23 ms·

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

• sbussard 6y ago
  Illuminating! Nice ending “reasonable exchanges only happen with reasonable people”
• z3ugma 6y ago
  Oof, this hits home. Out of college I worked for a large company that's well-known for hiring lots of folks straight out of undergrad with high salaries and a demand of high hours. Despite an almost cultlike devotion to meritocracy and micro-feedback, the "merits" only mattered if it was in furtherance of already established norms of success. In a large company like that, deviation wasn't viewed as having a unique skillset, it was viewed as making it harder for other people around you to fit their work into a unique landscape that featured you. If you feel like your company treats you this way, can I recommend a startup? When no one knows whether the process you're following today is the "right" process, like while a startup is achieving product-market fit, then there's lots of room for unique thinkers.
  • woutr_be 6y ago
    > If you feel like your company treats you this way, can I recommend a startup? Having worked in both startups and large corporate companies, I feel they're just on the opposite side of the spectrum. In big corps there are established processes that are almost impossible to change, in startups the processes are changed daily, which can be equally annoying. Jumping to a startup because you don't like the big corp style is a major change, the same goes for the other way around. Maybe go for a smaller, but already established company.
  • rmk 6y ago
    Some of the most heavily mismanaged places I have worked at have been startups. All sorts of insane people, particularly at management level, but also rank-and-file. Large companies have standardized interview and background checking processes on top of fairly standard requirements of candidates (educational qualification etc.) that work to root out pyschopaths and just plain weirdos, most of the time. No such luck at startups.
    • tonyedgecombe 6y ago
      That's no much good if you are a psychopath or weirdo though.
    • FabHK 6y ago
      I seem to recall studies that upper management in large companies has about 2.5x as many sociopaths as the general population.
      • stjohnswarts 6y ago
        In particular CEOs
  • rocqua 6y ago
    > deviation wasn't viewed as having a unique skillset, it was viewed as making it harder for other people around you to fit their work If your unique skillset makes it harder for people to work with you, it might not be that much of an asset, even if the skills are impressive.
• QuinnyPig 6y ago
  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.
  • kayodelycaon 6y ago
    For those of us with disabilities, we’re going to end up working with HR.
  • ryandrake 6y ago
    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!
    • Sebb767 6y ago
      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).
    • jldugger 6y ago
      > who are all these people where HR is part of their day-to-day? This post is _especially_ for folks like you. When something shitty happens at work, you might contemplate contacting HR for the first time in your life. This post is a warning: HR defends the company's interest, not yours. They are not a neutral court of appeals.
• decasia 6y ago
  This article raises a lot of important considerations about how large workplaces operate and what to expect from them as a line level employee. I think it's a reasonable takeaway for newer people to understand that HR in a big organization is there because it "adds value" to the organization mainly by protecting it from a wide range of potential legal liabilities. That's not to say that HR isn't ever useful to line level employees in specific workplace situations. I've found them to be responsive to workplace health and safety things, office ergonomics basically, when that potentially affects your health on the job. But it seems fair to observe that "human resources" is already a specialization that, as its very name indicates, tends to construe the human beings who work there as … need I even finish my point?
• theresistor 6y ago
  Reminds me of The Gervais Principle, which is also excellent: https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-or-the-office-according-to-the-office/ https://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-...
  • zeeed 6y ago
    Thanks a lot - Rachel’s article as well as the one you linked to hit home extremely hard. Besides the comics (re: macleod, dilbert, the office) or this very article - is there a field that occupies itself seriously with the described kind of dynamic? Or a good forum where these things are discussed? I’m looking for further information to deepen my understanding or a forum to bounce off thoughts and exchange experiences around that.
    • NotPavlovsDog 6y ago
      I am writing an MA thesis on cultural conflict between engineers and management. I would suggest reading works from the field of CMS - critical management studies. You can find lots of articles available, with no paywalls, through google scholar. I would start with Alvesson's work on CMS. We've actually used CMS to improve recruitment and retention of engineers in an organization. I subscribe to hard realism. We can't pay like FAANG, and we can't promise a fast career track. What do we offer? Oh, lots of things that don't cost money but are highly valued by engineers. Honesty. Transparent culture - who gets paid more, promoted, and why. Engineering excellence - management does not decide on tech choices, all decisions are negotiated from the principle of compromise between excellence, financial viability and short-and long-term benefits. Not dictatorial "transformational" leadership, with "agile" on top. Guaranteed no overtime for engineers. Flexible schedules. The opportunity to participate, in an active, self-determined, ethics-steered way, in creating tech solutions that impact millions of humans positively, with no moral gray areas. This particular org is honest about not giving "fuck-you money", but it also guarantees not bidding on military contracts, manipulating people to the lowest denominator, or engaging in surveillance capitalism. From the earliest recruitment communication, we make it clear that we don't do corporate cringe. No inspirational coaches. No transformational coaches. No coaches, period. We don't do "teambuilding" exercises. We do send people to conferences, on the company dime, and have the option of on-the-payroll personal project, for those that want it. Surprising how easy it is to compete for talent with idiot companies that expect "loyalty" that they translate as "blind obedience through fear".
• Yaa101 6y ago
  The problem starts with the name, humans are not resources. Stones. metals and food are resources. It's a slave term to see people as resources. I will never contract myself to those companies and people.
  • t-writescode 6y ago
    Under your philosophy, how do you manage who should work on a project, how many people should work on a project, whether you need to hire more people and how long something will take? Edit: I notice this person's account posted once 32 days ago, then 44 days ago, then 51 days ago ... I don't expect a response anymore.
