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One Person Human Resources Dept.
Life in Workforce Management
One Person Human Resources Dept.
Share your stories of workforce-management success in contributing to your business' bottom line, as well as your tales of business bloopers and blunders.
I am a one person Human Resources dept. Talk about having a to-do list as long as your childhood list for gifts from Santa Claus!
I wondered if any others out there are one person jugglers and if a
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Forums » Topic Forums » Life in Workforce Management » One Person Human Resources Dept.
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/11/2001 8:37 AM EDT
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Posts: 1
First: 9/11/2001 Last: 9/11/2001 |
I am a one person Human Resources dept. Talk about having a to-do list as long as your childhood list for gifts from Santa Claus!
I wondered if any others out there are one person jugglers and if anyone can offer tips on organizing my priorities to see all ends are met timely. I am often torn at the seams with projects from administration, daily issues from employees and the overflow of paperwork our profession requires. Help!! |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/13/2001 3:28 AM EDT
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Posts: 132
First: 7/3/2001 Last: 5/12/2004 |
If it is of any comfort, you are not alone.
I try to organize my day to desk and day according to priorities. Red hot issues are put in a file that color and are handled first thing in the morning. "Yellow" priorities are addressed before and after lunch. "Green" files are handled while on the phone or late in the afternoon. It also helps to schedule Quiet Time, if possible, so you can work uninterrupted. I do this a half-hour before my office officially opens (I backed up my operating hours by a half-hour) and for an hour upon returning from lunch. I also ask employees and management schedule an appointment when they need to see me (if at all possible) and strongly encourage people to communicate needs/concerns to me via e-mail to manage my time spent on the phone. I also live and die by my calendar. I hope these ideas help a little. |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/13/2001 7:00 AM EDT
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Posts: 280
First: 6/22/2000 Last: 10/13/2002 |
In addition to angelalee's good advice, I think you should also go through your workload piece by piece and ask yourself some questions about each piece. This is partly because sometimes we get so involved just trying to get everything done that we lose sight of the fact that the need for some of those things becomes obsolete over time. Ask yourself, am I legally required to do this? If not, does it support current business objectives? If I think it does, can I explain exactly which objectives it supports and how it does this? Does the company even know I'm doing this? Does it care? (Meaning if I stop doing it, will there be any effect on the bottom line? Will anyone notice?) And finally, am I the right person to be doing some of these things? Maybe some of the routine clerical and not-so-confidential stuff could be more sensibly handled by a senior clerical person. Maybe some of the benefits administration could be handled by the insurance carrier (and maybe for free - you might be performing some of the carrier's duties without even knowing it - this happens fairly frequently). Maybe some other stuff could be outsourced, or handled more quickly by yourself with help from an inexpensive machine or software program. And so on. Good luck! |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/13/2001 7:10 AM EDT
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Posts: 6
First: 3/29/2001 Last: 9/13/2001 |
I too have had several positions where I was a one-person HR dept. I worked for two different organizations where I was their first HR dept.
A manager at one of these organizations once told me, "we were told when we hired an HR person, everything would get fixed". So they were waiting for me to fix everything in a matter of months. You can become overwhelmed with the many different tasks that you could tackle. What do you do first - new recruitment process, employee handbook, compensation survey and plan, new benefit carrier, etc.? First, you have to be realistic with yourself that you can't do it all in a few months. I found setting realistic goals and objectives for each year, looking at what might be "quick wins" and what would have the biggest impact for the business first. Some things will have to wait until "next year". Then tell people that. Otherwise, you run the risk of doing a little bit of work on each project or area and nothing really ever gets to the finished or implementation stage. If staff are asking about, for example, a flexible working schedule policy, but you already have enough on your plate for this year. Tell them that it is worth taking a look at, but won't even be able to be considered until 2002 or 2003 and that you are working on "X" currently. If you show them you deliver on deadlines, then they will see that "things" are improving. Hope that helps. |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/14/2001 1:48 PM EDT
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Posts: 44
First: 6/6/2001 Last: 4/28/2002 |
merry xmas! the best way to help you run the dept. efficiently and effectively is to use a web-based knowledge management solution. a knowledge base is an electronic repository of plan, policy, process, procedure and communique that can be easily used by a shell answer person like yourself. These can be built in frontpage - you could be up and running in just a few weeks! The kb would enable you to provide answers faster, better, cheaper and would free you up to focus on strategic, value-added services. send me an me at gervair@aol.com for more details.
best of luck! howie |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/14/2001 1:49 PM EDT
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Posts: 44
First: 6/6/2001 Last: 4/28/2002 |
merry xmas! the best way to help you run the dept. efficiently and effectively is to use a web-based knowledge management solution. a knowledge base is an electronic repository of plan, policy, process, procedure and communique that can be easily used by a shell answer person like yourself. These can be built in frontpage - you could be up and running in just a few weeks! The kb would enable you to provide answers faster, better, cheaper and would free you up to focus on strategic, value-added services. send me an me at gervair@aol.com for more details.
best of luck! howie |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/16/2001 11:31 AM EDT
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Posts: 81
First: 7/6/2000 Last: 6/10/2010 |
If you can, hire an HR intern. They can help you with some of your administrative duties such as reference checks, recordkeeping etc. While I was in school I worked as an interviewer. It was a valuable experience and the company that I worked for forged a relationship with the university in our city, which could aid in future recruiting efforts. |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 9/19/2001 9:43 AM EDT
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Posts: 399
First: 6/21/1999 Last: 9/14/2005 |
Write it down!
I take a few minutes at the beginning of the day to write down everything I want to accomplish. I delete things as they're finished and add new things as they appear. I find that when I have everything in front of me it's much easier to prioritize. Also, sometimes I can do several really quick things right away and it keeps me from feeling overwhelmed. |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 10/18/2001 3:54 PM EDT
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Posts: 495
First: 9/30/2000 Last: 8/19/2011 |
I, too, am a 1 person HR department for 110 unionized employees and 35 exempt staff. I've been in my position for one year now. What I found quite helpful was to sit down with each manager to establish their expectancies of HR.
Prioritizing, obviously, will change daily. What you thought you would do the next morning may change instantly if a situation arises that needs immediate attention. Try to establish realistic timelines for the "nice to have but don't need to react to immediately" items. If you find that you are not able to meet previously established deadlines due to "putting out fires", share this with the managers. Bottom line is we all work for the same company, and need to learn how to make it work for all of us. If you would like to contact me by e-mail, I would be happy to discuss this with you further. I know it is extremely trying to spread yourself over a wide scope with no assistance, while trying to meet everyone's needs. |
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One Person Human Resources Dept.
posted at 11/27/2001 5:54 PM EST
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Posts: 1
First: 11/27/2001 Last: 11/27/2001 |
Then welcome to the club! One-person-HR is diversity in action, good for you...us!
In addition, aside from color coded work, important versus urgent thing, make the department managers your extensions with those ready-made-fill-in-the-blanks-forms. make them hr practitioners as well and during the management committee meetings or executive committe meetings where you preside over, dig out their hr talents and use the occasion to make things happen. Then of course, relax, find time to be truly happy and complete. |
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