Caras Consulting Inc.

As you’ve likely gathered by now, this blog dives deeper than most about the daily lives of HR Business Partners and Generalists. We have stressful, tough jobs that require us to be happy and shiny and approachable pretty much all the time. And we’re frequently one of the last groups to get “support” of any kind whether it’s related to mental health or career.

Today I wanted to talk about something that I’ve struggled with several times and what I’m sure my HR colleagues struggle with time and time again.

Leaders frequently call upon HR to come in and “help” their employees deal with their issues both at work and personal stuff that spills over into work. Whether that’s by referring them to the employee assistance program, or through gentle counseling and coaching from the HRBP. But who looks after HR folks when they are struggling with personal issues? How many companies have an HR for HR that truly looks after them?

The truth is, not many.

So, we’re left to our own devices. How exactly do you push yourself out of the funk, especially when you’re down in the dumps and then have to talk a manager or employee off the ledge? How do you give yourself to others when you don’t have much to give? There’s no doubt, it’s a tough spot to be in.

Over the years, I’ve come up with some coping mechanisms to help me embrace the funk without projecting on to my clients. These are not scientific methods in any way, and they may not work for everyone. But I’ve used these several times in the past and they’ve helped compartmentalize my personal feelings from what’s required on the job.

Count down from 5 to 1

5..4..3..2..1..deep breath. That’s literally the thing I do before jumping into what I know will be a difficult or draining conversation. This is a take on Mel Robbins’ trick to get yourself to do something you don’t want to do. Whether you’ve just got off the phone after a fight with your significant other or a difficult conversation with your child’s teacher, or you’ve just had a blowout with your mom (been there for all of these things), counting down and taking a deep breath works miracles when you’re trying to clear the previous conversation and get ready for the next.

Set the intention

I’m not into mediation or any of that mindfulness stuff, but when I discovered the concept of setting intentions, my life changed. I set intentions for almost everything I do now, whether that’s starting a difficult task, getting over my procrastination, or switching gears from personal to professional or vice versa. The concept is simple (and my method may not be the conventional method): before beginning a task, you say “I will worry about my problems in exactly one hour. For the next hour, I will focus solely on Sally’s problem and I will give her my full attention.” Then you smile and dial Sally’s number, or walk over to her office. It’s nothing complicated, but the simple sentence somehow puts you in the right frame of mind. This also works when you get home from a difficult day at work and need to focus on your spouse or kids.

Avoidance

Now, I know this one is weird. And unexpected, considering you’re reading this because you wanted tips on dealing with helping others. The truth is, the best way to stop the overlap or switching gears, is to avoid getting into the situation in the first place. So, where you can avoid the call from school for the moment, do so. If you can put off your mother until the evening, then do that. Or at the very least, don’t get into the conversation right before a critical meeting with a client. Avoidance is not the easiest option, but sometimes it’s the only option to stay focused at work.

Find a venting buddy

Let’s face it, as much as we should be the upholders of the “no venting” philosophy, blowing off steam after a tough conversation does wonder to your brain. Again, this is by no means scientific. I have no idea whether it actually does anything for your brain, but it works for me. Find a trusted friend at work (or outside of it) to quickly brain dump the previous conversation. Keep it to no more than 5 minutes and then move on. Honestly, talking about the issue for even five minutes, really eases the stress and pressure, allowing you the space to take on the next challenge.

Be Honest

I’m a big believer in authenticity. Your clients want to know that you’re human. It’s one of the reasons I allow myself to curse and am 100% myself in front of my clients. Sometimes telling your clients that you’re not in a good head space gives them the opportunity to rethink how they frame their problems. This is especially useful for chronic complainers. You know the ones: they always have something negative to say about the company (or their boss or their team or their work) and really suck the life out of you. Saying something like “I just had a really trying conversation with my husband and I’d really love to talk about something happy. Tell me something good that happened to you today.” This can potentially change the tone of the conversation and avoid a diatribe in its tracks.

