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How to Know If Something is Wrong with HR: Is Your Human Resources Department Overwhelmed?
The Human Resources department is instrumental in employee management, so if something is wrong with the HR department, rest assured that everyone will feel the effects directly or indirectly. The problem is, how do you know that something is wrong with the HR department to begin with? Ideally, they should be reporting it to you, but in the real world, things are not always that simple, while in others, the department may not even be completely aware of the fact that there is something wrong!
The good news is that certain telltale signs are a dead giveaway, and as a decision maker in the company, if you do notice them, it’s time to act accordingly and take action to remedy the situation.
Demeanor: A Negative Attitude in HR Could be a Sign of Being Overwhelmed
When people management is part of the job description, HR staff cannot afford to have a negative mindset or attitude. Given that HR is the place where people complain, you may not even hear about the problem until you look closely enough and ask around.
Talk to your employees from the other departments first and then talk to the HR department directly. Ask them if they are indeed feeling overwhelmed. Provided that they agree and/or you feel that they have enough reason to feel overworked, it’s time to contact an experienced human resource executive staffing agency, so that the workload vs. work capacity gap is filled in the exact way it needs to be.
Is It Time to Think about Shuffling the Pecking Order?
The intelligent addition of human resource executives can, in most situations, solve most problems, but in others, special attention might be needed elsewhere. For example, it isn’t entirely uncommon for an organization to have an incompetent HR head, but no one will come up to say anything against them because they are afraid of getting penalized.
Also, it is neither impractical, nor uncommon, for employees to assume that all management heads and higher ups favor each other over them. That’s a volatile and highly undesirable situation, which divides the workforce, and ironically enough, one of the main jobs of the HR department is to keep this from happening, rather than causing it!
How Should You Address Such a Situation?
Individual and private one-on-one meetings with certain employees, and even with HR department employees, may reveal undeclared truths about what’s really going on. Given that an incompetent or otherwise unsuitable HR head is not good for the company’s profits, employee management, overall performance and reputation, it might be time to think about replacements if there’s enough cause to justify doing so.
A closer look is, more often than not, all it takes to detect the problem, but taking action may take a while longer. It’s always better to take longer than make a rash decision and regret it later, especially since these are almost always tricky situations to handle.
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