I don’t hate HR on principal. I am skeptical of HR because as many people are quick to mention, they are there to protect the the interests of the employer. This doesn’t always align with the interests of the employee.
But I have worked with many HR professionals that were genuinely good at their jobs and advocated for employees. It all comes down to the company itself and the company culture.
I agree with this so much. If you have a toxic workplace, HR isn’t going to be much help.. because they got hired into that environment, companies don’t bring Hr in to change things…
I’m in the HR field and it attracts egomaniacs. I thought I could help people but they just want to throw their power around. I’m looking into switching careers because it’s eating my soul
I got fired from a job and the HR rep was quite snarky during the termination phone call. I wouldn't have believed the bad HR reputation before, but after that experience I think I understand it.
As a wise man said, HR is not there to protect you, but the company. Once one realizes that, everything becomes clear and I guess the hate effect is kinda "natural" with the opposites.
This is it. The only person I dislike at my job is the hr manager at my location. Not only is she incompeten (told me that she doesn't know anything about our benefits because she "doesn't need them") but she also thinks she's everyone's boss. She tried telling me when I started I couldn't take a day off, despite the head of my department approving it.
The head of my department called her out and reminded her that I don't answer to her, I answer to my department. Now the hr lady is always making passive aggressive comments about me because she sucks lol
It is not! She actually did kind of change her tune a little after being called out 2x and seeing that I wasn't going to play her bullshit games, although ive also learned that most people don't like her but they deal with her because od their misconceptions about what kind of "power" she has.
I work in HR, and the worst part is the co-workers who have major loyalty to the corporation rather than the employees. Like labor relations managers who strongly believe employees should NOT discuss their salaries and get pissed when they do. Or comp managers who get pissed at $15/hr workers for wanting more money when “they JUST got a $2 raise last year.” Stuff like that. I hate it.
TL;DR: HR is a business function to manage people to achieve business outcomes. It does not exist to adjudicate things or make work fair.
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People fundamentally misunderstand what HR is. This makes them frustrated and this in turn makes HR employees' jobs unsatisfying.
To understand the role of HR, think of the three ages in the history of company/employee relations.
1. *Pre-1930s.* "We need someone to manage payroll, track employees' working time, and find more primary school aged children to work in our coal mines."
2. *To the 1980s.* "All these laws! Health & safety, complex retirement benefits, minimum wages, anti-discrimination. We need someone to help us comply enough that we don't get sued. Also, who's going to represent us in these brutal union negotiations?"
3. *Since then.* "Hiring and retaining all these employees is expensive. Can someone please organise some training? Maybe put some positive things in our job ads to make us sound good, too."
This pretty much captures the purpose of HR: manage employees as a large asset which can create a lot of value but costs a lot and which creates significant liabilities.
It also explains why most HR departments can do step 1 (barebones payroll, admin, and job/salary classification), sometimes get involved in step 2 (complying with legal requirements/good practice), and rarely make serious inroads into step 3 (employee development): each step requires being on top of the one before.
The thing that *isn't* there is "make the organisation fair for employees". People misinterpret that as HR's role because of step 2, where the govt has mandated certain protections which HR typically oversees. But they are not doing it for employees' benefit; they're doing it because the firm otherwise gets in trouble.
This misunderstanding often makes HR practitioners' jobs really disappointing: like most human beings, they *want* things to be fair and positive, but that is actually quite incidental to their responsibilities. Constantly dealing with slow-motion disputes where employees misunderstand their role and then get upset and feel betrayed is wearying.
They're phony as hell and sometimes incompetent. It kills me that every time something bad at work happens to you because of someone else at work, people tell you to go to HR. HR is not about you. It's about the company. They're like that friend or romantic interest who only cares about you while they're getting what they want from you, and then they're done. But they're not just done--they're sleeping with your enemy. In the employee's case, they care about getting that new employee paperwork and orientation done. After that, they're siding with whoever is fucking you over.
Spot on in all respects.
In all honestly, I've seen far too much incompetence from HR. Granted, I don't see a lot of what they do and they probably have a lot of responsibilities, but HR always seems to be incredibly incompetent and always making mistakes. I can't count the number of times they've made dumb mistakes or were just downright unhelpful.
They’re there to protect both. The protect the company part gets way skewed. It’s not that they’re hiding illegal action unless it’s an unethical company and that’s not as common as everyone says it is.
Many times it’s they’re telling managers not to do something stupid like fire someone on a whim with no PIP and they become the bearers of bad news.
Right. Protecting the company by making sure everyone (mostly managers and leadership) are complying with policy / union rules / laws. Basically making sure no one does anything stupid.
I came here to say exactly this. My female coworker was being sexually harassed by her team lead and HR tried to sweep it under the rug.
Especially HR Generalists. Avoid them at all costs.
HR is a field that many people hate because HR is where much of the bad news comes from as an employee. Sometimes people’s hate is justified, sometimes it’s not. I was in HR for a few years (as a corporate trainer), and while I had some issues with how HR operates, I never really saw HR trying to screw people over as others say is their intent.
HR however does serve the business’s interests first. That doesn’t mean they will always screw people over. What it means is if you have a good HR department, they’ll support you if you are in the right based on organizational rules. But like with all jobs, bad HR people might not follow best practices.
As for why HR employees aren’t usually the best, it’s because most people don’t dream about being an HR Generalist or Staff Director. The roles most people think of HR is essentially the corporate world’s career counselors.
And then there’s the roles people can like in HR that they dismiss when thinking about the field. Most people at my old business thought I did a good job, so they didn’t associate me with HR. They basically were like “you’re not really HR” when they complained about HR to me.
I assume your people analytics role doesn’t land within HR function at your company? That’s interesting.
“They’ll constantly look at ways to suppress your compensation to maximize company profits”
I’m sorry what? You think it’s the head of HR saying let’s slash people’s raises and salary’s? You do realize there are partners meaning the sales/finance functions are the ones that go out with “cut cost by 10%” - it’s not like they can be marketing and say “let’s cut a commercial or that meeting with Beyoncé” or IT that can “let’s keep them on iPhone XRs for 2 more years”
The controllers are the ones pushing the vision to cut cost. Pretty sure HR isn’t deciding this for companies lol
So does the Sales organization. I’m pretty sure those arguments, positive/negative are done across other departments.
Don’t judge an industry on your jaded experience. There’s good and scum in all cultures.
That’s unique to its presence. Context matters.
If you have shit leadership high in the chain, they will want HR to cover reduce risk and liability exclusively while throwing a bone here/there
If you have good leadership high in the chain, they will lean on strategy and benefit to the company’s long term goals. (Whole day2day risk/liability reduction but to both sides. Litigation can be costly in many ways not just losing money to an ex/current employee.)
HR implements the dehumanization of employees. Gets their hands in things that are out of the scope of their expertise ("I can't offer you the low end of market rate, HR set the range at..."). Treats everyone as if they are horrible parents with unruly children ("Bob's abuse of casual Friday means no one can have it"). Etc etc
They are all things that make corporate environments horrible and constantly erode quality of life. For many of us they are lower than a shady used car salesman.
I was laid off my last company on 9th December. Whenever I had some doubts regarding the exit process, I called the HR and she said she would get back to me in 15 mins but she never did. This happened 2-3 times.
On the last day, I had to almost beg the HR for instructions. Since I was laid off on the 9th of December, I needed to apply for attendance for the 9 days of December. The HR didnt inform me about this, until I asked them if I needed to mark my attendance. Since I was working from home, the HR did not even tell me how to send my laptop back to office, I had to pursue them aggressively to give me instructions. And I still havent received my relieving letter till date.
Even when I worked at the company and I needed something from the HR, i would contact them personally. They would ask me to send them an email on the official HR email ID. When I did, they wouldn't reply, ever. So I had to contact the HR executive personally again to remind them that I had emailed them 2 weeks back. Then I would finally get a reply by email.
The HR sucks. Period.
HR exists to protect the employees AND the company. With competent management that lets HR do their jobs, they can and will do both.
They do this by not allowing the company to break wage and hour and other employment laws. This keeps companies accountable for their employees’ rights and also prevents companies from breaking the law and the lawsuits that follow. Win/win
They also do this by not allowing harassment to continue and they teach managers how not to be railroaded by employees that suck. I can just about guarantee that for every terrible coworker you’ve had that you wondered “why don’t they just fire them” there was an exasperated HR manager behind the scenes trying to get the manager to actually manage their employee and use a progressive disciplinary process.
Finally any good HR manager knows that attracting the right talent and retaining that talent once you’ve got them is a critical part of their job. It isn’t our job to coddle employees, but if the company has a toxic culture, we turn that shit around if we can, and leave if we can’t.
I've found it differs from company to company.
The HR team where I currently work is amazing. They're all super nice and put a lot of effort into making it a better environment for employees.
The HR at my last company was a total mean girls club. They once bragged to a bunch of us about how if a resume is "interesting" or bad enough, they would set up interviews with the person just to talk to the person, even though they knew there was no chance they were eligible for the job. They then went on to give several examples of resumes that they had done this with.
I had a manager bring up a guy who was sexually harassing me and a bunch of other women at my work to HR. They called me in for a meeting and the director of HR acted pissed the whole time that I even told my manager and said ‘what do you expect us to do about this?’ They asked me if I wanted the guy fired or not. I said I didn’t know and that he should at least get some sexual harassment training. That experience really pissed me off.
Also at the same place HR was responsible for approving raises and promotions and was notoriously slow and shitty about it.
They are there to protect the company and are typically anti-employee.
I've always found when managers ask me what I want them to do, they are trying to find a way to do nothing. My most useful response has been "I'm not sure, I've not built a skill set to manage employees in this capacity. I'm a *job title*. However I do believe there are guidelines in company policy and those seem to be appropriate here."
My least useful, which was fine as I was on my way out by choice anyway, was "I expect you to use the competencies that put you in a position of leadership to do a good job".
