Skip to main content

HR AND THE CULTURE OF SILENCE

 A man was asked recently why people do not speak out against bad things in the work place? The answer he gave among others was that people especially the HR Professionals do not speak out because of the fear of loosing their jobs.

The employees are not able to speak out because of the fear of loosing their jobs if the Head of HR is afraid of speaking out. Do you blame employees who keep quiet in the face of injustice?

The question is how can this culture of silence be broken in the work place?

Apart from the harsh economy, the main reason why most people cannot speak out is traceable to our national malady - Nepotism. You cannot bite the finger that is feeling.

Both the HR Professional and employees who did not get their jobs by merit will think twice before opening their mouths to speak against their own benefactors.

WAY OUT??

There are several ways out but the one I have applied in the past is the most effective. Most HR Professionals out there will claim they using, "EMPLOYEES ENGAGEMENT" . The question is to what level of success?

I tell you what I did was to introduce a monthly "Interactive Forum" which ends the process of choosing the employee of the month.

At this meeting, every body is allowed to say anything and nothing said at the meeting would be held against such staff.

In one company I worked, at the first Forum,  told them it was a " no hold bar" meeting which was confirmed by the managing director. 

A department manager, tried the resolve of manage to hear from employees through the IF by giving queries to staff in his department who exposed his bad practices. As would be expected, the staff afraid, that they have lost their jobs went to the branch executive of the union who came to me plead their cases. 

My response was that apart from query not being punishment, but nobody can be sent out of the company behind my office. Infact,  I told them that, a query is an insult to the giver of the query that he was saying I am an ignorant man.

After this episode, employees became very free to come to management through the office of HR Manager with information. To the extent that one of our managers described yours truly as CIA, KGB and Missed rolled in one.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

HR MISTAKES BY YOURS TRULY 8

 I have a first degree in Sociology and Anthropology from the best university then in that discipline in Nigeria, the University of Benin, Benin City. During my undergraduate days, I decided not to earn naira on graduation, so when my course mates were rushing to major in Organizational Behaviour, I opted for Medical Sociology. I equally decided to go on to obtain a Masters Degree in Epidemiology so as to ensure that I work with either WHO or UNICEF where I would be paid in dollars. However, my university of choice was then being shut every other three months. This was against another decision of yours truly that I shall not spend more than 12 months for the masters program. At this point, I changed my mind to study Industrial Relations and Personnel Management at the best University then in that discipline in Nigeria, the University of Lagos, Akoka, Lagos. This major shift brought yours truly into a profession that it's major tenants contradict my major attitudes to life. Some of ...
3 comments
Read more

MANAGEMENT RASCALITY 5

A management consulting firm came to do a restructuring in a Conglomerate I worked and Evil almost had it's way. When the consultant submitted her draft report for discussion by HR Community made up of over twenty (20) Managers,  on the prompting of the HR Group Head, the consultant recommended that the HR Group Head should no-longer report to the Group Managing Director but to the Chief Operating Officer who reports to the GMD. My lone voice against the recommendation was rebuked by the HR Group Head pointing out that the COO has more daily operational duties. However, the absolute minority position was upheld in the final recommendation and today the Human Resources Director reports directly to the GMD.
Post a Comment
Read more

THE LAW OF REST 1

There are two Economics laws that best  explain, the law of Rest. These laws are: The law of Diminishing Returns and The Law of Marginal Utility. The Law of Rest states that when you work and rest and work again, you produce more than when you work continuously without rest. The application of this Law of Rest has been manifest in the practice of Bush Fallowing and/ or Shifting Cultivation in Agriculture. Applied to fair labour practice, it results in the principle of annual vacation for employees. Employees are meant to stop work and rest for 30 minutes after 4 hours of work. This accounts for why employees who work 8 hours a day,, are given 1 hour break in between the 8 hours. Applied to yearly work, every employee is entitled to a number of weeks vacation every year without negotiation. In fact in my clime, the law says, an employee shall not accumulate more than two years vacation. Any employee in any organisation where the CEO goes on vacation annually, and does not go on vaca...
3 comments
Read more