I was interested in the conversation about human resources in the context
of Art Kleiner's up-coming article. As an external consultant I have been
intrigued by the differences among HR organizations and how they can
reflect the very worst of some organizations and conversely how they can
lead the very finest of change efforts. I have an example. A client of
mine recently wanted to make the HR department (TQ was part of it) more
responsive to customer needs and underwent a major re-organization in
order to de-centralize services. Service teams were created, as was a
resource center focusing on providing support to the teams. The process
was extraordinary- 1 year of careful design team work( an incredible group
process experience) which included "shopping the idea", getting in-put,
insuring that all in the "old" organization had a place in the new
organization (done through a peopling activity which actually had career
development and growth built in) and then a cut- over. And afterwards,
there has been continuing focus on what has worked and what hasn't, what
they have learned, what they would do differently, etc. One major
awareness is that implementation is really hard-(easier for externals to
know and understand) All along, the focus has been not only on doing what
they were doing, but learning and reflecting so that they could support
the change efforts throughout their organization. Following and during,
the VP in charge has been open to thinking and learning, has presented at
many conferences, and has modeled open and responsive leadership.
It is not an accident, I think, that his background was in finance and
that his organization had people from a variety of disciplines prior to
their HR assignments. Also, because TQ is taken seriously and was
incorporated in the department, it makes the mandate broader. What is the
summary? I think that much of innovation and creativity and change lies
in the "risk" capacity of a leader. Those HR departments that are willing
to try something new send a message not only to their own staffs, but to
the organization as a whole.
Do others have experiences like this? What do you think?
-- Deborah120@aol.com HellerCunningham Brookline, MA