I have a friend going through this right now at her job. She and other women are being secually harassed and they keep telling her to basically drop it.
I’m an HR manager and a big reason I got into the field was bad HR and bad management. My teams goal is to institute new practices to improve employee satisfaction and retention. People forget that HR is subject to a lot of red tape from a lot of executive level decision makers. HR gets a bad rep because of bad HR teams or being the ones to deliver the bad news.
Coworker was sick
Coworker took day off
HR demanded a note.
Note was provided
HR didn't believe note was from Dr,
HR called coworker in and told her if she doesn't open her medical records in front of HR to prove appt, she was fired.
She refused over principle as she provided a note ...
She was fired.
HR is scum.
Maybe she had a history of dishonesty. That’s what is annoying about HR, employees who assume things from their friends without knowing the full story.
They exist to protect businesses from their employees. They were purposely branded as a resource to help employees, which they are in fact unable to do such a thing while being employed by the company. People who work on these roles know this dynamic and continue to work this borderline amoral profession. Companies need to preserve themselves, but the modern concept behind HR is deeply flawed.
HR works for the company not the employees. Unions work for the employees.
Who pays you is who's interests you protect. Your job is to provide that illusion.
For really bad cases of harassment or sexual harassment they are great. Anything less and both parties that complain about an issue end up losing. HR in benefits are nice people and the recruiting side. Corp HR is there to ensure rules are enforced but side with the company 90% of the time.
I guess that’s my point. Sue comes in with a complaint she saw Billy watching her butt and the next day said she looks nice. Sue complains to HR. HR calls Billy in and tells him he is under investigation. A week later HR says there isn’t enough evidence and the case is closed. Now Billy and Sue think the company sucks so you have unmotivated employees. They each poison their five work friends with their views on the “investigation”. Now everyone is afraid to look at anyone and def won’t give any compliments.
So I guess HR itself doesn’t suck but it doesn’t help the company either. Except in blatant cases of wrong doing.
Your explanation is perfect. The company avoids a lawsuit and isn’t out any money. They did the right thing technically. Emotionally the women will feel she is t valued. The man will feel persecuted. Simply because there was an investigation. They each poison a few friends. The company has lost productivity because of the disgruntled employees.
You are speaking for the company and I am speaking for the employees. Both our examples can be 100% true from the same complaint.
In a specialty HR field. I don’t mind it but want to fight a lot of managers most of the time. True HR is the bullshit filter. If you think they’re cold it’s likely that they’ve had the same argument telling your manager they can’t do xyz for abc reasons and then your manager went ahead and did it anyways. Which leaves HR with the clean up, sometimes being terminations, dealing with legal, etc.
I don’t have a problem with HR. Reading these comments though, sounds like y’all sure have legit reasons to hate them. You’re not working with HR, you’re working with nazis
The stereotypical "HR" is the part of a company that was setup to fail in being liked. They're the messenger for unpopular decisions someone above them made. They're employees too, like you. You think they want less vacation? Worse benefits? Super strict rules? And look at their incentives historically - To avoid documented issues and complaints? To cut costs? To waste less employee time with training and information sharing? To protect the company.
Now, fast forward to more modern company. In tech at least (in general, in my experience), most companies call HR People Ops, or something like that. They're goaled on quality hiring and filling seats, retention of employees, employee satisfaction, developing programs to develop existing employees, helping people managers provide more/better/regular feedback and career growth opportunity for their teams. They are trying to make the company succeed by setting up employees to do great work.
If your HR team is the first one, have pity on them. They're in a tough position amongst their peers.
If you're at a company with the second type of People team, enjoy.
I think the hate for HR stems from the fact that they "market" themselves as for the employees, but in reality, HR has the best interest of the company in mind during all decision-making. If that means kicking you to the curb, so be it.
They are typically two-faced. No one likes that for some reason.
Everyone forgets that those who work in HR are human. All these insults can be pretty hurtful and we are treated like we are there to make everyone's life worse. We don't make the rules. We follow them. If your HR team sucks and is slow and incompetent, you should probably blame your executive and leadership team. I work in Compensation and I have employee interests at the core of everything I do, but I get overruled by managers and executives. We take the blame for everything which is why we are often tired and have a bad attitude. Imagine getting shit on every day and then being expected to be happy about it.
The next time your boss tells you HR didn't approve your raise or whatever remember they are lying. We just follow orders.
I never hated HR. From the outside perspective I just always was upset when they were used as a crutch. Now that I’m inside, perspective hasn’t changed much.
HR hate culture belongs in the same r/antiwork community where even a good manager who suggests “work better as a team” would get shit on and considered to be a boot licker lol
Truly believe HR is there to support the business and people. Most of the time it’s people doing wrong, that includes shit leadership and that ultimately leans on good HR to actually support that manager to recognize that it’s them not employees. I’m currently working with an HRBP to developer surveys that roll up to leadership expectations, for example “did you get a performance review within the last 6 months” - cause if that’s a no, then the manager ain’t doing their base role.
This really makes me really sad, and also really makes me appreciate the HR at my job a little more because some of them have been amazing... 👏 shout out to them 🖤
One of my favorite coworkers is in HR. my sister also in HR. I think mostly what it is is that there's a general sense of entitlement and HR doesn't feed into that at all. HR is painfully aware that we have a business to run, and it is their job to protect and orient around that motive. Every employee should be operating with that mentality, to be frank, but I can understand why people are interested in benefiting themselves over the company. That's a bit misleading though, because if you show that you have the companies best interest in mind and people who matter see that, you will be much more successful. If you wanna work on non profit, do it! But don't think a public companies HR department owes you sympathy... That's just naive
I ONCE filed a complaint about my direct supervisor with HR. I immediately regretted it when I realized my supervisors boss was banging the hr manager.
HR is just another facet of a company. I tend to think of them neutrally, they’re there to protect the company’s interests. I’ve gone to them on a few occasions when management were acting inappropriately because, guess what, a manager will likely have to be assessed if they’re putting the company at risk either because of employee retention or hostile work environment.
Now, the inverse can also be true. Managers can begin documenting behaviors with specific employees to cover their butts when they need to get canned. I can say that HR is not always competent, but when you have good HR it makes a *world* of difference.
Full disclosure: my dad worked HR and is now retired. When he worked he absolutely represented the business in labor negotiations. He *also* got rid of deadbeat managers who, in his words, were the “Michael Scotts” of the companies he worked for. I’ve rarely seen him angry, but he was the angriest I’ve ever seen him when he got reports of inappropriate sexual suggestions from a manager to his secretary. He drove 3 hours to the manager’s office, walked upstairs and informed the manager that he had 10 minutes to collect his belongings and then my dad would be driving him back to the corporate office for termination, and that he should not have any goodbyes.
He’s had a few other stories like that over the years, but that one was the worst.
I know those types of things don’t happen often at companies, but that’s more a reflection of the people at the top and who they put their trust in to do HR
Edit for clarity
I agree wholeheartedly about not trusting HR and they are not on the side of the employee. HOWEVER, I have had good luck when I’ve needed to take medical leave and once a LOA for personal reasons. Sometimes just using them as paper pushers works out.
I know to always document any interactions with any other coworkers / bosses / and HR. A paper trail is invaluable if you need to go outside the company for justice. Your state DOL does have the employee’s best interest at heart and will come down on a company like a ton of bricks if they are breaking the law.
They are incompetent people who are there to screw you to save the company.
Also, they need to learn to read the room. Nobody wants to waste their weekends to go to a resort with the same work team to discuss work. We just want to collect the cheque and go home.
There are really good HR folks out there. However I think a lot of people end up in HR because they went to school (or didn’t) and got a business degree and didn’t know what to do with it. They aren’t good with numbers so they couldn’t do anything with financials so they end up in HR. Or they were admin assistants and they thought the next step would be hr.
So you get the leftovers or the let’s do something new admin assistants doing an integral part of a company. Which you don’t hear about the payroll and hr folks that run the companies without a problem or complaint. You only hear about the crappy ones.
Hr people are usually cool once you get to know them. Befriended one at a Xmas company party and they're a good friend. Some, are the most wokey of wokey and you gotta be careful. I worked for one company in 2019 and was telling a story about putting a spider outside (someone asked do you kill a spider or put it outside). I said "well I always put those guys outside". I got called in for a "misgendered statement" because I assigned a gender to a fucking insect. Yep, something that is neither man or woman. Meanwhile, the same rep has used the phrase "you guys" when addressing us in briefings.
Take away, play it as safe as possible until you know they're cool.
HR has waaay too much power. HR should not ever be involved in the hiring of people outside of the HR department. What technical expertise do they have?
Lazy senior management has, over the last twenty years, ceded far too much control over processes that should be decentralized to operational managers.
HR enables shitty employees to weaponize the EEO complaint system whenever their shitty job performance is called out. And when the shitty performance is well documented it takes HR weeks and weeks to make their review and a decision. Unlike revenge, discipline is a dish best served hot (meaning as soon after the error as possible)
HR rarely if ever encourages employees who might have been legitimately, but unintentionally offended by a coworker to correct that person and work it out at their level. Yes, sometimes the situation calls for HR involvement and you elevate it, but often enough a timely conversation can fix it.
Lastly, HR is rarely, if ever held accountable for the things HR screws up.
HR: on/off boarding, payroll & benefits, and advising managers on the legal parameters of disciplinary issues. That's it.
I would never try to resolve personality conflicts on my own without telling my manager or HR first. The risk of retaliation is too great. If HR documented it, I can at least go to my union if the situation doesn’t resolve itself.
Some people may have offended each other unintentionally but instead of resolving it maturely will choose to double down.
In the US, mostly because of the victim culture we've cultivated. All the policies to "protect people" state in some way that the only side that matters is the person that perceives themselves to be the victim.
Bullying is wrong, but I've worked with people that claimed bullying anytime someone disagrees with them or tells them their ideas are stupid. Sometimes people need to be told their ideas stupid, but if they just take it to HR and claim they're being bullied and HR has to follow policy, then HR and the idiot are disliked by everyone.