    • WrtCdEvrydy 6y ago
      Direct supervisor of team, Head of team (C-level), Metrics or Organizational number of desired projects, Estimation?
    • scottmcf 6y ago
      HR don't decide any of those things, they're instructed to do those things by management.
      • t-writescode 6y ago
        > I will never contract myself to those companies and people. I read that as them saying they'll never work for a company that treats people as 'resources'.
  • ser0 6y ago
    A few companies I have been in have recognised this PR mistake and have renamed themselves "People and Culture". However, do not be fooled, the purpose remains ensuring the organisation has the right type of people and a culture that aligns with the objectives of the company.
  • hirundo 6y ago
    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 : a possibility of relief or recovery 4 : a means of spending one's leisure time 5 : an ability to meet and handle a situation : RESOURCEFULNESS I'd say humans are resources under definitions 1a, 1e and 2. Those things aren't particular to slaves.
• mesaframe 6y ago
  Blog is badly written. There are excessive uses of pronoun without proper references to who means whom. Points backing up the idea is shallow. Author looks he wrote the blog while being angry. Everything aside, I do agree with sentiment and would go on to say the nature of HR depend on the company. As it was alluded to later in the company. In my previous company, HR used to tell everything to the manager. Seriously everything!! In current one so far it looks good. But, let's see
  • indeedmug 6y ago
    > There are excessive uses of pronoun without proper references to who means whom. Points backing up the idea is shallow. I don't follow this logic that pronouns somehow means the idea is shallow. These workplace stories are usually intended to be vaguely written and not overly specific to avoid doxxing. In other words, plausible deniability.
  • blondin 6y ago
    i agree with you. not necessarily the pronouns but it's a very fast drop. and i believe it is hinting at what happened at GitHub. fundamentally, it is not telling us anything most of us don't already know. but go figure...
  • vxNsr 6y ago
    two fyi's: 1) author is female. 2) she gets that feedback a lot that she's overly aggressive in her blogging. Mostly she dismisses it as misogyny but here you thought she was a guy... I wonder how she'll respond.
    • drstewart 6y ago
      >Mostly she dismisses it as misogyny Starting not to be surprised she has such a bone to pick with HR
• d23 6y ago
  It’s tough when you have your eyes fully opened to this sort of thing. You never really see people the same way again.
• jiggawatts 6y ago
  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 strict hierarchy, much like in feudal times, with a top-down structure. A junior manager cannot say no to a senior manager. Nobody can say no to the CEO. In this picture HR is essentially the inquisition. The inquisition was most certainly not the friend of the common man! If you buck the system, if you step out of your place, if you're a commoner upsetting a lord, then you will be treated much like your ancestors would have been treated long ago: You will be put to the question. The inquisition will spare no pain to determine exactly why you stepped out of line and upset the natural order of things.
  • montenegrohugo 6y ago
    I would very much recommend Private Government by Elizabeth Anderson (specifically, chapter 2). It's a relatively short read, and very relevant to your comment. Personally, I found the book quite enlightening, it gives a very different perspective to the jobs landscape than the one we usually have. An uncomfortable perspective, but one I feel one that is much more accurate.
    • dannyw 6y ago
      Just read. Great chapter. Highly recommend.
      • jiggawatts 6y ago
        Seconded.
  • viraptor 6y ago
    With the major difference that these days a lot of people get to choose their employers. Yes, it's not perfect and not everyone can afford that, but we moved significantly from "you live here, this is your lord".
• gverrilla 6y ago
  this is generalizing hr choose another company style
• trustfundbaby 6y ago
  "reasonable exchanges only happen with reasonable people." is a pretty brilliant quote.
• arthurcamara 6y ago
  This is different than my perspective. From my POV most people are good at heart and well intentioned. The problem is: we each have different perspectives of what "good" is and conflict arises. Not only that, but as humans, we create fantasy narratives in our heads and simplify each other's complexities, categorizing each other as villains, heroes, somewhere in between - and centering our world views around ourselves. I don't know whether this will ever be fully fixable.
• irjustin 6y ago
  Agreed with one small correction, HR is your friend before you join the company simply because internal recruiters fall under HR and recruiters are your friends. Literally paid to try and place you into the company. Back to topic - HR is a tool. Their job is to keep the company from getting sued by employees, the government and sometimes unions over bad practices. If the company is large enough they also report to the board. Maybe HR's better analogy for the employee is a double edge sword. If you choose to use it, you'd better be prepared. Know the your rights, local laws/governance about your employment. If your complaint aligns with laws then you're better setup for success, but again, it can always come back to bite you.
  • pseudalopex 6y ago
    A recruiter can be an ally. A friend would tell you things the company didn't want you to know.
  • mcv 6y ago
    > "recruiters are your friends" They are not. They may act like it, but they represent the company they work for, and ultimately their own interests. Some recruiters have enough integrity to be honest with you, but some don't. If you want to know who you can trust, you need to know what motivates them. You can trust they will act in those interests. You can trust them to act in your interest when your interests align.
    • FabHK 6y ago
      Agreed, yes. Recruiters generally do want to place you and collect their fee, but few would have any qualms placing you at a terrible firm that pays well (=good fee) and keeps you doing the same shit for a year before going under, rather than a place that pays less but has great corporate culture and an engaging job with growth potential.
