4 ms·

It's hard to know for sure, since usually only bad HR events get reported. However, I certainly agree with your feeling. HR is there purely to be administrators

It's hard to know for sure, since usually only bad HR events get reported. However, I certainly agree with your feeling. HR is there purely to be administrators of processes involving people (hiring, firing, etc.) and also as a way to shield executives from a) having to spend time managing said processes, and b) being found culpable when their companies break the law.

TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
> It's hard to know for sure I'm going to strongly oppose this, with a simple statement to support my claim that HR is decidedly not on the employees side when a conflict arises: Follow the money. Who pays the HR bill? It certainly ain't you. Edited to add: when a conflict arises in response to @Joky
- yardie 9y ago
  If you expand it out logically. Since all companies make money from providing services and those services are provided by employees then employees are paying the HR bill through the carrying costs of being employees.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
    To continue this line of reasoning: ultimately the customer, or end user, pays the bills. Which is nonsense, of course: Neither I, nor the customers, nor the end users, have the authority to hire HR staff, sign off on their salary payments, or set their working policies.
    - mcny 9y ago
      I learned of something called principal agent problem not too long ago and now I want to fit it everywhere (when all you have is a hammer yada yada). I think it works here Even when HR is perfectly operational, it favors the institution over anything else. Of course, in real life we have difficulty favoring the institution over the management. I imagine some questions are out of HR's reach though. Why is the pay highest at the top? Why should a supervisor need more pay than the people they supervise? Why can't we make all pay information public in a public company? Could we recruit, hire, and keep talented people (especially at the top) with something other than simply better pay? How "hands-on" should HR be?
      - philipov 9y ago
        > yada yada When all you've got is an agent, everything looks like a principal.
  - monocasa 9y ago
    Capital != labor.
  - evanlivingston 9y ago
    Oh so if we follow that out further we find that managers and COs work for the employees too!
  - Avshalom 9y ago
    Good luck convincing anyone of that; capitalism is basically built on the idea that employees can't create value only owners.
- Joky 9y ago
  The thing is that your premise is about two opposing sides: the employee and the employer. In this case sure, HR represents the employer, it isn't supposed to be some sort of independent council. On the other hand, HR is involved in more situation than just conflicts between employee / employers and it seems to me to be very overly simplistic to just see this as a manichean environment.
  - TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
    You're right. I'll edit my comment to add: "when a conflict arises".

TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago

> It's hard to know for sure I'm going to strongly oppose this, with a simple statement to support my claim that HR is decidedly not on the employees side when a conflict arises: Follow the money. Who pays the HR bill? It certainly ain't you. Edited to add: when a conflict arises in response to @Joky

yardie 9y ago
If you expand it out logically. Since all companies make money from providing services and those services are provided by employees then employees are paying the HR bill through the carrying costs of being employees.
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
  To continue this line of reasoning: ultimately the customer, or end user, pays the bills. Which is nonsense, of course: Neither I, nor the customers, nor the end users, have the authority to hire HR staff, sign off on their salary payments, or set their working policies.
  - mcny 9y ago
    I learned of something called principal agent problem not too long ago and now I want to fit it everywhere (when all you have is a hammer yada yada). I think it works here Even when HR is perfectly operational, it favors the institution over anything else. Of course, in real life we have difficulty favoring the institution over the management. I imagine some questions are out of HR's reach though. Why is the pay highest at the top? Why should a supervisor need more pay than the people they supervise? Why can't we make all pay information public in a public company? Could we recruit, hire, and keep talented people (especially at the top) with something other than simply better pay? How "hands-on" should HR be?
    - philipov 9y ago
      > yada yada When all you've got is an agent, everything looks like a principal.
- monocasa 9y ago
  Capital != labor.
- evanlivingston 9y ago
  Oh so if we follow that out further we find that managers and COs work for the employees too!
- Avshalom 9y ago
  Good luck convincing anyone of that; capitalism is basically built on the idea that employees can't create value only owners.
Joky 9y ago
The thing is that your premise is about two opposing sides: the employee and the employer. In this case sure, HR represents the employer, it isn't supposed to be some sort of independent council. On the other hand, HR is involved in more situation than just conflicts between employee / employers and it seems to me to be very overly simplistic to just see this as a manichean environment.
- TheSpiceIsLife 9y ago
  You're right. I'll edit my comment to add: "when a conflict arises".