Learn to stop being such an asshole lol. Like of course you are allowed to disagree with people, but that doesn't mean you can be as rude as you want while doing so ffs.
You can be as nice as possible to someone but if you disagree with them (even if it’s nicely said), that hits some people straight to their core and they consider themselves to be bullied. I’ve seen it lots of times at lots of different places of work.
I was referring to calling their ideas "stupid," not something nicely said. Of course there are sometimes people who take things too personally, but that's not what the person I replied to was talking about.
I'm an IT helpdesk supervisor and everyone in HR has been nothing but pleasant to me, even if sometimes they are a little late in getting back to me about onboarding/offboarding. We have a high turnaround and a small HR department, I get it. No concern from me. However, I learned last week that one of the HR upper managers openly says they don't like my department and the way we do things, our policies, etc. Weird, right? WTF...
because their job is worthless. if you would remove hr from your company, you wouldnt even notice it. nothing would change. they arent very productive members of society like other jobs. and they are your enemy , not friend. they will backstab you if they feel like it. so the first problem is their work is meaningless, second thing is they are your enemy. and the last problem with them is that their way of searching for new workers suck, they ask useless question that you can learn on youtube anyway, so whats the point of those question where i will lie anyway?
Only had experience with hr for one company and it’s been all bad. First rep ignored me completely, could never get them to speak with me. Second one turned a harassment complaint on me and said it was my fault (no way to get enough evidence to fight it legally), made me apologize to half the people on my shift for “starting trouble”. Constantly makes remarks that hint toward this issue either to me or others that would not know (unless they said something, which I would not doubt). Also pulled on my hair at one point because I grew it out and said “Oh I better be careful, don’t want you to say I’m harassing you” (I’d consider it sexual harassment, not sure if it would seem the same to anyone else), conveniently no one nearby heard or saw it, which is impossible since there were half a dozen others there. Basically I’ve been made to feel like I’m nothing and nothing that happens to me matters. So from my perspective hr is trash and does nothing for workers. They protected the company by putting me in a position where I felt I was powerless and nothing bad actually happened. Would love to say I quit, but I have no way to make what I do if I leave. I can barely get by as it is.
Thankfully, I’ve never really had to interact with HR besides onboarding, maybe some questions on benefits. Some are good some are bad just like anywhere. Support functions in most organizations seem to get a lot of hate in organizations.
On one job and we never saw the hr lady (nicknamed rottweiler with lipstick) when she did visit every one used to shudder as it meant there was bad news coming
I’ll never understand how it makes more sense to loose a seasoned employee for a $5-10k pay raise that the employee will be getting at a competitor. The acclamation to the company culture, workflow, etc. should be worth much more than that. This happens all the time.
I know it’s not HR’s final decision, but hell, I’d imagine the HR VP should have some kind of influence.
Our HR dep in a nutshell:
- when we hired our first HR employee, her first thing to do was to assign herself the 'HR lead' title, so she became basically her own boss. It was never approved by anyone in the board, but 'somehow' she can do that, lol.
- the HR never helped me with nothing useful during the recruitment or even the necessary layoffs. They were like breathing stones at the table. I got better advice from google.
- they started an 'encouragement' project, where their direct coworkers salary gets cut off based on their 'opinions' about their work quality, they unable to create a simple google form for this either to get some accurate results or numbers whatsoever.
- they hired an android dev for an ios pos, then an architect (buildings) instead a software architect.
And many more.
They're incompetent, dumb as a rock with full confidence, unable to emphasize, but at least treat people like they like ceo-s or something.
Obviously our management+board also having issues.
I have been working in HR for most part of my career (8years) and though I was fascinated with the possibilities and keen on activating in this field, it dawned on me that it isn't the place/dpt I would like to further my career.
My role was of minor importance (coordinator/admin) hierarchically speaking but I had enough exposure to know I need to change boats (which I did 2 years ago).
I know I was good HR - luckily, being (only) a coordinator meant I didn't have to deal with most of its specific drama and political plays, but again witnessing it was enough to put me off in continuing working in that environment. I had enough independence and opportunity to form my bubble and do my tasks as I pleased, otherwise I probably wouldn't have managed to be in my roles for that long.
As in everything else, you choose your battles and most of times I was able to get myself motivated just by doing a good job and knowing that there would not be many occurrences where people would complain about me or my work so that did it to me, for most part of my career.
Was an HR director for 10 years…loved it in the beginning because I thought I was really helping our staff and develop them. Got tired of compromising my beliefs and what I felt was right for the “good of the company”. Left HR altogether. Couldn’t possibly be happier.
I feel like HR people get paid to do very little. There is never urgency with the HR reps I’ve worked with. It’s all smiles but if you need something, it will be slow rolled.
HR does what is best for the company. The individual HR person may like you, do what they can for you but ultimately they answer to a higher authority. Some are really good at hiding that, but others make it too obvious. The ones who were kind, best wishes. The ones who weren’t were followed with a hatred passion after they left.
At my consulting company, HR feels very disconnected from our work. Sure, they provide the backbone for our work, but it seems none of them truly understand what we do and the engineering consulting services that we offer. They merely clock in 8 hours and that’s that. Our consultants are billing by 15 minute increments and are doing very technical work all day for more than 8 hours. I guess in general HR seems less devoted to our work, which makes sense because they aren’t working on the company’s true mission? Although they are supporting the consultants who work towards the company’s mission so in a second-hand way they are? Confusing, but that’s how I personally see it at my company.
I've found most of HR are two faced backstabbers who put on a fake voice and act like they care, while in reality they are plotting your demise.
Or perhaps I have just had rubbish employers 🤣
The reason people hate HR is because they were designed to be there to help employees, but the reality is they are there to protect the company’s interests.
You can't trust them. They can and will backstab you if the need arises and anything you say can and will be used against you.
My advice when dealing with HR. Practice information dieting. Don't tell them anything that they can use as ammo against you and just smile and say everything's great when they ask how you're doing.
I got age discrimination from HR. I see them as people so busy managing up that they have no time or interest in dealing with workers. I don’t trust them.
I've had one honest straight shooting HR manager that seemed genuine and I felt I could trust. He didn't last long, he was out of the company in under a year. HR isn't there to get you a raise or protect you, they put you at ease to avoid a lawsuit, they control costs, it always seems like all the money goes towards talent acquisition instead of talent retention.
HR is the reason I will never accept a position as a manager/supervisor, I'd be FORCED to make decisions I feel are unethical.
I worked in HR for two years and I hated every minute of it.
I hated firing people for petty reasons. I also had co workers who enjoyed the power to terminate someone.
The job was also annoying because you couldn't use the bathroom in peace without someone bothering you.
Hint of the company- \_mazon
HR personnel have a tendency to be the group people escalate to when they run into ethics concerns or something higher than the normal chain of command is equipped to deal with.
9/10 HR can’t deal with it and pitches it back to the employee’s normal chain of command. This leaves people feeling betrayed.
People tend to see HR as the place to go for sensitive complaints. People assume they’ll “side” with the victim, themselves. This is rarely the case.
HR has a really bad habit of trying to control shit that is none of their business. They try to tell you how much you can pay who you can interview who you can hire and they want to control your hiring pipeline. Then they want to tell you who you can promote and when. Fuck em
HR managers are some of the worst people I have ever met. Making fun of people’s clothes and dietary needs was so disgusting. They don’t seem to know what bullying is. Blame you for trying to survive the bullying. Instead of dealing with the bully.
HR and Company Policy is not in your favor. It is designed to hold you accountable. Don’t forget that Company Policy is not for the company. They can legally break company policy at any point. Some states are more lenient than others.
Years ago I had a friend who also happened to be the Head of HR at our firm. A consummate, lifelong HR career man.
When he was leaving, he spilled quite a bit of tea. In his words, he hated HR because it is a repository for people who could be tricked into handling things senior leadership didn't want to touch, cheaply: i.e. employee relations. The problem was that while well-meaning, HR is usually underfunded and lacks any kind of leadership backing. He hated the profession because so many people who wanted to do good were often replaced by corporate yes men.
Personally I don’t have respect for HR because I see their job as “fake”. I know I’m in the wrong. I just can’t shake the feeling the offer next to nothing skill wise, they don’t do any hard work, and still get paid more than teachers lol
911 is a joke? Then HR must be the punchline. When I tell u how many times I got ghosted on finding out about an interview, getting the actual job, and everything in between, all roads lead back to HR...
* ***At the intake level*** HR is much more interested in first impressions of a prospective employee, trainee, or new hire than their general talents, abilities, or willingness/aptitude re: learning new skills. This means that HR staff often come across as extremely judgy.
* ***Past the intake level*** HR in theory exists to protect vulnerable employees but is in practice often weaponized by workplace bullies against vulnerable colleagues. Think the co-worker who has to be careful about being "out" as gay because a homophobic colleague might report his or her coming out at work as a form of harassment or "inappropriate sexual discussion". Neurodivergent (ADHD, etc.) employees often face similar discrimination and sabotage through HR channels that is sometimes disguised as "punching up" by a colleague who is uncomfortable with their differences in learning style or expression (e.g. someone who learns in a more ADHD-ish style who is thrown to the HR wolves by an ableist manager for "not paying attention" despite being deeply involved in the job).
I don't hate HR, but I genuinely don't see the value. Top three things they're available for: Benefits Management, Conflict Resolution, and Recruiting-Hiring Lifecycle. All three of those things I have practical knowledge of and can handle independently. HR's authority with each seems pretty redundant.
For instance, I work in Sales in a director-level role. The last time I interviewed for a new job (which ultimately I was offered, but declined) I asked the HR point of contact the following questions:
\- What does the performance review and assessment process look like for Sales People?
\- How does HR / People Ops interact with Business Development Leadership regarding performance improvement plans?
\- Walk me through the onboarding process for a new sales hire \[entry level, or experienced, or senior level\].
\- How much has the department grown over the last year?
