, because favoritism is understood to mean that no matter what you do, your efforts won’t be rewarded if you’re not one of the favored few.

Resentment. What then follows is resentment towards the manager who is unfairly favoring an employee who may not be the most deserving, as well as towards the favored employee who is taking advantage of the situation.

Desertion. If the resentment reaches a certain point, your company may be at risk of losing some potentially excellent employees who won’t want to stick around where they’re not appreciated.

Overlooked potential. When a manager continually favors one or a few employees over the others, he or she may be missing out on the talents and skills the others bring to the table. This can lead to promoting someone who is not ready for more responsibilities over someone who is ready and able to take on a challenge.

Stunted growth. With a decline in morale, growing resentment, and overlooked potential, a manager who unfairly favors one employee is also hurting the company overall by stunting the growth that would come from moving the best employees forward to management positions. This also is a consequence of losing employees who may have been of great value.

Legal implications. Last but certainly not least, the practice of favoritism may lead to legal action if an employee feels that he or she was discriminated against or was forced to work in a hostile environment. A manager’s favoritism could end up costing your company a lot of money in attorney’s fees.

Foster professionalism. At its very core, favoritism is unprofessional behavior. A first step to avoiding it is to foster and promote professionalism in your organization. They say the best offense is a good defense. Defend your company from potential favoritism by creating a professional environment that actively discourages any kind of unfair treatment.

Offer training. Educating and informing managers and employees alike is another way to help avoid favoritism in your workplace. Offer a training session on what favoritism is, why it’s detrimental, and what employees should do if they spot it in the office. If your employees are clear on what to look for, they’ll be more likely to report it if they see it.

Facilitate communication. Along the same lines as training, it’s important that employees know they have an open avenue for reporting favoritism confidentially. Unchecked favoritism is harmful, but employees won’t risk reporting it if they’re not sure how to go about it, or if they fear it will come back to negatively affect them.

Get to the bottom of it. If you discover that favoritism is taking place in your company, the most important thing is to make sure it stops. It can be a very delicate situation, to be sure, but the damage it poses is much too great to be ignored. If someone comes forth with an accusation of favoritism, don’t ignore it. Gather the facts and get to the bottom of it.

1. HR isn't there to be your advocate. The human resources department's function is to serve the needs of the business; its loyalty and responsibilities are to the company. Now, in some cases, that means advocate for employees against bad managers, because it's in the best interests of employers to retain great employees, identify and address bad management and stop legal problems before they explode. But plenty of other times, what's best for the employer will not be what's best for the employee, and the best interests of the employer will always win out. That's not cynicism; that's simply what HR's mission is.

2. HR isn't obligated to keep what you tell them confidential, even if you request their discretion. HR staffers aren't doctors or priests, and you shouldn't assume confidentiality when talking to them. If HR reps hear information that they judge needs to be shared or used to address a problem, their job obligates them to do that. In fact, in many cases they would be being professionally negligent – or in some cases, even breaking the law – if they didn't act.

Now, that doesn't mean that you can never talk to HR in confidence. But you should work out the terms beforehand explicitly – and should stay aware HR is still required to report certain things, like harassment or illegal behavior, even if they agreed to confidentiality before hearing your report.

3. HR knows things that they aren't telling you. Whether it's that changes to major benefits are approaching, or why some departments get significantly more resources than yours, or who in the organization is essentially untouchable, or who is on their way out, the human resources department learns things in the course of their work that they're not allowed to relay to you. If an HR rep who you normally know to be responsive is stonewalling you or seems resistant to explaining something, it's possible that they're simply not allowed to share something confidential. (That said, if you're regularly not getting what you need from HR, consider pushing back or talking to a different rep.)

4. HR's job is to support the company's managers, not to dictate how they operate. Some companies give HR more power than they should – such as letting they control how other departments hire or make promotion decisions. But in general, if you're a manager and your HR department is creating obstacles to your work (for instance, making it harder for you to hire great people or hire as quickly as you need to, or making it difficult for you to address performance problems forthrightly), you should push back. Escalate the situation, or find an ally higher up in the organization who can overrule HR or push for different procedures.

5. Your HR department might be great, or it might be awful. Some HR departments are tightly synced with the company's culture and goals and do excellent work – ensuring, for example, that managers are well-trained, benefits are strong and well-administered, salaries are benchmarked to industry and market norms and increased when needed, and that they help rather than hinder a company's managers. Others, though, focus more on holding office parties and then get in the way when managers need to hire, give feedback and handle sticky personnel issues. A good HR department can help a company get more done. A bad HR department will just get in the way.

1. Doing HR right can be time consuming

The scope and responsibility of HR is broad—covering both tactical and strategic activities. Unfortunately, tactical HR activities can consume most of the hours in a day and steal time from truly strategic activities. Doing HR yourself means allocating time for functions such as benefits planning, recruiting/hiring, training, managing personnel files, payroll/time reporting, performance reviews, manager development, annual merit evaluations, managing leaves and life status changes, plus lots of HR administration and compliance issues.

2. Explosion of benefit plan choices

The explosion of benefit options has created a huge administrative burden for many businesses. Should your company offer HMO, PPO, High Deductible, POS, Health Savings Accounts, even Flexible Spending Accounts? What about Life Insurance, STD/LTD, Retirement Plans, Commuter Plans, and various Voluntary Benefits? If so, which ones will best fit the needs of employees and executives? Which plans will make it easier to recruit the talent you need? Figuring out which plans will make you more competitive is no easy task.

