Should You Trust Your Human Resources Department?

Ah, the human resources department: the Dolores Umbridge of work departments!

From Catbert the Evil Director of Human Resources to Office Space‘s The Bobs, HR as an institution has a less than stellar reputation. Some consider it downright evil.

But why? Why does HR get such a bad rap? Especially when they’re supposedly set up to provide employees with recourse against shitty coworkers and a direct pipeline to the EEOC?

Is HR really all that evil? And more importantly… should you trust them?

What even is the human resources department?

Human resources exists to protect the company. Not the individual employee—the company. So if something is not in the best interest of the company, HR shuts that whole thing down!

Their mission statement: stop employees from costing the company money. They mediate problems not to seek justice, but to avoid expensive lawsuits, settlements, and public relations disasters.

So if you take nothing else away from this lesson, let it be this: human resources is not your friend or ally. They are not impartial judges, mediators, therapists, playground monitors, RAs, or anything of the sort. Doesn’t matter how nice the individual employees are, nor their best intentions. If they must choose between defending you and defending the company, they will choose the company every time. It’s their job to do so.

A brief history of human resources

Human resources originated as a way to stop employees from unionizing. This is because unions, as we’ve discussed, empower employees through collective bargaining. A powerful union can advocate for fancy things like basic human rights that eat into a corporation’s profits.

But if you can keep workers basically happy, you can cut unions off at the pass. A disgruntled workforce is much more likely to unionize. Whereas one that is merely gruntled has less incentive to go on strike and bargain collectively for profit-eating benefits.

Enter the human resources department!

HR was largely pioneered during the Second Industrial Revolution, when personnel managers were needed to handle huge factory labor forces. The idea was that if employees had an option for improving their lot besides “unionize and go on strike,” they’d be less likely to use that nuclear option. So HR installed itself as the Complaint Box of industry.

Then, during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s-1970s, all kinds of laws were passed to push our country toward social equality. Some of these laws were meant to maintain harmony between labor and employer. So somebody on the ground had to make sure the laws were being enforced within companies. And that job largely fell to human resources departments.

The modern human resources department

These days HR handles the entire employee life cycle—from germination to photosynthesis! They’re largely responsible for four main areas:

• recruiting, hiring, onboarding, and training employees
• arbitrating disputes, disciplining, and managing employees’ work-related problems
• handling employee benefits like payroll, insurance, and retirement plans
• firing your ass

Your mileage may vary. While researching this article, I listened to a lot of YouTube videos and podcasts that were hella critical of human resources professionals. Seriously, google “human resources is…” and you’ll be bombarded with articles titled “Human Resources Is Not Your Friend.”

So for every human resources department that handles all of the above with professionalism, be advised that you may run into an HR rep who does nothing more than gossip, sow discontent, enforce hypocritical company policies, and lay people off.

Why do people think HR is evil?

If you want anecdotal evidence of human resources departments screwing people over, look no further than this very illuminating Reddit thread.

But we’re not here for satisfying anecdotes! Here at Bitches Get Riches, an internet website where we ponder the net worths of anime characters and perform taste tests of cheesy junk food, we demand EVIDENCE-BASED RESEARCH! Nothing but the most rigorous studies may be referenced in our search for truth!

But srsly, check this shit out:

This next part is going to get at some of the reasons why human resources has a reputation for pure evil. It’s… not a flattering look for HR reps.

Don’t worry, though! I’ll give some grace to the HR folks later on. In the meantime, if you work in human resources, view this next section as “what not to do.”

HR ignores bad behavior by “high performers”

If you follow the #MeToo movement, then you know that Harvey Weinstein was reported to HR long before he was fired and prosecuted. Like… decades before he ever suffered any consequences for his pattern of predatory behavior. Numerous women went to the human resources department to say “Hey, this guy sexually assaulted me while I was just trying to do my job.”

HR largely did nothing. They certainly didn’t report Weinstein to law enforcement, let alone fire him. Most often they took the complaints to upper management, who threw money and NDAs at the women to keep them quiet.

The story isn’t unique. All too often, HR representatives stand idly by or even sweep the transgressions of “high performers” under the rug. They’re there to serve the company, remember? And in some cases, they might think it’s good for company to keep an abusive supervisor on the payroll because he brings in the big bucks.

HR eliminates employees instead of problems

If an employee has a complaint… and you fire the employee… does the complaint still exist?

If there is a complicated interpersonal conflict in the office, it can be easier to come up with a reason to fire someone than to resolve their conflict. It’s not a strictly ethical or legal practice—especially if the conflict is “everyone is racist” and the solution is “fire the one brown guy.”

HR knows HR… but not the industry

Human resources professionals can be great at what they do… and still have no idea what their coworkers are up to. And having zero functional knowledge about the business—whether it be manufacturing widgets or publishing the news—can lead to huge blindspots when orchestrating company culture and resolving issues.

At the very least, an ignorant HR rep can sow resentment among the employees they supposedly represent.

HR treats employees like cogs in a machine

When I requested time off to raft the Grand Canyon, HR told me I couldn’t be spared for that long. And yet a month later, I was laid off.

With the wisdom of time, I no longer blame my HR rep for these two decisions. But they were revealing. My unique personal circumstances were not factored into either decision. The first was just a matter of company policy—I didn’t have enough PTO saved up and there was no flexibility in the system to allow me to make up the time in other ways or take unpaid time off. The second was an upper-level decision that had little to do with me personally—the company needed to lay people off.