• shruubi 6y ago
  Everything makes sense if you go into a job with the mindset you are not a human being, but rather a tool that the company has to give cursory maintenance to, to ensure that you don't break down. HR is just the department that oversee's the tools and removes/replaces any tools that are not working or are becoming too much of a hassle. If you doubt that is true, just remember that many companies would willingly have you thrown off the top of the building to your death and replaced within a day were you to even so much as thought about time outside of work if they could do so and get away with it.
• ivanhoe 6y ago
  Isn't all human-to-human interaction in groups of more than a few people basically the same as described here? That's basically what the politics are all about, as soon as group grows to more than 3-4 closely tied people hierarchies and clans are formed - and they each have their agendas that are sort of in line with the community goals just enough to fit in, but really are mainly about the personal gains... humans do that at every possible level of social existence
• madrox 6y ago
  I get the impression this author is dancing around some particular bad experiences they’ve had, which is the real subject of this post. Without understanding those details it’s hard to get where this comes from. There’s certainly a lot of unspoken expectations of what HR is. I’ve worked with HR in many capacities, and find them to be supportive and helpful of both employees and managers. However, what you will not find them to be is sympathetic. They aren’t job relationship therapists any more than they’re mall cops. They are there to make sure workplace law is followed. Beyond that, it’s on everyone involved to be personally responsible for being a professional.
  • lostcolony 6y ago
    They're helpful of employees and managers only insofar as it helps the company. And even then, only insofar as the company values that help. I've never seen HR go to bat for an employee, against either a manager or against the company. The implication that they're not mall cops (but there to make sure workplace law is followed, i.e., they are cops of a sort) is actually quite apropos; they are there to protect the establishment and the status quo. They are not there to help you.
  • shoeshoeshoey 6y ago
    Can't help but read all of Rachel's posts through a Facebook engineering filter. And, with this post, once you've been on the opposing side of HR, you understand and appreciate her posts. Everyone expects HR to follow the law but in practice you can see this is applied selectively at many companies.
    • willxinc 6y ago
      She quit a while back if I recall from some of her posts about it a few years ago. Additionally this isn't the first time she's had issues at a company and left (if you read further back). That being said, it is still useful knowledge, but probably could be taken with a grain of salt.
  • hypervisorxxx 6y ago
    I agree with you the lawyer is leaving out anecdotes and trying to generalize from them, but all you have to do is google for a second to find some incredibly embarrassing messups from HR see microsoft amazon google for examples. I will challenge you on the part though about the unspoken expectations of what HR is. To be clear, HR always says come to them if I need anything. If I have any problems they are there to help me. Like you said, this is a lie. They are there to follow the law, and if they see you as a liability and your complaint doesn't have enough evidence and they can get away with finding a way to get rid of you and claim it's not retaliation they will. This happens often. So perhaps HR should take on some responsibility for actively misadvertising the purpose of their existence. They should say exactly that: We are not here for you we are here to make sure the company doesn't get in trouble so if on the books we can be in the right and reduce liability we will, so keep your mouth shut and do not give us any reason to think you are a liability to us. Alot of problems I agree could be solved if HR was honest about their role. And did not advertise themselves as therapists as a way to asses early on if you are a liability and come up with a way to get rid of you and get away with it.
• ser0 6y ago
  HR is not your friend and your company is not your family. Regardless of intent there are commercial realities that exist within the context of a company that may never be present in a non-work relationship. This has varying degrees of impact on the nature of the relationship itself and may not present itself until you are at your most vulnerable. I find that a collegial environment with shared goals and responsibilities can be equally rewarding as non-work relationships even if we all have some level of underlying self-interest at heart. Our day-to-day interactions can also be made more pleasant if we are not constantly reminded of the at times competitive, zero-sum, structure of professional engagements. At a team level your colleagues may be your friends but one shouldn't conflate professional relationships with personal ones.
  • firecall 6y ago
    Exactly. And nor does anyone have a 'career'. You have a job. When you lose that job, you may not get another one. It's an illusion. One minute you think you are a high profile manager with budgets and power. The next you are packing your desk up into a box and rethinking your entire life. We are not our careers!
    • mobattah 6y ago
      I am always terrified of losing my job. It's a fear I've had even though I've been a top performer the entire five years I've been professionally working. Maybe it's because I grew up poor or because I think things are too good in tech and about to crash any day. My antidote? $100k in liquidity. Preferably not invested in the NASDAQ. If tech crashes, you can take your liquid $100k and move to Thailand, Spain, Portugal, Turkey, etc. In these countries, you can live well for a decade, sometimes even thirteen years off just $100,000 USD. I know $100k isn't much and it certainly isn't the $1M - $3M people want for retirement in the US. But it's enough to have peace of mind.
      • bartvk 6y ago
        Indeed, it's a cushion that gives incredible peace of mind. Not only job-related, but also gives the option to deal with all sorts of other life-related problems.
• drstewart 6y ago
  IT is not your friend either. They work for the company, not for you. Legal is not your friend either. They work for the company, not for you. Janitorial staff is not your friend either. They work for the company, not for you. Sales is not your friend either. They work for the company, not for you. Marketing is not your friend either. They work for the company, not for you.
  • emptyparadise 6y ago
    Only trust your fists, HR will never help you.
  • 1-6 6y ago
    Your co-worker is not your friend either (at first, or may never be).
    • gabereiser 6y ago
      So true. More often than not, they see you as an obstacle.
      • eeZah7Ux 6y ago
        Speak for yourself please. Respectfully, this level of cynicism is not shared by everybody.