These are just a few ways I reframe myself when I have to be there for my clients during a difficult time or when I have to have a tough conversation. I’d love to hear what tactics you use to motivate and support your clients when you’re not feeling it yourself. Leave a comment below and let us know.

If you like this post, head on over to www.carasconsulting.com and sign up for our weekly emails that are packed full of tips and advice just like this.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post on the state of HR’s reputation with the business. My assumptions on that post were based on anecdotal and personal evidence of my interactions with Business and HR professionals over the years.

I’ve mentioned in earlier posts that I was at an HR conference in late January and that I came away with so much. Today I want to talk about HR’s reputation. In the Conference edition of the HR Professional magazine, my anecdotes and personal opinion were corroborated with statistical evidence (HRProfessional Magazine, page). The article talks about the public perception of professionalism in HR with research based on a 2018 Ipsos survey of approximately 2000 members of non-HR professionals. The results weren’t great.

The article describes professionalism as the attitudes, values and behaviours of an individual which included one of more of the following characteristics: maturity of character, dedication to one’s craft, a disciplined approach to ones work, emotional self-control, trustworthiness, honesty, high ethical standards, high standards of one’s work, and intrinsically motivated.

Only 29% of the public had a positive opinion of HR Professionals and believed that HR professionals had high or very high honesty and ethical standards. This was the second lowest among regulated professionals, with lawyers being the lowest (an interesting result considering we work so closely with legal professionals).

The survey also found that regulated professions such as Accountants scored much higher. Another interesting point when you consider that CFOs are frequently held in higher regard than CHROs (if the CHRO position even exists in the organization).

What isn’t clear from these studies is which of the characteristics people were considering when they answered the questions on the survey. It’s hard to imagine that anyone would doubt HR’s honesty, trustworthiness or our maturity. But there it is. And, let’s be honest, it’s a little hard not to take it personally, isn’t it? After all, the definition of professionalism includes attitudes, values and behaviours of individuals, not systems (we’ve already established that the system needs an overhaul).

The point of this blog post isn’t to rehash the stats in the HR Professional article. It’s to highlight a real problem facing our profession and start thinking about how we can fix it.

We have a lot of work to do, guys!

Rather than provide answers or solutions to the problem, I’d like to pose a few questions to you, my fellow HR Professionals:

What attitudes do you feel contribute to professionalism?

The HR Professional article gives us some broad categories such as high ethical standards and high standards of one’s work. What else could we focus on to develop an attitude that amplifies our professionalism? Here are a few that I think to make a big difference:

• Putting our clients first, whether they’re employees or managers of the company.
• Making sure that every piece of work we do is with the client’s benefit first, whether that’s rethinking performance management, compensation plans, coaching, advice.
• Have a strategic mindset. This is such a broad category, but it begs to mention because too many of us get caught up in putting out the fire of the hour, as opposed to determining root causes of the issues causing us to sometimes spin around in circles. Not a great look from our clients’ perspective.
• Develop an “Everything is figureoutable” attitude. This concept comes from Marie Forleo, a business and life coach who I greatly admire. The basic premise is that there is no problem that doesn’t have a solution, whether that’s ours or the client’s problem. When we have this attitude, we eliminate the “we can’t do that” response from our vocabulary.

What behaviours contribute to our professionalism?

Trustworthiness and honesty are paramount in this profession, so it is a little shocking that anyone would question our integrity in that respect. The logical conclusion is that our behaviours don’t match our values, or not to the extent we want them to. Here are a few things to think about and, no doubt, you’ll think of more:

• How often do we keep confidential things confidential? This is a tough one because sometimes we have to share what people tell us in order to solve their problem. But how can we share the information without betraying confidences and still solve the problem? Some say that’s impossible, but if we are to earn people’s trust, we have to think bigger and come up with a solution to that problem. Perhaps it means telling people up front that we can’t keep that particular thing confidential if we want to solve their problem. Perhaps that means learning a different way of approaching the issue with managers.
• How often do we give our clients the information they need to make an informed decision? How often do we have a vested interest in our clients’ successes? If we think about our clients’ success as our success, we start to put a different spin on the advice we give them. It becomes less about policies and legal constraints and more about creative solutions to problems (I had a boss once who was a master at this; watch for an interview with her in a future blog post).
• Getting back to people on time, doing what we say we will do, and thinking beyond the confines of HR. These are easy to implement and have a huge impact for our clients.

