Dear All, 
 
An article published a few years ago by Fortune magazine advocated  abolishing human resource departments. The piece criticized the  traditional HR department as bureaucratic and unable to quantify its  contributions. Fortune argued that many of the services provided by  traditional HR departments could be better handled by outside service  organizations that offer economies of scale, often reducing risks while 
improving service. 
 
How much Truth the above statements Hold in Indian context, I would  like  to know the View of all HR Gurus. 
 
Thanks & Regards,

hrushi

Well it is quite true that HR would never be able to quantify the activities that are performed in their department. The reason for this our job is not predictable, we may set a particular task for ourself as during the course of the day perform something completly different for the sheer urgency of the task !!

Certain activities can be outsourced but if the number of activities that are oursourced go beyond a point it would hamper the motivation of the employee as there would be no sense of bonding !! An inhounse HR Dept gives a sense of belongingness which plays a very vital role in increasing their motivation !!

Dear friend,

Any process, department or person, who does not contribute to the business should go. That does applies to HR also. I dont see any significant usefullness in a discussion which is a really a non- issue.

For those who find HR bashing interesting and exciting, I am appending a list of some other resources and articles below.

Happy reading !

Resources

A Waste of Human Resources (Craig J. Cantoni, Wall Street Journal, May 15, 1995), "A highly resistant form of bureaucracy is alive and well in corporate America's human resources department."

Tom Peters Sound Off (Tom Peters, Workforce, August 2000), "(HR leaders) are mechanics instead of visionaries. My real concern is that HR doesn't color outside the box."

It's Time to Fire the Human Resources Department (John Sullivan, VP of HR Newsletter; September, 2002), "HR has failed to present a convincing "business case" that having a great HR department matters."

Executive Briefing (HR Magazine, November 2002), "According to an independent study of 425 HR professionals only 48 percent believe that HR has the respect of company leaders."

Cheers

Sophiya Grenber

HR dept. is a must in an organisation. Lets say recruitment & seletion, which is probably where HR activities start, what if a wrong person is hired!!.............

Today we all talk about specialisions........ similarly even Human Resource Management is managed by specialists.

All said and done, THE HUMAN resource runs the organisation. Agreed it cannot be quantified but the difference can be noticed.

Archana

Hi,

Most of HR departments perform routine activities and vital role is to increase the performance of employees by motivating and facilitating them. 

I m agreed that Fortune statement is right but it will be applicable in third world countries after a long time because in these countries HR is at developing stage and after complete development it will take turn as pointed in article. In these countries few years ago Hr activities are handled by Personnel Administration. At this time there are very little organizations in which activities are handled by specialists like compensation by compensation Specialist and etc. even now organization outsource in Training 7 Development, compensation & Benefits and in recruitment & selection like leased employees, executive search firms.

So I think approach to hire specialists for each activity is good but very expensive. So after some years (5-10) Hr departments in any organizations will exist but just facilitate the employees in routine work and will do outsourcing for its core functions which will be affective and improve the services.

Thanks

anuj