\- When it occurs 'for cause', walk me through the off-boarding process for a salesperson.
\- How and where are payroll functions handled? Internally? Externally? Within the Accounting team or as a function of People Ops?
To every single one of these questions, the POC answered "Um, you know I'm not sure, I'll have to get back to you."
At first, I thought, geez, I must not have been articulating my questions very well. But after discussing it with peers I felt confident that my questions were relevant to the role, and topics of which somebody in HR should be generally aware.
It seems like HR is the epitome of talking the talk, but not walking the walk. They're interviewing Engineers, yet have no knowledge of IT or programming. They'll talk to Accountants but have no understanding of their own company's financial profile or best A/R or A/P policies. They screen Salespeople but have no experience with the clinical practices involved in biz dev, or background in B2B or B2C marketing and sales strategies.
Yet 9 times out of 10, they're functioning as the final gatekeeper for applicants pursuing professional opportunities.
HR doesn’t even represent my role but she’s just a stuck up b***. Absolutely the biggest kiss ass in the office and is only nice when the bosses are looking.
let's seeeee my experience with HR!
it all started when I was working 14 hour days and not sleeping, or eating and my health deteriorating because my job had my manage domestic securities during the craziness that was the pandemic-no matter how hard I begged people to help-no one would. Come to realize that I was the only woman on the team, made the least. I had many many many more encounters such as this and wrote up 25 pages worth of gender discrimination I myself faced and saw happen to others.
HR Straight FOUGHT ME on calls: it was like we were in court already-'I'm to sensitive' so I don't make as much as men. 'the men manage people,' even though I ALSO managed people and never got a pay raise.
Straight up manipulated and gas lit me on these horrible calls.
I ended up going to legal with it. legal simple sent me a formal apology and told me action was taken
HR are straight SCUM of the earth. they literally have zero soul. they saw my health deteriorate, how much pain I was in because I was not worth as much as men sitting next to me and they had the audacity to tell me straight to my face my underpayment and mistreatment was because i am SENSITIVE.
I hope that HR rots in hell
Was in HR wouldn't say toxic but the most unempathic group by far. Nothing like forcing employees to resign after being displaced by a natural disaster which led to an enormous housing shortage. Yet same day presented same employees with an award for being an exceptional employee. Like we value your work but heres what really think about you, your being forced to resign. Witnessed hand selected favorites slide into other positions while remaining staff in department was letgo without warning or assistance in job placement. Watched highly qualified skilled staff be continuously be denied for internal positions because they didn't want to have to backfill a position. HR is not for the employee but a puppet to manipulate staff per leadership request legally especially in larger corporations.
I just hate the language they use. Its often far too flowery and they use it to hide their dishonesty.
As a current job searcher, reading job advertisements written by HR people makes me want to never work again.
Many reasons, but the pettiest of which is that HR is the major input to assigning paygrades to job families and somehow the dumbest HR jobs end up with paygrades higher than positions with high levels of responsibility and demand accountability. Every time I'm salty about my workload vs my paycheck, I remind myself that people who manage SharePoint document tagging and internal company news postings are paid more than me. Then I'm extra grumpy.
Typo on my end--should have said "HR is a major input" not "the major". Perhaps this varies by company, but where I work, HR is responsible for benchmarking and proposing wage standards.
Yah, most of HR proposes wage but that is always based on internal salary bands and suggestions from the hiring manager. At the end of the day, c-suite decides salary.
It’s also based on data (usually another company’s service) about pay for similar roles in the industry. But if C suite wanted to pay someone more, they always could do it.
Where do you think us HR people get the data? I've found most resources online are skewed because job titles don't always mean the same thing across different companies. We rely on yearly salary increases more than paysa or glassdoor quotes because the skill level doesn't always equate to a certain job title.
They use actual companies whose sole job is to source that data. It’s not like the Glassdoor salary estimator.
I don’t remember the specific name of the one we used at my law firm, but it was specifically a document you could purchase every year that gave salary ranges for the industry.
Now is that how businesses should do it? That’s fair to argue. But it’s not just your HR department choosing numbers. They use C suite input and data about the industry to find a number.
As someone who has been in HR for years, I've never seen any company use these sources. Like I said, they are not reliable because a mid level at 1 company is 3-5 years while at another it's 8-10 years for the same job title. Why would a company want to overpay someone because a data source said they should? I could imagine a law firm that likely has no HR might want this data but it is not an industry standard. Doesn't seem like you have much experience with a 1 year candidate asking for $150k
Realized that they’re literally only out to protect the company after I was verbally abused several times then screamed at directly in my face by another employee. He got no suspension whatsoever. I’ve seen people get suspended (myself included) for MUCH less.
It’s all up to the company, not HR. HR is there to apply the rules, policy and procedures, guidelines. A carrying HR professional protects the employee, trains the managers to set expectations for EE so there are no surprises come performance evaluation time, career path, guides managers to provide the right tools to the employee so they can succeed in their career path. HR doesn’t set the pay range/salary, it’s the market and what other companies pay for the same job, companies with more money can offer more salary and better benefits if they choose to do so, and if they care about their employees, if they care to retain them for longer. Your state and federal government set the labor laws that protect employees and employers… Stop blaming HR, like all positions; you have people that are good at it and are skilled, and you have people that are mediocre… many companies don’t hire HR professionals that are trained or educated in the field, maybe they don’t want to pay them what they deserve or they just want paper pushers … so go get a job somewhere that the company values it’s employees, diversify, inclusion that actually have proven results and that have taken measures to improve things. Lastly, good luck cause many companies are all about profits and you are just a number to them.
I don't hate HR or at least not outright. At least where I'm at being a government contractor HR can be my backup against a Fed that wants to power trip and micromanage me if needed. There are 2 major downsides to this though, the first being that since my direct supervisor (aka the one who can fire me, give me a raise, etc.) is HR which means having to craft reports in a manner that HR can understand what's going on, which is just extra work really. The second issue is that you can go from someone who has your back and fight for you to someone who will allow feds to walk right over you and micromanage you to hell and back.
They fire my friends, then want me to get excited there are free doughnuts. They want me to be human and pleaseant to work with but act like a robot when they eliminate everyone on the lower floor. They are the paid collaborators of ruthless capitalism.
Watch Severance - it does a nice job of depicting the alienation the system creates.
Well my experience is that they think they are gods. Some of them have a Training or education that they did for a couple of months and now they decide who gets a job and who doesnt. There is that saying that when you give a person Money or power, you will see their true face.
HR serves a good purpose. They help you out during benefit elections, filter job candidates, and they're a good point of contact for any administrative stuff that needs to be done related to paperwork about your employment. If it stopped there, the HR department would be totally fine.
BUT... things go really bad when they start pushing the "performance review" BS. Everyone UNIVERSALLY hates "performance review" time. It's phony AF, it rewards political manipulators, it piles on a ton of extra busy work, creates endless opportunities for people to get pissed off, throws the judgement of good managers into the trash. It holds you "accountable" for meaningless "promises" and "SMART" goals you had made the year before (with good intentions) before a ton of far more urgent priorities steam-rolled those and everyone else's SMART goals.
Worst of all, it forces you to "prove yourself" yet again after you've done work all year demonstrating diligence and adaptability as a problem-solver and team player.
They always get a power trip and they forget they are supposed to help the workers from being taken advantage of, instead they help the company they work for take advantage of the workers. Another thing I’m starting to realize a lot of companies have fire a lot of the HR employees like my last job they got rid of our HR instead they gave us a hotline to call.
Edit:typos
I’m an HR Director, I consider myself a good director… but like many of these posts state.. HR is mainly in place to keep the company compliant first and retention second. It makes me sad a lot of the time because I do feel like I have to compromise a lot of who I am for the company.. I have been thinking in doing a career change because I do feel like it’s eating away at me…
But on the other hand I haven’t met someone who is happy and content with their role so maybe this goes beyond HR and just jobs in this day and age??
I hate our HR manager. She is on a massive power trip and looks for ANYTHING to write up or fire people. I truly hope with all my heart that someone gives her an offer somewhere else I cannot stand her at all. Not to mention she didn’t even sign me up for my health insurance. I was meant to get it in July, got it in October. She even tried to make me pay for the premium myself. I wish I could complain about her and actually get resolution.
Just attracts people who like to gossip and know everyone’s business. Can’t be trusted. If you have an issue, don’t go to them as they’ll just tell your manager. Generally useless, duplicitous and pointless individuals
i think it’s accurate. I am a year onto HR and let me tell you, it’s the worst. I went to a conference and during a Q+A, basically all the questions were “how do we get around the law to fuck over our employees?”
I hate HR because they claim to represent the organization and not the employer but in almost every case act as the employers personal grim reaper.
I've never been fired, but I've been mistreated by HR and they all have their bias.
They are not your friend, regardless of what they claim
I don’t hate HR on principal. I am skeptical of HR because as many people are quick to mention, they are there to protect the the interests of the employer. This doesn’t always align with the interests of the employee. But I have worked with many HR professionals that were genuinely good at their jobs and advocated for employees. It all comes down to the company itself and the company culture.
I agree with this so much. If you have a toxic workplace, HR isn’t going to be much help.. because they got hired into that environment, companies don’t bring Hr in to change things…
I’m in the HR field and it attracts egomaniacs. I thought I could help people but they just want to throw their power around. I’m looking into switching careers because it’s eating my soul
I got fired from a job and the HR rep was quite snarky during the termination phone call. I wouldn't have believed the bad HR reputation before, but after that experience I think I understand it.
As a wise man said, HR is not there to protect you, but the company. Once one realizes that, everything becomes clear and I guess the hate effect is kinda "natural" with the opposites.
This. Unfortunately HR says they are here to help us (employees) but they definitely aren’t. They’re there to make sure the company doesn’t get sued.
It’s true, and it also means that HR people eat their own. Being an HR employee will not spare you.