This blog post isn’t meant to provide answers to the big problems that our profession faces. It is meant to trigger discussion and start that journey towards changing that 29% to an 85%. If you’re shocked by the results of the HRPA survey, then let this blog post provide the wake-up call you need to get into action.

I’d love to hear from you! Are you surprised by the results? What are you going to do to change this perception of HR?

**I’d like to invite you to my community. Head on over to www.carasconsulting.com and sign up for my weekly updates, insights from the business, events and other nuggets that I only share on email. I’ll see you there!**

Hyperlink the underlined words to the blog post called “A Grassroots Guide to Fixing HR’s Reputation”

Note the hyperlink to the article

Last week I attended the HR Professional Association (HRPA) Annual Conference. It’s the annual 3-day event the Association puts on with several high-profile keynote speakers and dozens of concurrent sessions covering all areas of HR.

Can I tell you, I was blown away! It was one of the most value-packed, energetic events I’ve attended in many years. In fact, there was so much value, I think I have blog post fodder for several weeks to come. You’ll be hearing a LOT about the conference. If you didn’t attend, definitely stay tuned.

The keynote speakers were all awesome, but the two that really stuck with me were Jade Simmons and Cy Wakeman. If you don’t know who they are, I strongly urge you to check out their stories and follow them. Their journeys were so poignant, and so hit the mark on the theme that I want to talk about today: Courage.

Both women were (are!) pioneers in their respective (very different) fields. Both talked about the myths of fitting in, how pushing boundaries elevated their careers, and how they continue to lead change and do big things. When you think about it, we, as HR Business Partners, are perfectly poised to make BIG changes. But how many of us can honestly say that we have put ourselves out there and actually made those big changes? Or even tried to?

So I have a confession to make. Some of you know that I started my business in the summer of 2017, leaving behind an amazing corporate job. Many people thought it was the ultimate act of courage. Some were envious. Many were worried that I’d gone crazy. But the truth is, I was not courageous. I had a big financial safety net and extremely low overhead. It took me 3 months to get my first client and I charged him 15% of what I was worth because I was too afraid of losing him. 15%!

Beyond that, my courage failed when it was time to broadcast my message. I knew from the very beginning that I needed to create original content, get my thoughts and views out there into the world, build my brand. Yet I couldn’t make myself do it.

I was terrified of putting myself out there.

Everyone told me I was so brave to quit corporate, but I wasn’t brave at all.

You see, for 18 months, I played a safe game. I kept my ideas to myself. I only “liked” posts that others liked first. I didn’t share a single original blog post on my personal LinkedIn profile for fear of what people would think of me. I didn’t want to piss off that one influential person who might give me business but because I wrote the wrong thing now wouldn’t. I wrote blog posts that were boring and I didn’t have much to say so I blogged inconsistently. In wanting to please everyone, I was pleasing no one.

Jade Simmons and Cy Wakeman changed that for me.

Here’s what I realized. People want to see others carve a different path. They want to root for the new kid who’s doing something different. They want to be inspired. And inspiration doesn’t have to come from profound, eloquent trailblazers. Regular everyday people like you and me can inspire. We don’t need to start organizational-wide movements, but we can say one thing to one person that will help them change one thing about themselves.

But perhaps the most important lesson I learned last week is that you can’t inspire everyone. And if you’re too afraid of saying what you think for fear of upsetting one person, the person who really needs to hear your message will never hear it. If Jade Simmons hadn’t spoken up to her music teacher for fear of being expelled (or them dying! – you have to read her story), we would never have discovered her exhilarating, unique style of music.

