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One has to be incredibly naive to think HR is on the employee's side. Always follow the money: Who pay's HR? Company; ergo - if HR is against company, HR gets

One has to be incredibly naive to think HR is on the employee's side. Always follow the money: Who pay's HR? Company; ergo - if HR is against company, HR gets replaced. Same for binding arbitration: Who is the arbiter's repeat customer, company or client? company. ergo, if arbiter is not good for them, arbiter gets replaced. Also, when you buy real estate, some people believe that their agent is looking out for them. However, if you look at the money, one party (buyer) brings money to the table, and three parties (buyer agent, seller agent, seller) take money proportional to the deal amount; Therefore, everyone except buyer wants deal amount to be maximized.

fred_is_fred 9y ago
What's funny is that people and especially agents will say that they are ethically bound as your agent (the buyer) to help you. Money always trumps ethics unfortunately but I've found very few people who actually seem to understand this.
pasbesoin 9y ago
Given that a lot of HR is deliberately duplicitous about this, and that apparently -- still -- other "authority" figures in many young peoples' lives don't address this (every college "career counseling" center in the U.S.: I'm looking at you), I think one bout of naiveté can be excused -- although still preferably avoided. HR IS NOT YOUR FRIEND! Hell, HR often is not even the hiring manager's friend. "Best practices" are often a poor fit to the real world and individual circumstances. Hiring managers often have to jump through hoops to try to get HR to act on the candidates they actually want. The way to work HR, is to know that -- if they're competent -- they are all about risk management. So, make what you want also the way they minimize their risk, to the extent you can. When I left one of my jobs, some of my PTO time had lapsed per a newer "use it or lose it" policy -- this "loss" probably aided by another prior action, lumping "vacation" time and "sick" time into a single pool. But, I'd done well by my team. And HR didn't want any unnecessary waves. So, they paid it to me, regardless. It was also a time of enough organizational transition, that this individual action would most likely "get lost in the wash" and not become the basis for another employee claiming unequal treatment. THAT's how HR works. They help you, only when it helps them. The rest is all empty rhetoric. If you buy it, they just gained (gamed) some cheap compliance from you -- that's all. P.S. As always, individual circumstances may happen to vary. But regardless, go in with your eyes open and your guard up.

fred_is_fred 9y ago

What's funny is that people and especially agents will say that they are ethically bound as your agent (the buyer) to help you. Money always trumps ethics unfortunately but I've found very few people who actually seem to understand this.

pasbesoin 9y ago

Given that a lot of HR is deliberately duplicitous about this, and that apparently -- still -- other "authority" figures in many young peoples' lives don't address this (every college "career counseling" center in the U.S.: I'm looking at you), I think one bout of naiveté can be excused -- although still preferably avoided. HR IS NOT YOUR FRIEND! Hell, HR often is not even the hiring manager's friend. "Best practices" are often a poor fit to the real world and individual circumstances. Hiring managers often have to jump through hoops to try to get HR to act on the candidates they actually want. The way to work HR, is to know that -- if they're competent -- they are all about risk management. So, make what you want also the way they minimize their risk, to the extent you can. When I left one of my jobs, some of my PTO time had lapsed per a newer "use it or lose it" policy -- this "loss" probably aided by another prior action, lumping "vacation" time and "sick" time into a single pool. But, I'd done well by my team. And HR didn't want any unnecessary waves. So, they paid it to me, regardless. It was also a time of enough organizational transition, that this individual action would most likely "get lost in the wash" and not become the basis for another employee claiming unequal treatment. THAT's how HR works. They help you, only when it helps them. The rest is all empty rhetoric. If you buy it, they just gained (gamed) some cheap compliance from you -- that's all. P.S. As always, individual circumstances may happen to vary. But regardless, go in with your eyes open and your guard up.