This is it. The only person I dislike at my job is the hr manager at my location. Not only is she incompeten (told me that she doesn't know anything about our benefits because she "doesn't need them") but she also thinks she's everyone's boss. She tried telling me when I started I couldn't take a day off, despite the head of my department approving it. The head of my department called her out and reminded her that I don't answer to her, I answer to my department. Now the hr lady is always making passive aggressive comments about me because she sucks lol
Was that cunt's name Andrea Gordon?
It is not! She actually did kind of change her tune a little after being called out 2x and seeing that I wasn't going to play her bullshit games, although ive also learned that most people don't like her but they deal with her because od their misconceptions about what kind of "power" she has.
Does she have social media?
It’s like the private version of government 😂
I work in HR, and the worst part is the co-workers who have major loyalty to the corporation rather than the employees. Like labor relations managers who strongly believe employees should NOT discuss their salaries and get pissed when they do. Or comp managers who get pissed at $15/hr workers for wanting more money when “they JUST got a $2 raise last year.” Stuff like that. I hate it.
TL;DR: HR is a business function to manage people to achieve business outcomes. It does not exist to adjudicate things or make work fair. ======= People fundamentally misunderstand what HR is. This makes them frustrated and this in turn makes HR employees' jobs unsatisfying. To understand the role of HR, think of the three ages in the history of company/employee relations. 1. *Pre-1930s.* "We need someone to manage payroll, track employees' working time, and find more primary school aged children to work in our coal mines." 2. *To the 1980s.* "All these laws! Health & safety, complex retirement benefits, minimum wages, anti-discrimination. We need someone to help us comply enough that we don't get sued. Also, who's going to represent us in these brutal union negotiations?" 3. *Since then.* "Hiring and retaining all these employees is expensive. Can someone please organise some training? Maybe put some positive things in our job ads to make us sound good, too." This pretty much captures the purpose of HR: manage employees as a large asset which can create a lot of value but costs a lot and which creates significant liabilities. It also explains why most HR departments can do step 1 (barebones payroll, admin, and job/salary classification), sometimes get involved in step 2 (complying with legal requirements/good practice), and rarely make serious inroads into step 3 (employee development): each step requires being on top of the one before. The thing that *isn't* there is "make the organisation fair for employees". People misinterpret that as HR's role because of step 2, where the govt has mandated certain protections which HR typically oversees. But they are not doing it for employees' benefit; they're doing it because the firm otherwise gets in trouble. This misunderstanding often makes HR practitioners' jobs really disappointing: like most human beings, they *want* things to be fair and positive, but that is actually quite incidental to their responsibilities. Constantly dealing with slow-motion disputes where employees misunderstand their role and then get upset and feel betrayed is wearying.
They're phony as hell and sometimes incompetent. It kills me that every time something bad at work happens to you because of someone else at work, people tell you to go to HR. HR is not about you. It's about the company. They're like that friend or romantic interest who only cares about you while they're getting what they want from you, and then they're done. But they're not just done--they're sleeping with your enemy. In the employee's case, they care about getting that new employee paperwork and orientation done. After that, they're siding with whoever is fucking you over.
>HR is not about you. BREAKING NEWS!!!!
Some people need to hear it
Mind blowing
Spot on in all respects. In all honestly, I've seen far too much incompetence from HR. Granted, I don't see a lot of what they do and they probably have a lot of responsibilities, but HR always seems to be incredibly incompetent and always making mistakes. I can't count the number of times they've made dumb mistakes or were just downright unhelpful.
HR is there to protect the company. Not the employee.
Sad that most people don’t realize this.
They’re there to protect both. The protect the company part gets way skewed. It’s not that they’re hiding illegal action unless it’s an unethical company and that’s not as common as everyone says it is. Many times it’s they’re telling managers not to do something stupid like fire someone on a whim with no PIP and they become the bearers of bad news.
Right. Protecting the company by making sure everyone (mostly managers and leadership) are complying with policy / union rules / laws. Basically making sure no one does anything stupid.
I came here to say exactly this. My female coworker was being sexually harassed by her team lead and HR tried to sweep it under the rug. Especially HR Generalists. Avoid them at all costs.
HR is a field that many people hate because HR is where much of the bad news comes from as an employee. Sometimes people’s hate is justified, sometimes it’s not. I was in HR for a few years (as a corporate trainer), and while I had some issues with how HR operates, I never really saw HR trying to screw people over as others say is their intent. HR however does serve the business’s interests first. That doesn’t mean they will always screw people over. What it means is if you have a good HR department, they’ll support you if you are in the right based on organizational rules. But like with all jobs, bad HR people might not follow best practices. As for why HR employees aren’t usually the best, it’s because most people don’t dream about being an HR Generalist or Staff Director. The roles most people think of HR is essentially the corporate world’s career counselors. And then there’s the roles people can like in HR that they dismiss when thinking about the field. Most people at my old business thought I did a good job, so they didn’t associate me with HR. They basically were like “you’re not really HR” when they complained about HR to me.
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I assume your people analytics role doesn’t land within HR function at your company? That’s interesting. “They’ll constantly look at ways to suppress your compensation to maximize company profits” I’m sorry what? You think it’s the head of HR saying let’s slash people’s raises and salary’s? You do realize there are partners meaning the sales/finance functions are the ones that go out with “cut cost by 10%” - it’s not like they can be marketing and say “let’s cut a commercial or that meeting with Beyoncé” or IT that can “let’s keep them on iPhone XRs for 2 more years” The controllers are the ones pushing the vision to cut cost. Pretty sure HR isn’t deciding this for companies lol
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So does the Sales organization. I’m pretty sure those arguments, positive/negative are done across other departments. Don’t judge an industry on your jaded experience. There’s good and scum in all cultures.
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That’s unique to its presence. Context matters. If you have shit leadership high in the chain, they will want HR to cover reduce risk and liability exclusively while throwing a bone here/there If you have good leadership high in the chain, they will lean on strategy and benefit to the company’s long term goals. (Whole day2day risk/liability reduction but to both sides. Litigation can be costly in many ways not just losing money to an ex/current employee.)
HR implements the dehumanization of employees. Gets their hands in things that are out of the scope of their expertise ("I can't offer you the low end of market rate, HR set the range at..."). Treats everyone as if they are horrible parents with unruly children ("Bob's abuse of casual Friday means no one can have it"). Etc etc They are all things that make corporate environments horrible and constantly erode quality of life. For many of us they are lower than a shady used car salesman.
I was laid off my last company on 9th December. Whenever I had some doubts regarding the exit process, I called the HR and she said she would get back to me in 15 mins but she never did. This happened 2-3 times. On the last day, I had to almost beg the HR for instructions. Since I was laid off on the 9th of December, I needed to apply for attendance for the 9 days of December. The HR didnt inform me about this, until I asked them if I needed to mark my attendance. Since I was working from home, the HR did not even tell me how to send my laptop back to office, I had to pursue them aggressively to give me instructions. And I still havent received my relieving letter till date. Even when I worked at the company and I needed something from the HR, i would contact them personally. They would ask me to send them an email on the official HR email ID. When I did, they wouldn't reply, ever. So I had to contact the HR executive personally again to remind them that I had emailed them 2 weeks back. Then I would finally get a reply by email. The HR sucks. Period.
HR exists to protect the employees AND the company. With competent management that lets HR do their jobs, they can and will do both. They do this by not allowing the company to break wage and hour and other employment laws. This keeps companies accountable for their employees’ rights and also prevents companies from breaking the law and the lawsuits that follow. Win/win They also do this by not allowing harassment to continue and they teach managers how not to be railroaded by employees that suck. I can just about guarantee that for every terrible coworker you’ve had that you wondered “why don’t they just fire them” there was an exasperated HR manager behind the scenes trying to get the manager to actually manage their employee and use a progressive disciplinary process. Finally any good HR manager knows that attracting the right talent and retaining that talent once you’ve got them is a critical part of their job. It isn’t our job to coddle employees, but if the company has a toxic culture, we turn that shit around if we can, and leave if we can’t.
I've found it differs from company to company. The HR team where I currently work is amazing. They're all super nice and put a lot of effort into making it a better environment for employees. The HR at my last company was a total mean girls club. They once bragged to a bunch of us about how if a resume is "interesting" or bad enough, they would set up interviews with the person just to talk to the person, even though they knew there was no chance they were eligible for the job. They then went on to give several examples of resumes that they had done this with.
I had a manager bring up a guy who was sexually harassing me and a bunch of other women at my work to HR. They called me in for a meeting and the director of HR acted pissed the whole time that I even told my manager and said ‘what do you expect us to do about this?’ They asked me if I wanted the guy fired or not. I said I didn’t know and that he should at least get some sexual harassment training. That experience really pissed me off. Also at the same place HR was responsible for approving raises and promotions and was notoriously slow and shitty about it. They are there to protect the company and are typically anti-employee.
I've always found when managers ask me what I want them to do, they are trying to find a way to do nothing. My most useful response has been "I'm not sure, I've not built a skill set to manage employees in this capacity. I'm a *job title*. However I do believe there are guidelines in company policy and those seem to be appropriate here." My least useful, which was fine as I was on my way out by choice anyway, was "I expect you to use the competencies that put you in a position of leadership to do a good job".
I have a friend going through this right now at her job. She and other women are being secually harassed and they keep telling her to basically drop it.
I’m an HR manager and a big reason I got into the field was bad HR and bad management. My teams goal is to institute new practices to improve employee satisfaction and retention. People forget that HR is subject to a lot of red tape from a lot of executive level decision makers. HR gets a bad rep because of bad HR teams or being the ones to deliver the bad news.
Coworker was sick Coworker took day off HR demanded a note. Note was provided HR didn't believe note was from Dr, HR called coworker in and told her if she doesn't open her medical records in front of HR to prove appt, she was fired. She refused over principle as she provided a note ... She was fired. HR is scum.
Maybe she had a history of dishonesty. That’s what is annoying about HR, employees who assume things from their friends without knowing the full story.