So, in light of my new-found wisdom, I’m here to share something with you.

Whether you’re in HR or not, the world needs to hear from you. But particularly if you are in HR and support a client group, you have an obligation to be out there spreading your brand of wisdom. They want a passionate, real person guiding them and counseling them to be better.

Here’s one thing I know for an absolute fact. No one comes into work every day to be mediocre. Everyone wants to make their mark, make a contribution, and be fulfilled in their jobs. HRBPs, you have an obligation to the people at your organization to help them realize their potential and find their way.

Raise your hand, how many of you know at least one manager who should not be a manager? Not because they’re deficient in any way, but because their passion is in doing the job, not managing it. Guess what? Being a manager is not the holy grail of a corporate job. Why is it that we’re so accepting of people who tell us that they don’t want executive responsibility, but when someone says they don’t want to manage people, we think they’re unambitious?

Now, I know having courage is not easy. But that’s the thing about courage. You can’t be courageous without being afraid.

Another show of hands, have you ever known the answer to a question in a forum/presentation and have not raised your hand? I’ll bet there are a few of you out there. So, let’s start with this one. The next time you’re at a large meeting, or a conference and the speaker asks the audience a question, raise your hand. It’s a simple thing, but it will help you start.

We have to start small in order to get to the really big stuff. The world desperately needs us to get to the big stuff, but unless we can speak up about the little things, we don’t stand a chance with the company-wide things.

I was brave in the corporate world. I raised my hand, I was vocal about what I felt was right and what was wrong and I made an impact. But when I was dropped into a new world, I went silent again. I stopped talking and I’ve robbed the world of my viewpoint. You see, it’s irrelevant whether people like what I have to say or not. I don’t know either way unless I speak. I’ve decided to break my silence now and I hope that you’ll come with me and break yours.

I’d like to invite you to my community. Head on over to www.carasconsulting.com and sign up for my weekly updates. I promise to share regularly and I want to hear your viewpoints about HR and about the world. I’ll see you there!

No matter what their profession, the highest performing people are those that not only master their own craft but also understand their client’s world inside out.

I remember when I was studying for my HR certification, it was enough for an HR professional to just know HR, employment law, and the company’s policies and procedures. In those days, leaders didn’t expect much more from their HR rep and only went to them when they had an “employee issue” or needed to hire someone.

Anyone who’s been in HR for longer than the past ten years or so knows that the expectations of HR have increased significantly. It’s no longer enough to just know HR. HR Business Partners and HR Generalists are expected to know the inner workings of the business they support, whether that’s operations, finance, legal, marketing, or any other specific function in the company.

Plus, I can tell you from personal experience that speaking the department’s or business partner’s language gives you permission to get in their inner circle, a place where you need to be if you want to influence decisions. And, if you’ve been an HRBP for any length of time, you know the holy grail of this job is to be able to influence (not force) your client’s into doing the right thing.

Yet, unfortunately, there are far too many HRBPs and HR Generalists who struggle with learning the business. Some feel like it’s not that important, others feel overwhelmed by all the new information (and let’s be honest, there can be a lot!), and there are some who feel like they’re doing an effective enough job without knowing the details.

I remember several years ago, I asked a panel of senior HR leaders whether they thought it would be beneficial for an HRBP to have their CFA designation (Chartered Financial Analyst – a very difficult, lengthy certification process) along with their CHRL. They all but laughed at me. First, they told me that getting the CFA was too difficult and that it would be a waste of the HRBP’s time. Now, at the time I was supporting the Capital Markets group of a large financial services company. And it was a whole other world to me. I didn’t know much about that business, and the employees there didn’t really take me seriously. I mean, they respected me for my HR knowledge, but I never got invited to any deeper discussion. And fair enough, it would’ve gone over my head anyway! But what irked me was that these senior HR people were telling me that a CFA (a designation that 100% of the employees in this Capital Markets group had) would be a waste of time for an HRBP. Wouldn’t my job have been easier if I could speak the same language? And wouldn’t they involve me in deeper discussions if they knew I’d understand it?

