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Tales from the Corporate Frontline
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The Heart of the CompanyThis article relates to the Human Resource Functions competency, commonly evaluated in employee satisfaction surveys. It deals with employee feelings with regard to the quality and implementation of the human resource role within your organization. A human resource department that is properly informed of employee issues, demonstrates a high integrity level, and communicates effectively with staff and management supports a high level of confidence in the company, throughout the workforce. This article, The Heart of the Company, is part of AlphaMeasure's compilation, Tales from the Corporate Frontlines. The author compares the human resource departments of three different companies - their varying structures, styles of operation and the attitudes of the employees served. Anonymous Submission Of all the corporate functions being outsourced today, those in the Human Resources category affect employees most. My experience has told me that some companies make a huge mistake when they scale down or eliminate on premise HR staff. Over the past ten years, I've worked for three different companies. Each handled its Human Resource Functions in a completely different style. The first company, in my opinion the best, handled all of its Human Resources Functions in-house. Granted, it was a small company, but it always seemed as if the HR associates had complete control and access to information, and could serve employees very efficiently. This HR department was basically an arm of the company created to serve employees. It existed as a true "resource" for the people who worked there. Payroll and benefit questions were often answered immediately. The staff was caring, involved, and discreet, and employees felt welcome and comfortable approaching the department to get their questions answered and issues resolved. The second company's HR department functioned somewhat differently. It was harder for employees to get information about benefits or payroll, not to mention the new policies and procedures that were added to the employee handbook regularly. There was a long wait for any of the normal human resource functions to be complete, even under the best circumstances. The department was minimally staffed, and the associates always suffered from a lack of information. They genuinely wanted to be helpful, but sometimes the job was difficult and they did the best they could. This department was more an arm of the company created to serve the company. At the third company, Human Resource functions existed mainly online and were outsourced. Payroll was on one coast, benefits another, and very little information was kept on premises, and most of the services had to be accessed online. Although this was great for net savvy employees, for those not used to working with the Internet, it required extensive training that was always promised and seldom provided. This model was cost effective, but extremely impersonal. Employees said that they felt like they were working for "Big Brother". The few HR staff members worked garrisoned away behind high walls and closed doors - for privacy - but nobody really believed that. The result was low morale -I didn't stay there very long before moving to a company that worked differently.
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Measure. Report. Improve your organization with AlphaMeasure employee surveys. Josh Greenberg is President of AlphaMeasure, Inc. AlphaMeasure provides organizations of all sizes a powerful web based method for measuring employee satisfaction, determining employee engagement, and increasing employee retention. AlphaMeasure is fully customizable and allows you to target the organizational topics and challenges facing your staff today. Launch your employee satisfaction survey with AlphaMeasure.
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