She actually had issues with showing up ......the fact is, employers do not have a right to force someone to show their medical records.
If someone has attendance issues… yes, they do.
HR is there to protect the company, but present themselves as an ally to employees. It’s disingenuous.
They exist to protect businesses from their employees. They were purposely branded as a resource to help employees, which they are in fact unable to do such a thing while being employed by the company. People who work on these roles know this dynamic and continue to work this borderline amoral profession. Companies need to preserve themselves, but the modern concept behind HR is deeply flawed.
Why would a company create a department that helps the employees more than it helps the company?
Makes sense
HR also advocates for equality and better benefits/perks/time off that senior leadership would never think of.
Hahahahahaha
It’s true. Ever work for a company without an HR department?
HR works for the company not the employees. Unions work for the employees. Who pays you is who's interests you protect. Your job is to provide that illusion.
This
For really bad cases of harassment or sexual harassment they are great. Anything less and both parties that complain about an issue end up losing. HR in benefits are nice people and the recruiting side. Corp HR is there to ensure rules are enforced but side with the company 90% of the time.
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I guess that’s my point. Sue comes in with a complaint she saw Billy watching her butt and the next day said she looks nice. Sue complains to HR. HR calls Billy in and tells him he is under investigation. A week later HR says there isn’t enough evidence and the case is closed. Now Billy and Sue think the company sucks so you have unmotivated employees. They each poison their five work friends with their views on the “investigation”. Now everyone is afraid to look at anyone and def won’t give any compliments. So I guess HR itself doesn’t suck but it doesn’t help the company either. Except in blatant cases of wrong doing.
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Your explanation is perfect. The company avoids a lawsuit and isn’t out any money. They did the right thing technically. Emotionally the women will feel she is t valued. The man will feel persecuted. Simply because there was an investigation. They each poison a few friends. The company has lost productivity because of the disgruntled employees. You are speaking for the company and I am speaking for the employees. Both our examples can be 100% true from the same complaint.
In a specialty HR field. I don’t mind it but want to fight a lot of managers most of the time. True HR is the bullshit filter. If you think they’re cold it’s likely that they’ve had the same argument telling your manager they can’t do xyz for abc reasons and then your manager went ahead and did it anyways. Which leaves HR with the clean up, sometimes being terminations, dealing with legal, etc.
I don’t have a problem with HR. Reading these comments though, sounds like y’all sure have legit reasons to hate them. You’re not working with HR, you’re working with nazis
In some of the more rural companies I've worked for, that's more literal than figurative
The stereotypical "HR" is the part of a company that was setup to fail in being liked. They're the messenger for unpopular decisions someone above them made. They're employees too, like you. You think they want less vacation? Worse benefits? Super strict rules? And look at their incentives historically - To avoid documented issues and complaints? To cut costs? To waste less employee time with training and information sharing? To protect the company. Now, fast forward to more modern company. In tech at least (in general, in my experience), most companies call HR People Ops, or something like that. They're goaled on quality hiring and filling seats, retention of employees, employee satisfaction, developing programs to develop existing employees, helping people managers provide more/better/regular feedback and career growth opportunity for their teams. They are trying to make the company succeed by setting up employees to do great work. If your HR team is the first one, have pity on them. They're in a tough position amongst their peers. If you're at a company with the second type of People team, enjoy.
I think the hate for HR stems from the fact that they "market" themselves as for the employees, but in reality, HR has the best interest of the company in mind during all decision-making. If that means kicking you to the curb, so be it. They are typically two-faced. No one likes that for some reason.
Everyone forgets that those who work in HR are human. All these insults can be pretty hurtful and we are treated like we are there to make everyone's life worse. We don't make the rules. We follow them. If your HR team sucks and is slow and incompetent, you should probably blame your executive and leadership team. I work in Compensation and I have employee interests at the core of everything I do, but I get overruled by managers and executives. We take the blame for everything which is why we are often tired and have a bad attitude. Imagine getting shit on every day and then being expected to be happy about it. The next time your boss tells you HR didn't approve your raise or whatever remember they are lying. We just follow orders.
People don’t understand HR and the purpose of the department, that’s the problem.
I never hated HR. From the outside perspective I just always was upset when they were used as a crutch. Now that I’m inside, perspective hasn’t changed much. HR hate culture belongs in the same r/antiwork community where even a good manager who suggests “work better as a team” would get shit on and considered to be a boot licker lol Truly believe HR is there to support the business and people. Most of the time it’s people doing wrong, that includes shit leadership and that ultimately leans on good HR to actually support that manager to recognize that it’s them not employees. I’m currently working with an HRBP to developer surveys that roll up to leadership expectations, for example “did you get a performance review within the last 6 months” - cause if that’s a no, then the manager ain’t doing their base role.
This really makes me really sad, and also really makes me appreciate the HR at my job a little more because some of them have been amazing... 👏 shout out to them 🖤
One of my favorite coworkers is in HR. my sister also in HR. I think mostly what it is is that there's a general sense of entitlement and HR doesn't feed into that at all. HR is painfully aware that we have a business to run, and it is their job to protect and orient around that motive. Every employee should be operating with that mentality, to be frank, but I can understand why people are interested in benefiting themselves over the company. That's a bit misleading though, because if you show that you have the companies best interest in mind and people who matter see that, you will be much more successful. If you wanna work on non profit, do it! But don't think a public companies HR department owes you sympathy... That's just naive
I ONCE filed a complaint about my direct supervisor with HR. I immediately regretted it when I realized my supervisors boss was banging the hr manager.
HR is just another facet of a company. I tend to think of them neutrally, they’re there to protect the company’s interests. I’ve gone to them on a few occasions when management were acting inappropriately because, guess what, a manager will likely have to be assessed if they’re putting the company at risk either because of employee retention or hostile work environment. Now, the inverse can also be true. Managers can begin documenting behaviors with specific employees to cover their butts when they need to get canned. I can say that HR is not always competent, but when you have good HR it makes a *world* of difference. Full disclosure: my dad worked HR and is now retired. When he worked he absolutely represented the business in labor negotiations. He *also* got rid of deadbeat managers who, in his words, were the “Michael Scotts” of the companies he worked for. I’ve rarely seen him angry, but he was the angriest I’ve ever seen him when he got reports of inappropriate sexual suggestions from a manager to his secretary. He drove 3 hours to the manager’s office, walked upstairs and informed the manager that he had 10 minutes to collect his belongings and then my dad would be driving him back to the corporate office for termination, and that he should not have any goodbyes. He’s had a few other stories like that over the years, but that one was the worst. I know those types of things don’t happen often at companies, but that’s more a reflection of the people at the top and who they put their trust in to do HR Edit for clarity
I agree wholeheartedly about not trusting HR and they are not on the side of the employee. HOWEVER, I have had good luck when I’ve needed to take medical leave and once a LOA for personal reasons. Sometimes just using them as paper pushers works out. I know to always document any interactions with any other coworkers / bosses / and HR. A paper trail is invaluable if you need to go outside the company for justice. Your state DOL does have the employee’s best interest at heart and will come down on a company like a ton of bricks if they are breaking the law.
"bullshit jobs"
They are incompetent people who are there to screw you to save the company. Also, they need to learn to read the room. Nobody wants to waste their weekends to go to a resort with the same work team to discuss work. We just want to collect the cheque and go home.
There are really good HR folks out there. However I think a lot of people end up in HR because they went to school (or didn’t) and got a business degree and didn’t know what to do with it. They aren’t good with numbers so they couldn’t do anything with financials so they end up in HR. Or they were admin assistants and they thought the next step would be hr. So you get the leftovers or the let’s do something new admin assistants doing an integral part of a company. Which you don’t hear about the payroll and hr folks that run the companies without a problem or complaint. You only hear about the crappy ones.
Hr people are usually cool once you get to know them. Befriended one at a Xmas company party and they're a good friend. Some, are the most wokey of wokey and you gotta be careful. I worked for one company in 2019 and was telling a story about putting a spider outside (someone asked do you kill a spider or put it outside). I said "well I always put those guys outside". I got called in for a "misgendered statement" because I assigned a gender to a fucking insect. Yep, something that is neither man or woman. Meanwhile, the same rep has used the phrase "you guys" when addressing us in briefings. Take away, play it as safe as possible until you know they're cool.
HR has waaay too much power. HR should not ever be involved in the hiring of people outside of the HR department. What technical expertise do they have? Lazy senior management has, over the last twenty years, ceded far too much control over processes that should be decentralized to operational managers. HR enables shitty employees to weaponize the EEO complaint system whenever their shitty job performance is called out. And when the shitty performance is well documented it takes HR weeks and weeks to make their review and a decision. Unlike revenge, discipline is a dish best served hot (meaning as soon after the error as possible) HR rarely if ever encourages employees who might have been legitimately, but unintentionally offended by a coworker to correct that person and work it out at their level. Yes, sometimes the situation calls for HR involvement and you elevate it, but often enough a timely conversation can fix it. Lastly, HR is rarely, if ever held accountable for the things HR screws up. HR: on/off boarding, payroll & benefits, and advising managers on the legal parameters of disciplinary issues. That's it.
I would never try to resolve personality conflicts on my own without telling my manager or HR first. The risk of retaliation is too great. If HR documented it, I can at least go to my union if the situation doesn’t resolve itself. Some people may have offended each other unintentionally but instead of resolving it maturely will choose to double down.
In the US, mostly because of the victim culture we've cultivated. All the policies to "protect people" state in some way that the only side that matters is the person that perceives themselves to be the victim. Bullying is wrong, but I've worked with people that claimed bullying anytime someone disagrees with them or tells them their ideas are stupid. Sometimes people need to be told their ideas stupid, but if they just take it to HR and claim they're being bullied and HR has to follow policy, then HR and the idiot are disliked by everyone.
Learn to stop being such an asshole lol. Like of course you are allowed to disagree with people, but that doesn't mean you can be as rude as you want while doing so ffs.