Now, I’m not telling you to get a CFA if you’re supporting a Capital Markets business. What I am telling you is that you have to speak the language of your client’s business. I’m telling you that after working with hundreds of leaders over the past 12 years, I know that you will get more time of day when you understand the inner workings of your client’s organization.

The funny thing is, senior HR leaders all over know this. But there is no manual that teaches HRBPs how to “learn the business”. We all know it’s important to understand the business, but we’re left to figure it out for ourselves.

Over the years, I’ve had to fumble my way through learning my client’s business. I’ve supported clients in real estate, investments, private equity, capital markets, legal, marketing, finance, manufacturing, IT, engineering, insurance, sales, and operations. And I’ve had to learn the business pretty darn quickly to make an impact as quickly as possible.

Here are my 8 foolproof ways to learn your client’s business in less than 30 days.

Make it priority

You can’t learn anything without making it a priority. In the early days of taking over a new client group, you’ll have more time on your hands. I suggest you set aside 10 hours a week to ramp up over the first month on the job. Yes, it’s a lot, but the payoff is most definitely worth it.

Speak to people

One of the first things I do when I take over a new client group is set up meetings with everyone in the group, from the most senior person to the most junior person. I have a list of questions I like to ask them about what they do, who they report to, how their job fits into the department and the company, what they like about their job, and what’s the one thing they would change if they could. These questions give you a world of information. At first, you may not understand the nuances of everything they say but take copious notes. I promise that after the first few meetings, things will start to make sense. I also like to bring a copy of the org chart of the department so we can reference other people and functions as they come up in conversation.

Ask to be invited to team meetings

If you haven’t already been invited, ask the senior-most leader if you could be invited to their team meetings. I tell leaders that I want to learn the business so that I can provide as much value as possible. I also tell them that I’d be available to them if there was an HR question that came up. Sometimes leaders are skeptical, but if you present it in a way that makes sense, they almost always say yes. Again, take copious notes.

Organize Your Files

Look back at my last post about organizing your emails. Organize your physical files the same way. I have one file folder for each department or leader. You can do whatever makes the most sense to your business. When I return from my meetings, I file my notes into the respective folder. At the end of the week, I set aside an hour to read through my notes from all my meetings. I make note of any follow-up questions I have and any major themes that have emerged.

Ask clients for useful websites

Industry websites are extremely helpful in learning the basics of any business you’re supporting. For example, when I was supporting the various financial services departments, I found Investopedia to be invaluable. It broke down complex concepts into very simple terms. You can then use the concepts you learn to relate them back to the issues your clients talk about in your one on one meetings or team meetings. This way you learn the concepts and then learn the context within your client’s business. I would set aside 5 hours per week for this.

Share the information with HR colleagues

One of the best ways to solidify your learning is to teach it to someone. Share the information you learn with your COE partners and other HR Business Partners across your larger organization. If you’re a single HR person in a small company, network with other HR Generalists in your industry and share notes. Plus, there’s nothing more valuable than going back to your client’s with information on how others in the industry do things, or organize their departments, or other HR practices. Of course, it goes without saying that you need to be careful you’re not oversharing or giving away proprietary information. If you’re not sure what is proprietary, ask your business partners what is considered confidential or a trade secret. I would set aside 1 hour per week for networking.

Read Executive decks or Client presentations and pitches

Another really easy way to learn high-level basics of your client’s business is to read decks they prepare and send to external parties such as investors, clients, and partners. When I joined a private equity firm, I read through their deal documents to learn and understand the deal process. You’d need to ask your clients to share this information with you, and if you present it such that you want to learn to help serve them better, most times they’re more than willing to share.

Google!

