Psychologist Thijs Launspach is a stress expert and author of the book Breeding pressure† He marvels at modern working and gives tips every week for more happiness and less stress at work. Today: Human Resources
“Words are powerful. Don’t underestimate them!’ Lennard Toma recently wrote this in his appeal to directors, HR people, managers and business owners. The two words he was referring to in his cry from the heart: Human Resources. Shouldn’t we get rid of that term for once?
Toma will be no stranger to loyal readers of this newspaper. He works for Keytoe, the company in Maassluis where employees determine their own salary and participate in the decision-making process. He also took over this column once a summer. Toma wrote the book with partner Cedric Muchall Company Noodles – a good book, despite the title. In the book, the authors are angry about what they call ‘playing a business’: the tendency of organizations to do things ‘because they are supposed to’. And now he thinks that the name Human Resources can go in the trash.
People as instruments
I agree with his argument. In the category ‘grandfather tells’: I can still remember that HR was still simply called Personnel Affairs. At least that term is nice and clear – that department dealt with all matters concerning personnel. Contracts, complaints, absenteeism, holidays. But now we do Human Resource Management.
Let’s follow Toma’s suggestion and make the name ‘Human Resources’ disappear from the management vocabulary
Behind that tough English hides a different view of personnel: the people in the company have thus become ‘human resources’ that need to be ‘managed’. The value of the staff therefore lies in their contribution to the profit margin. The fact that they are also just people of flesh and blood is of less importance. Before you get angry: I’m not saying that the people who work in HR think so too – in my experience they usually want the best for their people! But it is: that the idea of people as instruments is already baked into that name.
Also read at Intermediary: ‘Do you drop a job if you’re not sure about the corporate culture?’
It’s not like there aren’t any alternatives. Should ‘Personnel Affairs’ sound too boring or too 90s, then according to Toma we can also opt for a more modern name: People & Organization. If necessary, it must be in English, Human & Organisation. That immediately makes it clear: at our company, people are mainly human!
The people in the organization are not a ‘resource’. So let’s follow Toma’s suggestion and let the term ‘Human Resources’ disappear from the management vocabulary. People don’t need to be managed. People are not means of production. They are the goal, the lifeblood of a company. Because if it’s not about the people, what is it about?
Thijs Launspach is a psychologist and stress expert. He wrote the books Fokking Druk (2018), Working with millennials (2019) and Werk kan uit (2020) about this.
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