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For HR, fostering a culture of trust, in which HR is seen not only as a function that serves overall business outcomes, but also aims to improve the working lives of professionals, is absolutely fundamental.
Without trust, it’s increasingly hard for HR to deliver on its key objectives.
However, according to new research, a growing number of employees are seemingly expressing distrust and dissatisfaction not with their businesses, but with their HR departments.
And this sentiment has reportedly sparked the emergence of independent HR services, providing workers with an alternative avenue to address grievances and seek support.
In fact, a survey published last month found that more than a third of 1,005 small-business workers in the U.S. didn’t trust their HR departments.
In a 2021 survey of 1,000 workers at organizations with more than 250 employees, 47% reported that they didn’t trust HR to help with conflict resolution.
More than two in five respondents didn’t believe that the department would act impartially, with 43% saying they think senior staff members were favored in workplace disputes.
According to research from the Workforce Institute, two in five employees (38%) don’t trust their organization to put employee interests ahead of profits and almost half (47%) of employees don't trust HR to help with conflict resolution at all.
It seems, according to Zeneefits data, that much of this distrust stems from the idea that HR serves only to benefit the corporate agenda, which many perceive as morally questionable.
A significant 38% of respondents felt that HR does not equally enforce company policies for all employees, with 18% of that group believing managers get special treatment.
71% of HR employees in the survey stated that less than 30% of complaints they received in the last two years resulted in any disciplinary action.
Having less than a third of cases result in disciplinary action reportedly led respondents to wonder — if they bring complaints forward, will anything even result?
What can HR do to improve employee trust?
There are two vital ways in which HR can convey its advantage to employees and win back trust.
The first is to consider transparency. HR teams have to be visible and open to employees. This means getting in front of employees—and doing it on a regular basis.
The research found that the better-known they are, the higher the level of trust, and that’s good for the way the whole business works together.
The second is evidencing hard outcomes. Employees are used to the prospect of multiple employee surveys, however few are seemingly aware of how their insights and contributions actively inform direction of travel.
Even if HR concludes that it cannot act on employee insight, evidencing what has been taken from it and that the senior leadership is actively listening. Without this clear communication on hard outcomes, employee engagement will wane and give way to distrust.