    • tonyedgecombe 6y ago
      I've had co-workers who I considered friends but was disabused of that thought once they no longer needed me for something. Workplaces are funny environments, they aren't natural places to be.
    • pydry 6y ago
      I've had coworkers who put other coworkers first. Ive never seen or heard of an HR department that didn't put the dictates of management first.
      • 6y ago
• dehrmann 6y ago
  > Performance reviews are a joke because almost nobody knows how to measure anyone else's effectiveness. They are just a continuation of the same popularity contests you thought you left behind from...high school Bowling For Soup (I'm that old) has a song called High School Never Ends. I guess it also applies to the corporate world.
• bsder 6y ago
  I dunno. A group of your senior staff engineers can probably do a pretty damn good evaluation of everybody's engineering performance--thank you very much. You're not as special a snowflake as you think, and, yes, the senior engineering staff probably are paying attention. The issue will likely be that the engineering ranking won't match the political rankings and will sometimes diverge wildly. THAT is a separate problem.
• gregjor 6y ago
  A handful of angry just-so stories. Companies can operate with a lot of dysfunction. You will encounter sociopathic and stupid people in life. You might not get treated reasonably or fairly sometimes. Santa Claus isn’t real.
• juanbyrge 6y ago
  Seems like OP observed something unsettling at the office, wanted HR to fire the perpetrator, and HR did not do that. Then OP generalizes and says that HR is not effective and not your friend. However, there are many gray areas where it's hard to justify firing someone. For example, let's say this person was acting passively aggressively and ignoring/avoiding someone. Is that a fireable offense? I am not sure it is. There are also very clearcut situations, like harassment or racism or aggression. But there are a lot of gray areas also.
  • shortandsweet 6y ago
    Good example. My boss pretty much ignores me and avoids me. I don't see myself winning at all so I just figure at least I'm not being micromanaged. Flipped a negative into a positive.
  • musicale 6y ago
    I think the point is that HR exists primarily to protect the company from its employees. It's very good at that.
  • NestedLoopGoBrr 6y ago
    Even the situations that you argue are clearcut are not. Say for example two teams in separate locations were working together, solely through email. One had a lead, who effectively lead both teams. One day they all met together in the same location for a team building event, and the other team discovered that lead was black. Suddenly when working together the lead was met with scrutiny, hostility, and even aggression. But because they never said the explicit gotcha words, there is no clearcut situation. And while that lead can raise attention to the problem with management, their only hope is an empathetic manager — which is rarely the case, especially without shared experiences of that kind of problem. Inevitably, that employee quits, because they find themselves stuck in performance reviews that are subpar, courtesy of having uncooperative coworkers (or worse, they poison the well behind this employee’s back), with no real hope for rectifying the situation.
  • dan-robertson 6y ago
    Surely the first example in the OP is one of these clearcut situations (I don’t think there’s any law in California obliging people to report passive aggression) and the point is that HR ignored the allegations until they came from the accused’s manager. Surely there are grey areas but to consider them on their moral merits, HR would need to be in an impartial position which this article claims they are not.
• 29athrowaway 6y ago
  These are rather strong words, but it's true: HR is most of the time can be seen as criminal organization. If someone tries to form a union, they will ignore the law and try to shut it down. If someone reports harassment or any equal employment opportunity violation, they will try to cover it up. Susan Fowler's Uber story is the perfect embodiment of how HR operates. Never trust HR.
• doc_gunthrop 6y ago
  Here's another thing to note: At least a few people here have probably heard the words "culture fit" uttered when a decision is being made to bring a new employee onboard. That's basically just a socially acceptable way of validating discrimination in hiring (with ageism being a typical example).
  • closeparen 6y ago
    Culture fit is more an assessment of how similar the candidate’s current workplace is to yours, than anything about the candidate personally. It’s “unfair” in that it penalizes the candidate for doing what is appropriate in their current environment, without knowing how well they might be able to assimilate and be effective under your norms.
    • caturopath 6y ago
      I don't really think many people tie things back to the candidate's current workplace. It just means "Did they seem like a toxic asshole?" at its best and "Did they seem like your sort of person?" when it's worse.
      • closeparen 6y ago
        In “tell me about a time...” questions, the interviewer has some idea of how he would expect his coworker or report to handle such a situation. That idea is culture. The candidate’s response doesn’t have to be “toxic asshole” to be very different, and therefore a culture fit concern. I have seen candidates rejected for telling stories where they were too cooperative with coworkers they knew to be wrong. Some interviewers in technical rounds will second guess the candidate on correct decisions to see if they stand their ground.
  • digitaltrees 6y ago
    This is easy to say until you have actually tried to create a clear culture. It is even more clear when you have suffered from a bad culture you are trying to reform. For example, I bought a company, the culture was highly competitive, focused on greed and self enrichment...and what do you know, we caught employees engaged in shady behavior. When we disciplined or fired some, they claimed discrimination, and while I have personal experience with discrimination and fully acknowledge it exists, their allegations had no merit, and their actions required the consequences. The longer a lead people the more I value and strive to create a good culture.
• lgleason 6y ago
  While HR can be helpful, and in some organizations do great things for you as an employee, it's best to treat them like a domesticated lion...the lion might be friendly most of the time, but still need to stay on your toes because it could turn on you, revert back to instinct and maul to to death.
• law_enforcement 6y ago
  Your website doesn't have https. Please fix.