3. Many third party relationships to manage

You will have to manage a payroll vendor, state tax authorities, health insurance brokers, health insurance carriers for medical, vision, and dental, and disability, as well as vendors for employment liability, voluntary benefits, recruiters, HRIS system, compensation data, employee handbook/policies, outplacement, legal guidance, and many others. Managing all these vendors also places a burden on the accounting team to reconcile invoices and pay vendors.

4. Many regulations

The acronyms are numerous and adding up every year: COBRA, FMLA, ADA, OSHA, EEO, WARN, HIPAA, ERISA, FLSA, etc. And you will have to keep up with federal laws and labor laws specific to your state and region, plus an ever-changing tax code.

5. Lack of negotiating leverage

Given their size, most small businesses simply do not have negotiating power when dealing with large insurance carriers and other vendors. Even a single event, such as an employee who gives birth to premature twins, can dramatically alter the cost of your medical benefits. Unfortunately, the end result can be a lack of control over escalating costs.

6. Too much paper and inefficient manual processes

HR consists of multiple inter-connected business processes and multiple people involved in each process. Our clients tell us that their former in-house processes were ad-hoc and required manual effort, quickly turning into a paperwork nightmare.

Do-It-Yourself

You can accomplish it on your own or offload the job to current or newly-hired internal staff. The upside is you control everything, which keeps costs low. The downside? You don’t have the time to do it all—not when generating business is the main priority. In addition, you own all the liability. One missed deadline or misunderstanding of a regulation, and you could damage your business.

Multi-vendor

Single Vendor/PEO

In terms of technology, the best PEOs have developed a single information system platform that powers all of their HR software systems. Many of them have also developed user-friendly business intelligence that aids executives in decision making, specifically related to salary levels, compensation trends, and workforce performance data. These online tools reduce paperwork and the overall administrative burden at small businesses. They are especially helpful for companies with multi-state workforces.

The upside to finding a single vendor is that you manage a single relationship and gain HR expertise, HRIS technology, and a qualified team to manage your HR function. This saves time and cost in the long term. However, the downside is you must find the right HR partner—one that tailors its services and cost structure for your specific industry—because a wrong choice is a costly one.

Involve employees in the change process. Employees are not so much against change as they are against being changed. Any time managers are going to implement organizational change, there is always a lag between the time the change has been discussed at the management level and the time the change is going to be implemented. Managers like to play like an ostrich and believe that they are the only ones who know about the changes that are going to take place. Unfortunately, while their heads are stuck in the sand believing that no one else knows, employees are effectively undermining the future changes with negative informal communication…the company grapevine. The sooner you involve employees in the process; the better off you will be implementing the change. A formal communication channel is more effective at implementing change than a negative informal one.

Interview employees regarding their feelings. It is critical that managers and supervisors understand what employees are feeling regarding the change. It is only when you accurately understand their feelings that you know what issues need to be addressed. Implementing change requires the ability to market and to sell. It is difficult to effectively sell without understanding your buyer’s needs, concerns, and fears.

Concentrate on effective delegation. Too often managers and supervisors feel they must use self-protective measures, especially during organizational change. They start by trying to police all activities. Don’t try to cover all the bases yourself. You should concentrate on effective delegation during the early stages of the change process. Effective delegation is particularly good for two reasons: first, it helps you manage and maintain your workload, and second, it gives your employees a sense of involvement. Involvement positions employees to share responsibility for change.

Raise levels of expectations. Now more than ever, you should ask more from your employees. It is expected that more work needs to be done during the change process. While it may be most practical to expect less in terms of performance, raise your levels of expectations and theirs. During change, employees are more likely to alter their work habits, so reach for the opportunity and push them to try harder and work smarter. Require performance improvements and make the process challenging, but remember to keep goals realistic in order to eliminate frustration and failure.

Ask employees for commitment. Once the change has been announced, it is important that you personally ask for each employee’s commitment to successfully implement the change. It is also important that you assure the employee that if there are problems, you want to hear about them. If a negative employee does not tell you, they will tell other employees why the change will not work.

Expand communication channels. The change process usually means that normal communication channels in the firm need to be enlarged. At this time, your employees will be hungrier than ever for information and answers. You can “beef up” communication. First, give employees an opportunity to give you input. Start by becoming more available and asking more questions. Get employees’ opinions and reactions to the changes. Maintain your visibility and make it clear that you are an accessible boss. More importantly, be a careful listener. Second, keep employees updated on a regular basis. Just letting your employees know that you have no new information is meaningful information to them. Strive to be specific; clear up rumors and misinformation that clutter the communication channels. Remember, it is almost impossible to over communicate.

Be firm, committed, and flexible. As you introduce a change, it is important that you see the change through to completion. Abandoning it halfway through the change process accomplishes two negative impacts. First, it destroys your credibility. Second, it tells every employee that if you take the stance of a dinosaur, the change will pass by, even if you lose your job and become extinct in the process. Remain flexible, because you will have to adapt to situations to successfully implement the changes.

Keep a positive attitude. Your attitude as a manager or supervisor will be a major factor in determining what type of climate is exhibited by your employees. Your attitude is the one thing that keeps you in control. Change can be stressful and confusing. Try to remain upbeat, positive, and enthusiastic. Foster motivation in others. During times of transition and change, try to compensate your employees for their extra effort. Write a brief note of encouragement on their paychecks; leave an affirming message on their voice mail; take them aside and tell them what a great job they are doing; listen to their comments and suggestions. Last, try to instill organizational change as a personal challenge that everyone can meet…with success.

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