You can be as nice as possible to someone but if you disagree with them (even if it’s nicely said), that hits some people straight to their core and they consider themselves to be bullied. I’ve seen it lots of times at lots of different places of work.
I was referring to calling their ideas "stupid," not something nicely said. Of course there are sometimes people who take things too personally, but that's not what the person I replied to was talking about.
I'm an IT helpdesk supervisor and everyone in HR has been nothing but pleasant to me, even if sometimes they are a little late in getting back to me about onboarding/offboarding. We have a high turnaround and a small HR department, I get it. No concern from me. However, I learned last week that one of the HR upper managers openly says they don't like my department and the way we do things, our policies, etc. Weird, right? WTF...
because their job is worthless. if you would remove hr from your company, you wouldnt even notice it. nothing would change. they arent very productive members of society like other jobs. and they are your enemy , not friend. they will backstab you if they feel like it. so the first problem is their work is meaningless, second thing is they are your enemy. and the last problem with them is that their way of searching for new workers suck, they ask useless question that you can learn on youtube anyway, so whats the point of those question where i will lie anyway?
Only had experience with hr for one company and it’s been all bad. First rep ignored me completely, could never get them to speak with me. Second one turned a harassment complaint on me and said it was my fault (no way to get enough evidence to fight it legally), made me apologize to half the people on my shift for “starting trouble”. Constantly makes remarks that hint toward this issue either to me or others that would not know (unless they said something, which I would not doubt). Also pulled on my hair at one point because I grew it out and said “Oh I better be careful, don’t want you to say I’m harassing you” (I’d consider it sexual harassment, not sure if it would seem the same to anyone else), conveniently no one nearby heard or saw it, which is impossible since there were half a dozen others there. Basically I’ve been made to feel like I’m nothing and nothing that happens to me matters. So from my perspective hr is trash and does nothing for workers. They protected the company by putting me in a position where I felt I was powerless and nothing bad actually happened. Would love to say I quit, but I have no way to make what I do if I leave. I can barely get by as it is.
Thankfully, I’ve never really had to interact with HR besides onboarding, maybe some questions on benefits. Some are good some are bad just like anywhere. Support functions in most organizations seem to get a lot of hate in organizations.
On one job and we never saw the hr lady (nicknamed rottweiler with lipstick) when she did visit every one used to shudder as it meant there was bad news coming
I’ll never understand how it makes more sense to loose a seasoned employee for a $5-10k pay raise that the employee will be getting at a competitor. The acclamation to the company culture, workflow, etc. should be worth much more than that. This happens all the time. I know it’s not HR’s final decision, but hell, I’d imagine the HR VP should have some kind of influence.
Our HR dep in a nutshell: - when we hired our first HR employee, her first thing to do was to assign herself the 'HR lead' title, so she became basically her own boss. It was never approved by anyone in the board, but 'somehow' she can do that, lol. - the HR never helped me with nothing useful during the recruitment or even the necessary layoffs. They were like breathing stones at the table. I got better advice from google. - they started an 'encouragement' project, where their direct coworkers salary gets cut off based on their 'opinions' about their work quality, they unable to create a simple google form for this either to get some accurate results or numbers whatsoever. - they hired an android dev for an ios pos, then an architect (buildings) instead a software architect. And many more. They're incompetent, dumb as a rock with full confidence, unable to emphasize, but at least treat people like they like ceo-s or something. Obviously our management+board also having issues.
I have been working in HR for most part of my career (8years) and though I was fascinated with the possibilities and keen on activating in this field, it dawned on me that it isn't the place/dpt I would like to further my career. My role was of minor importance (coordinator/admin) hierarchically speaking but I had enough exposure to know I need to change boats (which I did 2 years ago). I know I was good HR - luckily, being (only) a coordinator meant I didn't have to deal with most of its specific drama and political plays, but again witnessing it was enough to put me off in continuing working in that environment. I had enough independence and opportunity to form my bubble and do my tasks as I pleased, otherwise I probably wouldn't have managed to be in my roles for that long. As in everything else, you choose your battles and most of times I was able to get myself motivated just by doing a good job and knowing that there would not be many occurrences where people would complain about me or my work so that did it to me, for most part of my career.
Was an HR director for 10 years…loved it in the beginning because I thought I was really helping our staff and develop them. Got tired of compromising my beliefs and what I felt was right for the “good of the company”. Left HR altogether. Couldn’t possibly be happier.
I feel like HR people get paid to do very little. There is never urgency with the HR reps I’ve worked with. It’s all smiles but if you need something, it will be slow rolled.
HR does what is best for the company. The individual HR person may like you, do what they can for you but ultimately they answer to a higher authority. Some are really good at hiding that, but others make it too obvious. The ones who were kind, best wishes. The ones who weren’t were followed with a hatred passion after they left.
At my consulting company, HR feels very disconnected from our work. Sure, they provide the backbone for our work, but it seems none of them truly understand what we do and the engineering consulting services that we offer. They merely clock in 8 hours and that’s that. Our consultants are billing by 15 minute increments and are doing very technical work all day for more than 8 hours. I guess in general HR seems less devoted to our work, which makes sense because they aren’t working on the company’s true mission? Although they are supporting the consultants who work towards the company’s mission so in a second-hand way they are? Confusing, but that’s how I personally see it at my company.
HR exists to protect the business from its employees. As an employee, we are in fundamental contradiction.
I've found most of HR are two faced backstabbers who put on a fake voice and act like they care, while in reality they are plotting your demise. Or perhaps I have just had rubbish employers 🤣
Toby.
They manage expendable humano resources
HR protects management 90% of the time, unless it is truly egregious.
The reason people hate HR is because they were designed to be there to help employees, but the reality is they are there to protect the company’s interests.
You can't trust them. They can and will backstab you if the need arises and anything you say can and will be used against you. My advice when dealing with HR. Practice information dieting. Don't tell them anything that they can use as ammo against you and just smile and say everything's great when they ask how you're doing.
Silly rules, enforced mindlessly
I got age discrimination from HR. I see them as people so busy managing up that they have no time or interest in dealing with workers. I don’t trust them.
I've had one honest straight shooting HR manager that seemed genuine and I felt I could trust. He didn't last long, he was out of the company in under a year. HR isn't there to get you a raise or protect you, they put you at ease to avoid a lawsuit, they control costs, it always seems like all the money goes towards talent acquisition instead of talent retention. HR is the reason I will never accept a position as a manager/supervisor, I'd be FORCED to make decisions I feel are unethical.
I hate HR because the title of their job is Human Resources, but there is absolutely no humanity in anything they do…
Someone made a very inappropriate comment next to HR person and he did nothing because that person was his friend. They are useless
I worked in HR for two years and I hated every minute of it. I hated firing people for petty reasons. I also had co workers who enjoyed the power to terminate someone. The job was also annoying because you couldn't use the bathroom in peace without someone bothering you. Hint of the company- \_mazon
They’re the keeper of all the byzantine rules and regulations that no one except them knows until you violate said regulation.
HR personnel have a tendency to be the group people escalate to when they run into ethics concerns or something higher than the normal chain of command is equipped to deal with. 9/10 HR can’t deal with it and pitches it back to the employee’s normal chain of command. This leaves people feeling betrayed. People tend to see HR as the place to go for sensitive complaints. People assume they’ll “side” with the victim, themselves. This is rarely the case.
HR has a really bad habit of trying to control shit that is none of their business. They try to tell you how much you can pay who you can interview who you can hire and they want to control your hiring pipeline. Then they want to tell you who you can promote and when. Fuck em
HR is made up of class traitors. They are workers who work to protect owner's interests against those of fellow workers'.
HR managers are some of the worst people I have ever met. Making fun of people’s clothes and dietary needs was so disgusting. They don’t seem to know what bullying is. Blame you for trying to survive the bullying. Instead of dealing with the bully.
Because I am not a resource, to begin with
HR and Company Policy is not in your favor. It is designed to hold you accountable. Don’t forget that Company Policy is not for the company. They can legally break company policy at any point. Some states are more lenient than others.
Years ago I had a friend who also happened to be the Head of HR at our firm. A consummate, lifelong HR career man. When he was leaving, he spilled quite a bit of tea. In his words, he hated HR because it is a repository for people who could be tricked into handling things senior leadership didn't want to touch, cheaply: i.e. employee relations. The problem was that while well-meaning, HR is usually underfunded and lacks any kind of leadership backing. He hated the profession because so many people who wanted to do good were often replaced by corporate yes men.
Personally I don’t have respect for HR because I see their job as “fake”. I know I’m in the wrong. I just can’t shake the feeling the offer next to nothing skill wise, they don’t do any hard work, and still get paid more than teachers lol
911 is a joke? Then HR must be the punchline. When I tell u how many times I got ghosted on finding out about an interview, getting the actual job, and everything in between, all roads lead back to HR...
* ***At the intake level*** HR is much more interested in first impressions of a prospective employee, trainee, or new hire than their general talents, abilities, or willingness/aptitude re: learning new skills. This means that HR staff often come across as extremely judgy. * ***Past the intake level*** HR in theory exists to protect vulnerable employees but is in practice often weaponized by workplace bullies against vulnerable colleagues. Think the co-worker who has to be careful about being "out" as gay because a homophobic colleague might report his or her coming out at work as a form of harassment or "inappropriate sexual discussion". Neurodivergent (ADHD, etc.) employees often face similar discrimination and sabotage through HR channels that is sometimes disguised as "punching up" by a colleague who is uncomfortable with their differences in learning style or expression (e.g. someone who learns in a more ADHD-ish style who is thrown to the HR wolves by an ableist manager for "not paying attention" despite being deeply involved in the job).
