The Secret HR Director: Is HR really a credible business partner?

The Secret HRD has worked for some of the world’s largest organisations. Each month our undercover operator will speak out on the biggest issues in HR that many in the industry would rather sweep under the carpet. Following our recent roundtable on business partnering, the Secret HRD asks, are HR professionals doing enough to build credibility?

I recently attended a seminar on finance and accounting. When I told some HR colleagues, once they had stopped laughing, most of them groaned and said how awful it must have been. It actually hadn’t been, and I’d refreshed my skills over some important points with forecasting.

But it’s a relevant example to a question that runs something like – are HR professionals really prepared for business life or just for HR life? The two are different. In business life, the Finance Director should be your best friend. In HR life, you can sometimes ending up having nothing to do with them, particularly in big organisations, and working on your own, discrete projects.

As budgets are increasingly squeezed, there are many organisations that don’t have any HR function. HR is seen as a cost and one that they can do without. However, where there is an HR function, justifying the value of the department is important, and business prioritization is key. Are we preparing the next generation of HR professionals for the true pressures of business, giving them a credible presence, or do they emerge with their qualifications still thinking a new organisation design will solve every problem in the business?

Recently I was managing a junior member of staff who was studying for their CIPD. As part of their on the job experience, I got them to spend some time with a management consultant from a big firm, and a coach who worked with C-suite leaders, to learn what not only made business priorities inside and outside the company, but also how to gain credibility when communicating with these people. What are the different pressures if a company is privately or publicly held? Is Private Equity backing more challenging? And then they spent time with a finance head learning how to read the balance sheet and why it was important.

This junior member of staff was more credible than many of their senior colleagues. And I wasn’t the only one to notice it – she was headhunted a couple of months later for a more senior role. Whilst I was sad to lose this person, I was equally glad that someone with business acumen was succeeding. Businesses need more of them!