Welcome to Discuss HR, the HR blog written by Human Resources UK.
In the next post in our guest blogger series I am delighted to welcome Gemma Reucroft, who is an experienced HR professional and seasoned blogger. (Ed Scrivener)
What your policies and procedures say about you
A recent EAT case involving a redundancy selection process has been stuck in my mind lately. The company in question found themselves on the receiving end of a rebuke by way of the judgement. The judge commented that the company had devised a process and then followed it with such 'blind faith' that they had lost touch with common sense.
A recent Discuss HR blog by Annabel Kaye touched on similar theme in her comments on redundancy processes; how companies can forget the individual and instead become focused on box ticking and form filling. A few months ago I was re-writing a HR policy and asked for feedback from others on my draft. I wish I hadn't bothered. I was asked to try and cover every eventuality, add clause after detailed clause. If I'd done as I had been asked it would have been document longer than a Tolkien novel.
Why do we fall into these traps? There are two interlinked reasons in my opinion. The first is fear of getting it wrong, and landing in the ET. I don't deny that dealing with an ET claim and can be time consuming and costly, especially for small organisations. But this can lead to exactly that box ticking approach that Annabel referred to. Policies and processes are designed to reduce every possible risk, rather than focusing on what is the right way to treat people, the right way of doing something. Social Media policies are a good example of this. I'm sure you will have seen the articles about the risk of employees doing something they shouldn't on Facebook, chance of reputational damage, among other things. This has led lots of organisations to clamp down on social media, and have lengthy policies which have lost sight of the fantastic benefits of social media.
The second reason is that organisations don't always train managers, and indeed sometimes HR teams sufficiently, to deal with the difficult people stuff. We provide leadership development training, guidance on how to do the annual performance review, coach or provide feedback. However, unless it's the kind of organisation where redundancy, grievance or dismissal is routine, some managers may only find themselves going through these processes very infrequently. They then rely on following a checklist or policy to the letter.
The same can apply to HR people too. As a HR professional, how did you learn how to do the challenging ER stuff? In my CIPD studies I recall one, totally unrealistic, role play on hearing a grievance. The rest I learned on the job. Did I do the first ones well? Probably not.
These factors can lead us to develop complex and lengthy policies and procedures.
It's well known that HR can have an image problem. We have all seen the discussions about how we prove we add value, as if we should have to. Slavish devotion to complicated policies and processes does not help. Your policies and processes say something about your organisation generally, but also your attitude to people. I know plenty of organisations that send key policies to new starters before they join. Have you ever stepped back, looked at them afresh, and thought what tone they set, especially at the early and delicate stage in building the psychological contract?
If your policies are long, overly prescriptive or bureaucratic, then what does that say about your organisation, your culture? If you received a Social Media Policy in the post with a long list of things you can and can't do, and threats of action 'up to and including dismissal', it hardly provides a warm welcome.
I have a rule when it comes to HR processes. They need to meet a criteria before I will do them. They have to be legally necessary, add value, or somebody needs to do something with the output. They also need to be as straightforward as possible. As for policies, I try and make them principle led. I once managed to get a social media policy down to six bullet points, which largely amounted to telling people not to be stupid. Some people still were, and you then deal with that accordingly. I also scratch my head when employers ask employees to sign policies to say that they have read them. Why? So if there is an ET you can wave a piece of paper as 'proof' you have done your bit to enforce the rules? It doesn't mean that they were read, understood or listened to, which is what really matters.
So my advice at the conclusion of this blog? Treat people like adults. Treat them like people. And strip it back.
About the author:
If you’re thinking of following anyone on Twitter, you couldn’t go far wrong by following Gemma, who puts out a series of informative tweets. Her blog is worth reading too! (Ed)
*****
Discuss HR is the HR blog written by members of Human Resources UK, the 10,000 member strong LinkedIn group dedicated to the HR professionals in the UK. Discuss HR is published twice weekly and looks to take an insightful, informative and sometimes irreverent view on the world of HR – all with the purpose of generating a discussion.
*****
If you would like to be a guest writer for Discuss HR, you can find more information here. Our next guest writer week is the week commencing 26th August.
No comments:
Post a Comment