Lekcja 13: New Roles in HR

The Human Resources department in a company has an important role in the functioning of the organization. It is an intermediary between the management and its employees

In the last few years, the unstable economic situation has forced companies to undergo major restructuring. Changes were introduced to the functioning of particular departments, including HR. The role of HR today is to be more pro-active in finding new solutions and new procedures in recruiting and developing staff, thus helping the company to maintain a competitive advantage in the market.

Unfortunately, the economic crisis of today does not create new job vacancies, but sometimes forces companies to lay people off. Tough times bring about tough decisions. One of the roles of HR is to protect the future of the organization by finding cost saving solutions, like cutting personnel expenses or reducing the headcount. The decision to lay people off is made by management, however the HR professional has to decide and provide essential information as to which parts of the business are more important in the long run.

Another role of the HR department is being the Employee Advocate, which entails knowing the employees in the organization and their main interests. The knowledge of the Employee Advocate helps to retain staff satisfaction and motivation. The strength of an organization lies in the job satisfaction of its employees. If the morale is low, efficiency drops and problems begin. That is why the HR Employee Advocate should provide regular feedback to top management from employee opinion surveys. Additionally, they provide development opportunities to help employees keep their value for the business.

One of the essential roles of HR is to, no doubt, take care of the human capital. They provide smooth channels of communication between workers and top managers and sustain workers high performance.

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Vocabulary

Word-of-the-week

intermediary – someone who carries messages between people who are unwilling or unable to meet (pośrednik)

Glossary:

restructuring – organizing a company, business or system in a new way to make it operate more effectively (restrukturyzować)

lay off – to stop employing someone, usually because there is no work for them to do (zwalniać)

headcount – the number of employees in an organization or assigned to an activity (stan osobowy)

entails – to make it necessary (powodować)

retain – to keep or continue to have something (zatrzymac)

smooth – happening without any sudden changes, interruption, inconvenience or difficulty (bez zakłóceń)

sustain – to continue to have or not allow to become less (podtrzymywać)

Practice makes perfect

Complete the gaps with words from the text

Experts believe economic growth will not be ………………..

in 2009.

Due to the economic crisis many businesses have decided to …………some of its staff in the hope of avoiding bankruptcy.

When I commute by train I never have a ………………. ride. I always experience delay problems.

The ……………in our company

is not sufficient to the number of projects assigned.

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