Really for any 21st-century professional researching a topic, Google truly is your best friend. Set up Google Alerts for keywords that you learn in your meetings and through reading pitches and decks. Learn how to do BOOLEAN searches and zero in on really specific terms to get the most accurate and relevant results. I set up daily alerts for the first 30 days, then weekly alerts after that.

That’s it!

Follow the 8 ways above for one month and you’ll be well on your way to learning the ins and outs of the business you’re supporting. These 8 ways have worked for me time and time again and helped me build outstanding relationships with my clients. I’ve always been able to give my clients advice that most other HR Business Partners have not been able to give them. All because I took the time to learn their business.

I’d love to hear how you implement these steps and your success stories afterward. Are there any other tips that have worked for you? Comment below and let me know.

If you like this post, head on over to www.carasconsulting.com and sign up for our weekly emails that are packed full of tips and advice just like this.

The discussion was getting heated.

A group of about seven of us were in a performance calibration session. You know, those year-end meetings HR facilitates with business leaders to ensure everyone is being rated fairly (yes, we were still doing those, but more on that later).

One of the managers had gathered feedback from all of the employee’s clients and was reading the emails to the group, to justify the rating. The emails went something like this: “Eric is always ready to brainstorm with me to find a solution to my problem”, and “Eric goes above and beyond by responding to emails on time”, and “I love working with Eric; he’s part of our team”. The manager’s own feedback was along the same lines.

“Hang on,” I said. “Everything that you’ve said about Eric is great. But I would expect that of every employee. What has Eric done that has exceeded expectations?” At this point, all eyes were on me, and a moment of stunned silence ensued. Then all at once, everyone started speaking.

“No, he’s the best employee we have!”

“We need more people like Eric on the team!”

“Eric is way farther ahead than his peers!”

Then one of the VPs turned to me and said:

“Eric does far more for his clients than anyone in the HR department does for me!”

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out. It was like a slap in the face. The argument deflated pretty quickly after that.

When I got back to my desk that afternoon, I had to think hard about what the VP had said.

And it reminded me of other times I’d heard similar things, not about me, but about HR in general. When I tell people that I’m in HR, they give me an almost disdainful look. Oh, it’s very subtle. Guilty by association. In the early days, I was puzzled. Then I started calling people out on it. Why? What has been your experience with HR? Some would fumble and give me platitudes, but most would look me straight in the eye and tell me their truth:

Hinderance to business, unhelpful, just a mouthpiece, Catbert (with a smirk), narrow-minded, useless. I swear, I’m not making this up.

It hurt. Knowing that I didn’t want to be like that, and so many HR people I’ve worked with didn’t either. We genuinely want to help our clients. But the perception stays. Why is that?

I mean, I respond to emails. Sure, I’m not always prompt about it, but that’s because there’s so much work to do all the time, and sometimes emails fall to the bottom of the pile. And I try to give them options, but the policies we have in place are very clear on what is possible and what isn’t. I try to understand their challenges, but I didn’t really know what they do. And it’s hard to brainstorm with clients when they just come to you and tell you what to do, usually the very things they can’t do because of policies or the law.

So, if we don’t want to be that way and work hard not to, is the fault with us, or with the system? And isn’t the system defined by the people within it?

When the #MeToo movement began in 2017, it started with one man, but it was a movement against a flawed system. A system that was not merit-based, a system that forced women to do things they didn’t want to do if they wanted any measure of success. Women were victims and, finally in 2017, men were called out, but the reality is that women were part of that flawed system for decades. They were complacent members of that system. Everyone knew what was going on, but it took until 2017 for women to speak out.

We have to take charge of our own reputation and our own place in the corporate world. I’m so tired of waiting for the system to change.

I read HR magazines, and I hear about HR executives who are making transformative changes to their organizations and making HR more business-centric while balancing the needs of the employees.