And the two decisions, while they both impacted me greatly, had nothing to do with each other.

In this way, HR sometimes fails to see the “human side” of an issue. They’ll stick rigidly to company protocol even when famously non-rigid, flexible human lives are involved. The process must remain uniform and exception-free at all (human) costs!

HR is not to be trusted

HR people are not considered exactly trustworthy.

Allow me to return to my Reddit thread of anecdotal evidence. There are dozens of stories there of HR reps surveying workers, assuring them their answers are confidential and anonymous… and then reporting directly back to management. This kind of betrayal of trust can lead to uncomfortable repercussions for employees.

Other stories tell of HR reps who gossip uncontrollably. Imagine explaining to an HR rep that you need to take time off for an embarrassing medical issue… only to have them turn around and tell the whole office!

Again: HR is there to protect the company, not the employee. You cannot trust them to keep confidences like a doctor, lawyer, or therapist must. At best, they may be discreet. But at worst, they’re narcs, spies, and common gossips.

HR is the wicked cat’s paw of corporate interests!

If the people at the top of the corporate ladder make unpopular personnel decisions, guess who has to relay those decisions to their coworkers. Guess who has to enforce shitty or hypocritical corporate policies. Guess who denies vacation requests, informs pregnant employees they only get four weeks of unpaid maternity leave, and chooses the new subpar insurance provider.

In many ways, the HR department is the Hand of the King: they don’t set the kingdom’s people policies, but they do enforce them. And while a CEO may make a breathtakingly callous personnel decision, it’s the HR representative who has to deliver the bad news.

That all sounds pretty evil…

Sure, but it doesn’t have to be like that! If the goal is to not get sued, then oftentimes what’s in the best interest of the company is also in the best interests of employees.

For example, let’s say you have a misogynist asswipe for a manager. Said asswipe regularly demeans, harasses, and threatens the women on staff, creating a hostile work environment. It’s up to HR to receive complaints about the asswipe manager, recognize that keeping him around could cost the company a sexual harassment lawsuit, and then make the call to fire his ass. (You know: the opposite of what the Weinstein Company did.)

In this scenario, HR is protecting the company from a lawsuit by getting rid of a misogynist employee who creates a hostile work environment. But in doing so, they are ALSO protecting all the women on staff who were suffering under his sexual harassment. It’s a win-win.

And I’m sure HR professionals love it when the case is as cut-and-dried as that! Their challenge is in figuring out how to handle situations when the win-win is not so apparent. Which leads me to…

Ok but are HR representatives evil?

Of course not! “Some of my best friends are human resources representatives!”

Personally, I fucking love my HR team at work. They all have the best Zoom backgrounds and they are militant about checking in on me regularly and making sure I have all the tools I need to succeed at my job. I’ve sat through a few of their diversity, equity, and inclusion training sessions and I found them both useful and considerate.

It’s hard to imagine my HR representatives deliberately screwing over a coworker.

Lots of individual people go into HR because they have a genuine passion for helping humans and improving relations. It’s all there in the title! And they have to absorb a lot of shit from bad leaders, unhinged employees, and toxic environments they didn’t personally create.

And yet something is definitely broken in HR. Because HR reps are only as lawful-good as the companies they represent.

The challenges facing HR workers

Even the most compassionate and capable HR reps, with the most noble of intentions, can be hamstrung and disempowered by corporate policy. They may not have actively chosen the Dark Side, but the Dark Side can work through them anyway. Like Anakin in the Jedi Temple, they are blinded by a moral absolutism that demands the blood of the younglings be spilled to bring balance to the Force.

By which I mean: these people are just trying to do their jobs.

Yet the problem is systemic!

Fortune quotes employment lawyer Eric Nelson as saying “People in HR understand more than most that they’re not essential. If they stick their necks out too far, they’re not going to get anything but the hatchet themselves. Until the people who make companies money are made responsible for what goes on, nothing is going to change.”

It costs money to run a human resources department. And that department brings in $0. It’s necessary, but it generates nothing in the way of profits for the company. So the people making up the HR department have very little leverage. If they want to effect meaningful change in corporate culture, they’ve got to somehow persuade a corporate board that it’s the right thing to do.

Which, like… good luck with that!

So should you trust your HR department?

In a word: sometimes!

But as they say in Russia: “Trust, but verify.”

You can depend upon your HR department to handle black and white matters like onboarding and benefits. But when it comes to any sensitive matter (interpersonal conflicts, complaints about management, disciplinary issues), you must accept that your HR representative may not be incentivized or empowered to have your back. So approach with caution.

You are your best advocate

I can’t recommend enough Jennifer Brick’s brilliant YouTube video, “HR Is Not Your Friend.” She gives a comprehensive guide for how to approach HR in a way that will both protect your interests and make HR more likely to help you. Here’s some of her advice:

• To properly use HR, make sure your goals align with theirs. They want to keep the company out of court and profiting. So frame your issue as a problem with a money-saving, non-litigious solution that benefits both you and the company.
• Document E V E R Y T H I N G. You don’t want to start a fight until you’ve got receipts. And keep a backup of said receipts somewhere other than your work computer, just in case you get terminated without a moment’s notice.
• Have reasonable expectations of HR solutions. It might not be within their power to fire your bully, but they can reassign you so your duties no longer overlap.

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