• filmgirlcw 6y ago
  HR is definitely not your friend. I’ve had exactly one good “real” HR person in my career, and she was forced out after our company was acquired, and we didn’t even get a replacement for months on end, despite our acquirer being a multi-billion dollar company. There are some people in HR that I know and like, but I’m acutely aware that I am merely a cog in the system and that HR works for the company, not for me. As a general rule, I record all conversations with HR. I’ve never had to use the recordings, but if a third-party isn’t there, I'm protecting myself, period. I no longer live in a one-party consent state, so that means informing HR in advance that I’ll be recording, so if you’re in the US, check your local laws before proceeding. HR has an important role and I don’t discount what that role is, but it exists to protect the company, not the employee. And knowing that is crucial to getting the best experience out of HR.
  • napsy 6y ago
    In the end, I think it really depends on your expectations what the role and responsibilities of a HR actually are.
• NikolaNovak 6y ago
  Overall agree, but it IS company/institution specific. In all companies I personally worked on, HR is... neutralish at best in good times, occasionally actively useless, but always company-focused. In my wife's massive north american big-box retailer company though... I am ASTONISHED how friendly, involved, helpful, caring, HR managers are, from policy, culture, as well as reasonable sample of individuals. I still think it's not the norm, but it was a pleasant surprise how supportive HR can be.
• crispyambulance 6y ago
  > If you are the sort who honestly expects everyone to be reasonable, honest and generally agreeable, prepare to be shocked. That’s the key idea from this RachelByTheBay article. I think many of us, especially earnest tech folks, learn this the hard way. I know I did. HR easily gets mistakenly perceived as some kind of impartial ombudsman. It’s an ugly disappointment when one realizes they can instantly turn from your buddy to a cold fish, depending on what management tells them.
• gumby 6y ago
  What a cynical article. Also: what a realistic article. It's probably not obvious but management at most companies doesn't actually want HR to be like this, at least for exempt employees (more cynicism, this time mine). But if it doesn't converge this way the execs usually start to get upset with the result.
  • marcus_holmes 6y ago
    If every manager was a good manager, there'd be no need for HR. Good managers don't cause HR-type problems, and can deal with any problems in their teams without involving HR. So, yeah, kinda - management at most companies don't want HR to be like this. The bad managers because HR keeps getting involved with them, the good ones because HR imposes restrictions that they don't need. But HR is like this because it needs to protect the organisation from bad management.
• zerof1l 6y ago
  Simple fact: HR is hired and paid by the company, not by you. Company's interests will always come before your interests.
  • napsy 6y ago
    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.
• ChuckMcM 6y ago
  I always love a good HR rant :-). At Google the "people person" was called your "business partner." I like the notion that they are the inquisition though, that metaphor includes the adherence to dogma at the expense of common good. There are also people who enjoy "the game." That being the corporate politics of "gotcha" and "praise". When I got to the place at Sun where I had some "influence" and people started trying to cultivate me as an ally, it really annoyed some of them that I didn't play the game.
  • zeeed 6y ago
    Yeah, what’s that “business partner” thing about? We have that as well but no one could ever explain what’s the difference between a regular HR role and a HR business partner role.
• choppaface 6y ago
  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.
• fartcannon 6y ago
  HR even eats it's own. At a company I worked for, after a merger with another company, one of the HR reps was tasked with laying off numerous people. It was the first time she did it, and it devastated her. At the end of the grueling week, HR laid her off.
• musicale 6y ago
  I imagine most people who have worked at a company probably know these things very well already, but it's nice to have them acknowledged and repeated publicly since companies rarely tell the truth in this regard.
• ryandrake 6y ago
  > Imagine working with a person like this when you're trying to get something done that involves their team acting like a gatekeeper. You get the approval from them on doing something one way, then plow a bunch of time into developing it, and then when it's time to deliver things, that same person gets in the way and stops the whole affair. Every meeting should have a note taker who takes complete, accurate notes listing at a bare minimum every major decision, who decided it, and every action item including who it’s assigned to. Send it out to everyone involved with the discussion. Do it for every meeting so it’s not seen as some special event. Every face to face conversation where a decision is made should be followed up with a written email basically saying “Per our chat on 3/5, you decided [very specific description of what was decided]. Please let me know if my understanding is incomplete.” You need the paper trail!
• yibg 6y ago
  HR is not your friend, but sometimes incentives can align. One of the goals of HR is employee retention, and in that incentives do align. I’ve seen HR really go out of their way to accommodate for personal situations during covid times for example. A lot of it is not seen by the typical employee, but they do happen.
  • Rapzid 6y ago
    HR is your friend if helping you doesn't harm the company. Otherwise, it just reflects bad on their performance. Also, HR is more your friend if you are a key IC.