But, let’s be really honest here… unless you’re part of that rare progressive company, most of us are stuck with the same HR practices that were put into place 30 years ago. Annual performance review forms that nobody likes, bonuses that are uber subjective (if there are bonuses at all), terminations at will (even in Canada, though we have better severance packages), bureaucratic org structures, cumbersome systems, rigid policies, and the list goes on.

In other words, the tools of the trade have changed, but the trade itself is exactly the same!

So, this article is for the regular HR folks out there who are disenchanted with their HR department’s internal practices. For those HR folks who want big changes but can’t get their Senior Leadership Team to see their value. For those HR folks who have bosses who are too scared to go against the norm.

I’m talking about a grassroots shift in the way HR is perceived at your company. The way you are perceived in your company.

Grassroots movements start with small changes, at the individual level. The way to change the HR system in your workplace is to do something yourself. Let’s not wait for permission. Let’s not wait for them to figure out how to fix the system.

Let’s make 2019 the year HR professionals speak out about HR. Don’t let the system define who we are. Reclaim your right to be respected!

So, here’s what I’m asking us to do, starting today:

Respond to every email and voicemail the same day.

This is from countless people I’ve spoken with, and such a simple one, but it does wonders to increase the perception of reliability with your business partners. Even if we don’t have an answer, acknowledge that we’ve received their email/voicemail and will get back to them with an answer. Then get back to them with an answer or provide regular updates on the status of the answer. Let’s aim for a client to never have to follow-up with us.

Take the time to sit with clients at regular intervals without an agenda

The first rule of building trust is to get to know our people. And allow them to know us as people. I’m talking about frustrations, likes, dislikes, aspirations, interests, strengths, fears. The more we know about them as a person, the more effective we’ll be in our communication with them, and in giving them advice and guidance when it really counts. In time, they’ll see us as a trusted friend, not the HR adversary they have to brace themselves to deal with.

I’m talking about all employees, not just the managers and leaders. This is so important because many times we get a one-sided view of the business: the managers view. When we aim to get to know all employees, we can add more value to leaders.

Make time to understand the client’s business

Let’s set aside a part of our week to learn the business area that we’re supporting. Talk to people about what they do, learn their jargon and business terms, then practice with them. Ask to be invited to their team meetings so we can see those business terms in practice. Book coffees and lunches with people to learn about what they do in the organization. At first, this will be hard, but if we come at this with a genuine desire to learn, people will warm to us. Aim to talk to all employees, not just the managers. We want to learn the business inside out, their processes, their practices, their relationships with internal departments.

Get a handle on tasks and get organized

This sounds easy but is so hard for most of us, and it’s so crucial. One of the biggest complaints people have about their HR departments is that their request goes into a black hole. Let’s organize our emails, our tasks and project manage the large initiatives we’re involved with. Listen to productivity podcasts, read blogs, watch videos. Pick a system that works for each of us and implement it right away.

Work hard to come up with non-standard HR responses to questions.

Let’s blow our clients away with solutions that don’t involve the phrase “you can’t do that”. I’ll talk more about this in future posts, but for now, whenever we have the urge to tell someone they can’t do something, follow it up with what they can do, and if possible, offer several options. As we keep doing #1 to #4 above, this will get easier, because we’ll know our people, and we’ll know their business, and that’s 80% of the solution.

Lastly, the only way to fight this fight is to be passionate about what you do. If you’ve lost your passion, then now is the time to change that. Life is too damn short, and work hours are far too long, to live without loving every single day.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll go deeper into how we can turn this conversation about HR on its head. How to build trust with clients, how to be courageous, how to change the limiting beliefs about our potential. Because once we start doing these things, a wonderful thing will happen. Those around us, our peers, our clients, will start to emulate us. We’ll change people’s lives without citing a single policy or writing a single performance improvement plan.

Now I’d love to hear from you. Do you agree? Disagree?

Head on over to www.carasconsulting.com to join our community and get weekly updates, live events, interviews with clients, and so much more.

**COMING SOON – private Facebook group to share ideas with each other and hear directly from me weekly!**