From HR to Talent - Focus on Growth

There has been a movement to change the title of the human resources leader, or CHRO, to Chief People Officer, or CPO. While we applaud this change, we think it doesn’t go far enough, and the entire HR department needs a rebrand and refocus.??

The language we use affects how we think and affects how we view the work done in what has traditionally been the HR function. We believe transforming this area is long overdue, starting with how we think about the function’s rationale, purpose, and impact.??

When a business starts, one of the elements is who will do the work - that is where the founders would think about what resources are needed to get the job done and what support those resources need. In addition, how to find new people, train them, and retain them all became part of the function known as HR. But this was all predicated on the idea that people were the “human” resources, just like the buildings to house them and equipment needed were capital resources to keep a business up and running and sustain growth.?

The challenge with this framework is that people are different from commodities. When we think of them as “resources,” we ascribe all types of values to people we then spend a lot of time and energy measuring. These include but are not limited to; time to hire, time to train, an expense to leverage when cutting costs, and replacement of higher wage experienced employees with lower wage employees to cut costs. We also view benefits as a drain on the bottom line vs. care of the team, and we don’t focus on development because it is seen as easier to buy more experience than build it or something employees need to do on their own.?

When we think of employees as resources, they are not part of the fabric of the business like a founder or shareholder is, but part of the cost of doing business - and something we always want to shrink - the “do more with less” concept.?

What if we change this mindset, rebrand HR to Talent, and think of our employees as our talent, the way a movie or orchestra thinks of actors or musicians? We recognize that the movie/play would not exist without the actors, writers, and directors, and no one would attend the orchestra without musicians or conductors (plus behind-the-scenes people.) Our companies would not exist without the employees, but we fail to consider our talent in this same way with few exceptions.?

If we think of employees as?talent?and start calling them talent, this would shift the mindset and focus of the HR group’s remit. The purpose would be to attract, develop and retain the talent (as many do now) to ensure they have everything needed to succeed. Investing in providing training for career growth would be critical, or healthcare, so employees are not worried about paying for healthcare vs. housing or time off to regenerate. Leaders would be incented to provide development to their team members, not once a year, but ongoing. Companies would not reduce their talent to save money. Instead, they would look at other ways to cut costs and ask the talent for their ideas on how to cut costs in a downturn, what they need to work up to their full potential, how to innovate, and more, because the company respects them - after all, they are the organization’s backbone; they are the “talent.”??

The biggest reason people leave jobs is that they don’t believe they can use their skills or develop to their full potential and don’t have leaders who provide support and development. This would end if employees were treated as valued talent, supported by the Talent Department, and leaders were accountable to the Talent Department for this.?

The people who work in the Talent Department would be those committed to these concepts, not to bureaucratic systems that capture information to manage resources as though they are widgets. They would be strategic partners in moving the business forward through talent and are valued for innovative, inclusive thinking.?

Let’s get rid of HR in favor of Talent Departments that ensure our workplaces are environments where everyone can thrive and ultimately companies prosper through appreciation of their amazing talent.