• hypervisorxxx 6y ago
  I'm a senior SRE now software developer building infrastructure with a decade of experience and an engineering degree. I'm also a woman. When I mentor serious younger women coming into these challenging but rewarding jobs I always tell them: HR is not your friend. They are not there to protect you. They are there to protect the organization. If they see you as a liability, and they often do over the man being complained about, they will find a way to get rid of you. If I told you the experiences I've been through, I would get bombarded by a bunch of white conservative males on this site telling me I'm making it up, so I don't even bother. In reality, the whole diversity in tech thing is a marketing scheme for these big companies. But once they hire you don't speak...don't have opinions. Put your head down and do your job. They don't actually care about you beyond their ability to print a picture of you on their website but if you dare cause trouble you are out. They could not care the least about your long term career development beyond their ability to market you externally. Behind closed doors, HR will gaslight you and kick you out if things are actually bad. The only bigger slap in the face this could possibly be beyond that is the people sitting across the table from you justifying why what you're telling them isn't a big deal or trying to gaslight you or trying to turn the tables on you are mostly women. Women who are rewarded for shutting up and doing what men want them to do at the expense of everyone else, and they have no clue nor do they want to of what it's really like to be a women on the other side of the fence in a male dominated environment. HR is not your friend. If you are a woman and having issues with males at your company the answer is to get the hell out as quickly as possible without them knowing beforehand. Especially if other people observe the negative experiences you do and don't say anything it means You cannot change the culture and trying to at the expense of your career should not be the hill you die on. Some men also just don't believe women should speak in meetings at all period. It's an unspoken rule and I've unfortunately only ever had this problem with managers who are makes from countries where womens rights aren't respected. We in tech cumulatively cannot even begin to comprehend the permanent damage we've set in place and invisible barriers for decades to come we've set up by allowing men who don't respect women as equals to participate in the workforce. It should be a requirement but I can tell you as the least of my woes I have worked for two men who do not believe women should speak, ever, and I have been severely punished in my career for challenging this. You cannot begin to imagine.... If you find yourself unhappy. Whatever you do do not go to HR. They are sick. They are mostly evil. They are the kind of woman who work at Microsoft and tell women behind closed doors it's ok to sit in a man's lap at work when he asks you to especially if he's your superior and after it gets leaked publicly they stand on stage pretend to be sorry and pretend to fix it (they never do). This is what HR is. I have been bullied by HR. I have sat across the desk from a woman in HR who made a fraction of what I did at the time decked out in designer bought by the man she was dating, my superior at work and ignored me. I cannot even begin to describe the level of ice cold HR is. They are the bitches incarnate of this world. Your goal if you are a female in tech is to make sure HR forgets you exist after they hire you. If you find yourself unhappy. Do not go to HR. Do not try to make things better at your expense if the other party isn't trying. Apply elsewhere agressively and gtfo. Take yourself out to a nice bar. Buy yourself some drinks. Rest all weekend. Wake up on Monday and turn in your two weeks notice after negociating up a better salary elsewhere because if you are a women in tech and work hard and actually have skills there are many companies who also have shitty HR because it is the standard but atleast have cultures so much better the likliehood you need to go to HR is pretty nonexistent. Never...never go to HR. They are not there for you. They are not your friend.
• pmontra 6y ago
  This is no news. Other readings about this subject. The HR Secret Police? (2016) https://theartsmechanical.wordpress.com/2016/02/02/the-hr-secret-police/ https://theartsmechanical.wordpress.com/2016/02/02/the-hr-se... Corporate Police? Picnic Planners? Here’s What HR Really Does (2020) https://www.forbes.com/sites/servicenow/2020/09/18/corporate-police-picnic-planners-heres-what-hr-really-does/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/servicenow/2020/09/18/corporate... Why Underachievers Dominate Secret Police Organizations: Evidence from Autocratic Argentina (2019) https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ajps.12475 https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/ajps.12475
• gabereiser 6y ago
  >Also, if you push hard enough to "fix" the situation, guess what? YOU become the problem. Ugh, where was this advice when I needed it years ago. At a company that championed self-improvement, unless you suggested the company improve... queue made up reason to let you go. Doorknob bruise on the back.
• hn_asker 6y ago
  I think the relationships in a corporate environment aren't conducive to bringing out the best in people. If you work in one, the best you can hope for is for your team to be left alone and managed by earnest and diligent engineers that have earned the trust of PMs and POs.
• andreskytt 6y ago
  Do not confuse a particularly nasty organizational culture with how HR operates. The HR community tends to look sideways to such organizations while seeking to become (and succeeding) a strategic partner rather than a paper-pusher or a “mall cop”. There are also fundamental differences between how HR operates in US and the rest of the world. Please do not generalize.
• apple4ever 6y ago
  My problem with HR and company dealings with employees is everything is based on what every other company they've worked for has done, and not whether it's the right thing to do.
• ibudiallo 6y ago
  I've been talking with companies that are somewhat small but receptive to the idea of employee protection. Unions is often the subject but the damaged done to their reputation in the U.S. is irreversible. No highly paid professional wants to even talk about it. With unions, an employee being treated unfairly has a place to complain. A place that will actually listen and side with her instead of the corporation. But non-union employees often think that HR is the exact equivalent. Unfortunately they almost always learned the hard way (me included). If we want to make any dent in the system, HR is the place we want to reform. The idea that I have started proposing is of a public HR. An hr department that reports back to the state government. The government may not be perfect, but it has a better record when it comes to employee protection. Edit: previous discussion for more context https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25795851 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25795851
• ramraj07 6y ago
  This has always troubled me as well, and have thought if it's possible that (a potentially well meaning) company (maybe Google in the early days?) Could employ a counsel alongside HR who is explicitly and legally required to have the employee's interest at heart? So if you have genuine worries that HR might not help you, you can go to them?
• jacquesl 6y ago
  This is well put. I understand most of this now, but Talk about things I wish I understood in my early career. Along the lines of performance reviews, I've had HR try to negotiate demotions for my team members who were doing on target work. So when it comes to performance reviews, I always suspect that HR may have a metric on resource costs.
• paxys 6y ago
  Is this a reference to the ongoing GitHub saga?
• hbarka 6y ago
  What would Citizens United be under the serfdom analogy? Does it have a place in Capitalism?