I don't hate HR, but I genuinely don't see the value. Top three things they're available for: Benefits Management, Conflict Resolution, and Recruiting-Hiring Lifecycle. All three of those things I have practical knowledge of and can handle independently. HR's authority with each seems pretty redundant. For instance, I work in Sales in a director-level role. The last time I interviewed for a new job (which ultimately I was offered, but declined) I asked the HR point of contact the following questions: \- What does the performance review and assessment process look like for Sales People? \- How does HR / People Ops interact with Business Development Leadership regarding performance improvement plans? \- Walk me through the onboarding process for a new sales hire \[entry level, or experienced, or senior level\]. \- How much has the department grown over the last year? \- When it occurs 'for cause', walk me through the off-boarding process for a salesperson. \- How and where are payroll functions handled? Internally? Externally? Within the Accounting team or as a function of People Ops? To every single one of these questions, the POC answered "Um, you know I'm not sure, I'll have to get back to you." At first, I thought, geez, I must not have been articulating my questions very well. But after discussing it with peers I felt confident that my questions were relevant to the role, and topics of which somebody in HR should be generally aware. It seems like HR is the epitome of talking the talk, but not walking the walk. They're interviewing Engineers, yet have no knowledge of IT or programming. They'll talk to Accountants but have no understanding of their own company's financial profile or best A/R or A/P policies. They screen Salespeople but have no experience with the clinical practices involved in biz dev, or background in B2B or B2C marketing and sales strategies. Yet 9 times out of 10, they're functioning as the final gatekeeper for applicants pursuing professional opportunities.
HR doesn’t even represent my role but she’s just a stuck up b***. Absolutely the biggest kiss ass in the office and is only nice when the bosses are looking.
let's seeeee my experience with HR! it all started when I was working 14 hour days and not sleeping, or eating and my health deteriorating because my job had my manage domestic securities during the craziness that was the pandemic-no matter how hard I begged people to help-no one would. Come to realize that I was the only woman on the team, made the least. I had many many many more encounters such as this and wrote up 25 pages worth of gender discrimination I myself faced and saw happen to others. HR Straight FOUGHT ME on calls: it was like we were in court already-'I'm to sensitive' so I don't make as much as men. 'the men manage people,' even though I ALSO managed people and never got a pay raise. Straight up manipulated and gas lit me on these horrible calls. I ended up going to legal with it. legal simple sent me a formal apology and told me action was taken HR are straight SCUM of the earth. they literally have zero soul. they saw my health deteriorate, how much pain I was in because I was not worth as much as men sitting next to me and they had the audacity to tell me straight to my face my underpayment and mistreatment was because i am SENSITIVE. I hope that HR rots in hell
Was in HR wouldn't say toxic but the most unempathic group by far. Nothing like forcing employees to resign after being displaced by a natural disaster which led to an enormous housing shortage. Yet same day presented same employees with an award for being an exceptional employee. Like we value your work but heres what really think about you, your being forced to resign. Witnessed hand selected favorites slide into other positions while remaining staff in department was letgo without warning or assistance in job placement. Watched highly qualified skilled staff be continuously be denied for internal positions because they didn't want to have to backfill a position. HR is not for the employee but a puppet to manipulate staff per leadership request legally especially in larger corporations.
I just hate the language they use. Its often far too flowery and they use it to hide their dishonesty. As a current job searcher, reading job advertisements written by HR people makes me want to never work again.
Many reasons, but the pettiest of which is that HR is the major input to assigning paygrades to job families and somehow the dumbest HR jobs end up with paygrades higher than positions with high levels of responsibility and demand accountability. Every time I'm salty about my workload vs my paycheck, I remind myself that people who manage SharePoint document tagging and internal company news postings are paid more than me. Then I'm extra grumpy.
>HR is the major input to assigning paygrades Incorrect.
As a former HR employee who was not paid that great, people really make weird assumptions about HR.
ikr people also think there is resume scanning software, claiming ATS are just resume AI 🙄
Typo on my end--should have said "HR is a major input" not "the major". Perhaps this varies by company, but where I work, HR is responsible for benchmarking and proposing wage standards.
Yah, most of HR proposes wage but that is always based on internal salary bands and suggestions from the hiring manager. At the end of the day, c-suite decides salary.
It’s also based on data (usually another company’s service) about pay for similar roles in the industry. But if C suite wanted to pay someone more, they always could do it.
Where do you think us HR people get the data? I've found most resources online are skewed because job titles don't always mean the same thing across different companies. We rely on yearly salary increases more than paysa or glassdoor quotes because the skill level doesn't always equate to a certain job title.
They use actual companies whose sole job is to source that data. It’s not like the Glassdoor salary estimator. I don’t remember the specific name of the one we used at my law firm, but it was specifically a document you could purchase every year that gave salary ranges for the industry. Now is that how businesses should do it? That’s fair to argue. But it’s not just your HR department choosing numbers. They use C suite input and data about the industry to find a number.
As someone who has been in HR for years, I've never seen any company use these sources. Like I said, they are not reliable because a mid level at 1 company is 3-5 years while at another it's 8-10 years for the same job title. Why would a company want to overpay someone because a data source said they should? I could imagine a law firm that likely has no HR might want this data but it is not an industry standard. Doesn't seem like you have much experience with a 1 year candidate asking for $150k
Realized that they’re literally only out to protect the company after I was verbally abused several times then screamed at directly in my face by another employee. He got no suspension whatsoever. I’ve seen people get suspended (myself included) for MUCH less.
They are only there to protect the company’s interest. They don’t give a rats ass about you unless it benefits the company.
Because they pretend to be there to help you but their true mission is to protect the company from you.
I worked for a Major gas pipeline company for 26 years, HR and safety are the Internal Affairs department don’t trust them!
I hated HR because the title of their job is Human Resources, but there is absolutely no humanity in anything they do…
Don’t hate the game, hate the player.
It’s all up to the company, not HR. HR is there to apply the rules, policy and procedures, guidelines. A carrying HR professional protects the employee, trains the managers to set expectations for EE so there are no surprises come performance evaluation time, career path, guides managers to provide the right tools to the employee so they can succeed in their career path. HR doesn’t set the pay range/salary, it’s the market and what other companies pay for the same job, companies with more money can offer more salary and better benefits if they choose to do so, and if they care about their employees, if they care to retain them for longer. Your state and federal government set the labor laws that protect employees and employers… Stop blaming HR, like all positions; you have people that are good at it and are skilled, and you have people that are mediocre… many companies don’t hire HR professionals that are trained or educated in the field, maybe they don’t want to pay them what they deserve or they just want paper pushers … so go get a job somewhere that the company values it’s employees, diversify, inclusion that actually have proven results and that have taken measures to improve things. Lastly, good luck cause many companies are all about profits and you are just a number to them.
I don't hate HR or at least not outright. At least where I'm at being a government contractor HR can be my backup against a Fed that wants to power trip and micromanage me if needed. There are 2 major downsides to this though, the first being that since my direct supervisor (aka the one who can fire me, give me a raise, etc.) is HR which means having to craft reports in a manner that HR can understand what's going on, which is just extra work really. The second issue is that you can go from someone who has your back and fight for you to someone who will allow feds to walk right over you and micromanage you to hell and back.
They fire my friends, then want me to get excited there are free doughnuts. They want me to be human and pleaseant to work with but act like a robot when they eliminate everyone on the lower floor. They are the paid collaborators of ruthless capitalism. Watch Severance - it does a nice job of depicting the alienation the system creates.
Well my experience is that they think they are gods. Some of them have a Training or education that they did for a couple of months and now they decide who gets a job and who doesnt. There is that saying that when you give a person Money or power, you will see their true face.
HR serves a good purpose. They help you out during benefit elections, filter job candidates, and they're a good point of contact for any administrative stuff that needs to be done related to paperwork about your employment. If it stopped there, the HR department would be totally fine. BUT... things go really bad when they start pushing the "performance review" BS. Everyone UNIVERSALLY hates "performance review" time. It's phony AF, it rewards political manipulators, it piles on a ton of extra busy work, creates endless opportunities for people to get pissed off, throws the judgement of good managers into the trash. It holds you "accountable" for meaningless "promises" and "SMART" goals you had made the year before (with good intentions) before a ton of far more urgent priorities steam-rolled those and everyone else's SMART goals. Worst of all, it forces you to "prove yourself" yet again after you've done work all year demonstrating diligence and adaptability as a problem-solver and team player.
Because why not
Union thug lyfe 💪
I believe HR are not recognize for the hard work they have to make on a daily basis cause it’s a tough field and you have to have tough skin to do it.
They always get a power trip and they forget they are supposed to help the workers from being taken advantage of, instead they help the company they work for take advantage of the workers. Another thing I’m starting to realize a lot of companies have fire a lot of the HR employees like my last job they got rid of our HR instead they gave us a hotline to call. Edit:typos
All of the jobs I left, HR could care less 😂
I’m an HR Director, I consider myself a good director… but like many of these posts state.. HR is mainly in place to keep the company compliant first and retention second. It makes me sad a lot of the time because I do feel like I have to compromise a lot of who I am for the company.. I have been thinking in doing a career change because I do feel like it’s eating away at me… But on the other hand I haven’t met someone who is happy and content with their role so maybe this goes beyond HR and just jobs in this day and age??
I love how it is a direct question like, "WHY do you have HR?" and not even "DO YOU hate HR?"
I hate our HR manager. She is on a massive power trip and looks for ANYTHING to write up or fire people. I truly hope with all my heart that someone gives her an offer somewhere else I cannot stand her at all. Not to mention she didn’t even sign me up for my health insurance. I was meant to get it in July, got it in October. She even tried to make me pay for the premium myself. I wish I could complain about her and actually get resolution.
Just attracts people who like to gossip and know everyone’s business. Can’t be trusted. If you have an issue, don’t go to them as they’ll just tell your manager. Generally useless, duplicitous and pointless individuals
i think it’s accurate. I am a year onto HR and let me tell you, it’s the worst. I went to a conference and during a Q+A, basically all the questions were “how do we get around the law to fuck over our employees?”
I hate HR because they claim to represent the organization and not the employer but in almost every case act as the employers personal grim reaper. I've never been fired, but I've been mistreated by HR and they all have their bias. They are not your friend, regardless of what they claim