The fact that there are no HR standards reveals the lack of competence within the field. Every professionally led industry has robust set of standards but HR. Yet we wonder they are the only ones crying.
Their solution is trends! Reiki healers, engagement activities, wellbeing applications, company culture brainwashing activities, HR community groups, and all the nonsense nobody cares about. And they wonder that nobody is taking them seriously.
If you have exceptional specialists, they will establish standards. If you rely on generalists to run a department, you must provide them with a well-structured system they can learn from and execute effectively. HR is inherently a generalist function, meaning its professionals won't be specialists in anything. Therefore, they need a clear roadmap outlining what needs to be done and how to do it.
The workforce is surveyed to death, yet HR is no closer to addressing any people-related issues. They’ve tried everything—like changing the name of their department—but that’s not the solution. They even ruined surveys because employees now cannot be bothered giving us real info we could work with.
But if it is used well, employee surveys reveal the problems, but only standards provide the solutions! Without standards, HR is stuck in the cycle of turnover, dissatisfaction, and missed business impact. Without standards they cannot see what’s broken and how to fix it.
Every professionally led industry is standardized.
✅ Finance and Accounting
✅ Health and Safety
✅ Quality Management
✅ Manufacturing and Operation
✅ Environmental Sustainability
✅ Customer Service and Experience
✅ Education
✅ Healthcare & Medicine
Finance built consistency through standards not through trends.
Health & Safety built safe workplaces through standards not through trends.
Quality is built through standards not through trends.
Your favourite restaurant and hotel built quality service trhough standards not through trends.
And so on….
So why is HR the only department that feels like the Wild Wild West?
Do those industries use surveys and data? Absolutely—even more than HR. The key difference is that they use their data to identify problems and then establish standards to solve them.
So, what does HR do with surveys? Most of the time, they just present the results—and that’s it. Occasionally, they’ll put together a vague “action plan,” but it usually depends on individual execution, and we all know how that turns out. And don’t even get me started on exit interviews—just a pointless exercise that wastes everyone’s time.
What does this tell us? That HR doesn’t care? No. It means they aren’t thinking critically about what they’re doing. It highlights the lack of specialist expertise needed to establish clear standards that guide each HR function.
Without standards, there’s no consistency, quality, or measurable results, and no amount of surveys or name changes will fix that. Without standards it is just one good idea or trend after another with no result. Standards tell you what to do, where to collect data, and to use them for improving the system.HR is easy you just don't have standards. You have trends - the supplements or vitamins - but you don't have a painkiller that solves most of your problem - standards.
If you need help with putting HR standards in place let us know. This is what we do; Standardising the Employee Lifecycle so you don’t have to run your department on trends.
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