• jdthedisciple 6y ago
  I think the whole "HR is not your friend" thing applies mainly to the US, bjt definitely much less to the EU. It's part of the price Americans pay for liberty ...
• boxmonster 6y ago
  You'll find out just how much HR is your friend when and if you ever get laid off.
• kome 6y ago
  It makes me sad that a lot of people see this article as "cynical but realistic" and it "hits home"... Many people, especially in STEAM need to be trained to critical thinking. That would avoid them to drink the corporate ideological kool aid before starting their career. Of course the HR is not your friend. Corporation thrives by exploiting you. Full stop.
• d--b 6y ago
  HR is neither your friend nor it is some evil secret police that’s here to root out the saboteurs in your company... HR is an agent between you and the company. It’s there to run the negotiations between what the company wants and what you want. If you don’t understand that, you won’t be able to use HR to your benefit. HR is there for you to ask stuff. You want a shower on your floor? Ask them. You want a course in React? Ask them. You can get plenty of things for you to work well if you know how to play HR.
  • Tuna-Fish 6y ago
    > HR is an agent between you and the company. Just to be more specific, HR is an agent of your company. Their job is to make every interaction resolve in favor of the company. Often, this is a good thing for you, because when things are running smoothly, a lot of the stuff that is good for the employees is good for the company. The important part to always remember is that when there is a clear conflict, a situation where something that is good for you is bad for the company and vice versa, their job is to make you lose. Their job is to be the negotiator that resolves the situation maximally in the favor of the company and against your interests. In those situations, it is important to remember that "your boss, hr and you" is not two parties and a neutral intermediary, it's two parties, one of which has two representatives. Bring either an union rep or a lawyer.
    • stjohnswarts 6y ago
      Exactly, they are legally bound to do what is best for the company while they only have to "sort of" give consideration for your situation.
      • itsdrewmiller 6y ago
        I don't think you mean "legally bound" here - there is no legal obligation for HR to operate with anyone's best interest in mind, corporate person or organic person.
  • lb1lf 6y ago
    > HR is an agent between you and the company. It’s there to run the negotiations between what the company wants and what you want. If you don’t understand that, you won’t be able to use HR to your benefit. -I like to think of HR as an abstraction layer between management and employees, whose basic function is to shield management from having to interact with the employees. Also, HR receives its pay from the company, not their coworkers - so HR is very much an agent of the company, not you. (Which is fair - after all, their loyalty is with whoever pays them, which is not unreasonable) That being said, there is good HR and bad HR out there - just don't think that HR is there for you; they're not.
• phibz 6y ago
  HR's primary job is to protect the company from the employee. I respect Rachel's honesty here but its delivered with a lot of negativity. I've tried to accept these ideas and protect myself as best as I can. Going in to work relationships with healthy boundaries will help avoid a lot of disappointment.
  • _nalply 6y ago
    > its delivered with a lot of negativity Sometimes truth hurts. People cope with pain differently. A good way is to be direct and sincere with yourself and use a pinch of sardonic humor when telling the story to a friend. To your not-a-friend colleagues maintain a respectful distance, try to learn and understand what they think and feel, then with this knowledge search a path which feels okayish to you. So looking at it this way I don't find the truth being delivered with a lot of negativity.
• rocqua 6y ago
  I really don't enjoy the tone here. The derision with which it speaks about managers, like they are either evil or incompetent, is unfair in my experience. (my) Managers are just people. They have a task, they do their best to get that task done. Sometimes they decisions that seem bad to me. Often that is because I misunderstand their goals. Sometimes, it is because I know something they don't, and something they couldn't verify if I told them. And other times, they just made a mistake, or weren't told the relevant information by me or others. Indeed, sometimes their goals are somewhat self serving. But often it just has to do with wider business goals than what I am working at. I am grateful for them keeping an eye on those. Leaving me to worry less about the biggest of pictures. That however, doesn't mean I should just bog down on the small picture of my work, and deem everything that seems bad in that context as stupid.
  • nicoburns 6y ago
    > But often it just has to do with wider business goals than what I am working at. I think the problem comes when you work at a business whose wider business goals are unethical, or simply don't include respecting the needs and rights of their workers. This definitely isn't everywhere, but from the stories I've heard this seems to be some companies. Totally agree that managers aren't a bad thing in general though.
  • kowlo 6y ago
    I enjoy the tone because it seems genuine. As with almost everything, I view it as their opinion, not fact. It might not apply to you or many others, but their experience likely explains their perspective.
    • rocqua 6y ago
      I came in to my current (first) job with this kind of cynicism. Had I held on to that I would be a lot worse off right now. I hope to prevent others from making that mistake. Especially if management is slightly worse than at my current job. It would be easy but wrong to write them of as incompetent based on articles like this. This would be quite costly for anyone making that mistake.
• carschno 6y ago
  I worked with great HR people who were trying to systematically identify factors leading to employee frustration, and try to eliminate them. Of course, their motivation still is the (long-term) benefit of the company because frustrated employees are going to leave sooner or later. However, their efforts mostly led to suggestions that involved structural changes to the company, and were rejected or neglected by management. As a result, the HR people became as frustrated as the other employees, and they left one by one. Eventually, the HR department developed more and more towards one that looked like the one described in the article. This looks like the "bad" HR pattern emerges inevitably, but given that HR depends on the company management, I would reduce it like this: toxic companies will have toxic HR departments. Maybe the article's metaphor holds in the sense that "nice" security guards also exist in environments where management wants them to be nice. edit: typo
• b0rsuk 6y ago
  Has anyone played the indie andventure game Yuppie Psycho? A delicious take on corpo horror. Their depiction of HR department is pretty accurate. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aUESdHCOIA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aUESdHCOIA It's short, a bit overpriced and the story loses its focus towards the end, but overall a very cool game.
