A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of speaking to a professional group of African American Human Resources professionals. I had been looking forward to speaking to this group since I could've been sitting in that audience years ago. Their world is the one I come from, and I know their particular challenges. The presentation and remarks were going to be augmented by video vignettes, featuring performances from our Novations Players.
Within the hierarchy of business functions, HR is traditionally seen as a "soft" department. HR professionals can be frustrated by what seems to be leadership's disinterest in investing resources to address the needs of the average employee. But I realized in my tenure in corporate HR departments that it's not that CEOs are uncaring about their people. Rather I needed to do a better job of connecting my recommendations to the business needs that CEOs and other senior leaders are most concerned with: revenue, profitability, and competitive advantage.
In other words, I needed to take a "business-centric approach." Once I looked more carefully through the lens my leadership was looking through, I could position my ideas in a way that gave me more credibility--and made my recommendations more likely to be taken seriously.
In the video portion of my presentation, one of our talented Players depicted the concerns that Seth, a CEO, is grappling with. Seth is alarmed by a sudden drop in the sales forecast; he's worried that a new initiative in China doesn't have the momentum to help remedy the looming revenue shortfall; he anticipates he'll need to cut some expenses to weather the storm. And, he doesn't see how his upcoming meeting with his HR rep, Latasha, is going to help with that—especially when he sees her recommendation for spending on a new leadership training program.
Have the Seths and Latashas in your organization come to share a business-centric approach to HR? How do you make that transition without losing HR's proper focus on the people in the organization? In my presentation, I talked about three areas (and the group really seemed to resonate with these):
1.Study the business so you can make your ideas more strategically relevant—how will your recommendations help drive the business forward or address a current challenge? What are the financial costs and benefits of your proposal? In our video example, Latasha reports how she's made an appointment with the visiting VIP from China to help get him oriented—(and here's the part that has Seth paying attention) so that he's better able to get up to speed on moving the China initiative forward.
2.Strengthen your influence skills. You need to develop a compelling message and logic to capture others' attention and support. In our video examples, Latasha presents her recommendation to reinvigorate the affinity groups with specific examples of how Seth can use this effort to get people more engaged in driving revenue. It's hard to say no to something that's connected to the health of the business!
3.Build personal connections. Senior leaders are like all of us in that they tend to work better with someone they know and trust—someone they feel they can rely on to represent them and their ideas in the way they want to be represented. That interpersonal ease only comes from personal connection. Your business leaders need to know you and what you bring to the table.
The idea of the business centric approach is not limited to HR. It applies to any department that has any need. And it's not limited to just getting the things you need, it's about making change from within. It's working with the things you can control to make things happen. And it's about navigating your own careers to make more of a contribution to your organizations.
