Tips on Establishing & Maintaining a Positive Relationship with HR with Dr. Keri Ohlrich
Human Resources is often misunderstood and seen as a daunting department to approach. But HR can actually be a valuable partner in helping you succeed in your career. In this episode, we debunk HR myths and discover how to best interact with HR for professional success.
After this episode, you'll be able to...
Establish how and when to approach HR
Develop a positive relationship with HR
Make HR a part of your professional success
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About our guest:
With 20+ years on the front lines of the HR field, it’s safe to say that today's guest Dr. Keri Ohlrich is considered an expert. As the co-author of The Way of the HR Warrior, she continues her mission to share insights from these experiences with others whose passion is to be the best in the HR arena.
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Role of Human Resource
HR is often misunderstood and seen as a daunting department to approach, but HR can actually be a valuable partner in helping you succeed in your career.
People have in corporations, and it was in HR and it was at a giant HR, I mean, they had 300 HR people. I thought that was normal. And then I realized, that's not normal at all. So, I learned and I saw this impact that you could have, and so it really spoke to me then on this individual level where you could help people and coach them and help them with a very personal thing sometimes.
You see people get promoted, you see there are beautiful things that happen, and then on a systemic level, you get to institute programs that can help the entire organization.
And the psychological part, the person who wants to make a difference in the world, you can very much do that by being in HR.
Because if you create and help to create these beautiful environments at work, people are happier.
You have more space to do more profound things, so it's just amazing to be in HR and make that impact.
The Critical Role of Human Resources in Organizations
HR holds a very special place in my heart because the impact that you make, creates a ripple effect.
As you're talking about getting the right people in the right roles and providing programs that help them be the best version of their selves professionally and personally, you hold to a special place in a lot of people's lives and how it's influenced and changed and it, it really does.
It's a very special role within an organization.
Dark Side of Human Resources
With that amount of specialness, there's the flip side and the dark side. So as much as I can make an impact and help people and facilitate getting a job and getting a promotion, there's the downside of that where people get terminated, people don't get the job. People have been told that they're going to lose their job because they have done something.
HR is very much first row. So there's this amazing experience, but then there's also this dark side.
We facilitate it, but it doesn't matter to an employee.
They see my face, they don't see someone else's face sometimes. So that's a negative part. And the profession isn't really, it's a helping profession.
So the same thing we see with teachers and nurses sometimes where we don't get the respect of the profession they need.
So you have that going for it.
And then I guarantee you have run into some not-so-great HR folks. They are out there. I'm not saying that the entire profession, just like any profession, you have really amazing people and then you don't have the best people.
The problem is when you run into that not-so-good HR person, you tell all your friends because it was usually a very personal thing for you.
Either they never got back to me and I didn't get a benefit, or they have this stupid program and they keep asking me my opinion.
The misconception that we control things like “HR fired me, or HR hires me.”
That is extremely rare. Maybe in 1% of the case where the business leader just doesn't wanna do it and says, please, you make the decision. But usually, we are trying, we're facilitating, we're coaching, and sometimes we totally disagree with the business. But it's the business leader's job and decision, and so we have to support it.
So I think people really think that we have this power that we do not have. That's probably the biggest misconception.
Integrating Human Resources in Decision-Making
We had gone through downsizing and HR was not part of that decision. The decision was made by our VP of sales. By the board members, the stakeholders, and the stockholders. Those were the people that were making the decision. It was a financial decision on what they needed to do to be able to generate more revenue within the business to be able to sustain the business or to take the business to the next level in the future.
But the HR person was not part of the decision-making process. They were part of the decision-making process when it came to how are we going to communicate this. To the individuals that are being let go, how are, what resources are we gonna be able to provide them when they've been laid off when they have been fired in any circumstance?
And sometimes the best solution is for you to talk directly to the person. And that this is where an HR person can, can role-play it with you. They can give you some prompting questions. They can go through the scenarios.
And sometimes all you need is to, as I like to say it, in such a professional way, just vomit it out.
Sometimes it's a pretty bad situation, and so you need a third party to kind of help you navigate that.
Hire Right People
It's like in construction if you don't pay a lot for a good foundation or you're like we can hurry up and put the scaffolding up real super quick, I'm sure it'll be fine. And then there'll be lots of consequences later. That's what happens when you don't hire the right people. And so that's when the managers get into a lot of problems is not having the right teammates.
And again, the culture fits with your team and this is where the multiple interviews and getting other people's opinions, and being really clear about what you want as well. And what fits. I'll ask questions about working like hours of work and how you kind of integrate your work life, because that's important and we going to figure that out.
That's the overall message of this you need to take time as a people manager and have your HR person help you manage some of that time, give you some good ideas so you can do your job more efficiently and you don't have to struggle so much because that takes time too when you're struggling by yourself.
Curiosity About What A Partnership With HR Could Potentially Look Like
How can managers partner with HR? hen we take the time to be curious, what other people's roles are, what their responsibilities are, what hats they wear, what are they doing that we don't always see?
We have a greater appreciation. We value them more and we are able to uncover areas that we can collaborate on together.
There are a lot of opportunities to partner with HR. It just is us taking the time to be curious about what that partnership looks like.
Give HR some time, I bet you you'll receive an ROI for the manager tenfold because you have a good relationship and then you have this good partner, thought partner you can talk to, and life might just be a little bit easier for you as a people manager.