• refurb 6y ago
  Not to be cynical, but nobody at your work is looking out for you, with the exception of people you’ve developed a relationship with that doesn’t revolve around work. Your manager? They will throw you under the bus if it comes to that. HR? Will throw you under the bus if it comes to that. That’s just the way it is. I’m not bitter about it, but despite all the “we’re a big family” talk, it’s a business. I think everyone would be better served if we were just honest about it.
• nix23 6y ago
  Just the name "Human Resource" says everything about a Business. Humans are NOT resources but Peoples, can we please change that disgusting name to something like personnel office.
• jhiggins777 6y ago
  Did anyone else read "HN is not your friend..." and think, "ooo, this is going to be juicy."
• nojvek 6y ago
  > Performance reviews are a joke because almost nobody knows how to measure anyone else's effectiveness. They are just a continuation of the same popularity contests you thought you left behind from middle school, high school, and maybe even your college/university days. This has a bit of truth. In my experience climbing up the ladder is so disconnected from actual reality. There’s quite a bit of a buddy buddy / quid pro quo system that goes on when it comes to promos. There are people who do the actual work and take it 99%, and others who stitch the last 1% and take credit for all of it. Our Industry loves rewarding for features over things that customers actually care about. I’ve seen many feature promos in my life. One year later we’d have to kill the whole feature because it’s not worth the maintenance cost. One of my managers believed folks who write python and JS are not real programmers, C and go programmers faced hard problems therefore they are more real. There was also the unconscious bias that women can’t lead projects so opportunities weren’t given to them. Over time women kept leaving. Over time really stellar frontend engineers kept on leaving. It also baffles me how much energy is spent on hiring people, vs mentoring and fostering them so they grow and are promoted.
  • guenthert 6y ago
    > It also baffles me how much energy is spent on hiring people, vs mentoring and fostering them so they grow and are promoted. I used to be baffled by that too (and frustrated when they hired someone from outside, when we had IMHO better candidates in-house). However the alternative leads to the Peter Principle, won't it (I've seen that too and the result was worse)?
    • thethought 6y ago
      Factor in nepotism and the alternative is even worse.
  • sershe 6y ago
    There's a concept of "visible productivity", where you do good work but also make it visible. I learned pretty early in my career that merely doing good work is not enough; it's not that someone else will take credit, it's that few people will notice, especially outside your immediate area. Features are much easier to make visible, but it's not universal... a long time ago my manager told me to shift the perspective on some crappy boring perf work I did by multiplying milliseconds saved by runs per day and converting CPU time into dollar cost in the datacenter ;) IIRC I literally put the dollar figure into my perf review. A semi-related point w.r.t. visibility/popularity, is that your team is much more likely to be continuously aware, and depend on, your work; whereas controlling for levels/etc. each person's opinion of you counts roughly the same, and in fact that of the people from other teams may matter more because working across teams is perceived as a sign of seniority. So, doing awesome job when you work with other teams is much more important as far as your "popularity" goes.
• rurban 6y ago
  I observed this only in the USA. Even worse then described. In Europe people and managers/HR mostly tend to be reasonable instead. Never had any such problems here.
• bambax 6y ago
  HR doesn't always win though; Github's head of HR "resigned" (or was resigned) this Saturday after having inappropriately fired an employee the week previous. It seems the employee has been reinstated. https://github.blog/2021-01-17-update-on-an-employee-matter/ https://github.blog/2021-01-17-update-on-an-employee-matter/
• deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
• beckler 6y ago
  > "One exception to this that I've found is when someone already has plans for getting rid of someone and just needs the "ammo". At that point, they will quickly become your "friend" in order to get all of the dirt on that person, and then once the deed is done, it'll be like you never existed to them." This one hits hard. I was just a developer at the time, but I had a co-founder get really chummy with me, and I eventually discovered it was for exactly this reason: to get "ammo" against the CTO to force him out. I got fired shortly after the whole situation played out.
  • me_me_me 6y ago
    I can sympathize, when I was young and naive I was also befriended by my manager who used our conversations about project and about one of my coworkers to get rid of him. He was a bit erratic but he was honest and good programmer. He must have been a 'handful' to a manager so he got rid of him. I realized what happened years after and to this day I feel shitty that I took part in it.
• cybert00th 6y ago
  Having recently come within a hairs breadth of losing my job due to HR overreach; I can confirm that, certainly in the current climate, Rachel is right.
• mrlonglong 6y ago
  Interestingly enough somewhere on HN is an article about GitHub's recent firing of a Jewish employee and the subsequent resignation of top HR manager. Coincidence?
• silexia 6y ago
  If your company works like this, get a new job. There are companies out there that don't work like this. Her company sounds like a nightmare. Fortune 500s are usually like this, avoid them. VC back companies are even worse. Buy a company that is profitable and run by the founder.
• baud147258 6y ago
  > if they have been sticking to in-person chats (in normal times, not now, obviously) or phone/video calls, good luck that's why I usually request a summary by email or send one myself, asking if anyone has anything to add. Even beyond creating a trail, it's also useful for me as I'll be using those notes as a TODO list.