The ‘Human’ in Human Resources: How HR Can Help or Hinder the Development of Liberatory Cultures
The first time I came in contact with a human resource department my young mind thought “awesome, there is a group of people that are dedicated to my overall well-being and development as an employee!” That was my starting definition of human resource work. I won’t say that I was right or wrong as there was no right or wrong, but what was clear was that within the human resource department, people had varying orientations to the purpose of their work and that affected the level of trust I had in seeking their support. I wondered if they even defined human resources the same way. I wondered if I was defining human resources the same way. I became curious about the implications of the term itself on the value placed on everyone working in the company. Words are powerful, and if people aren’t wielding that power in the same way, people can think they are doing the exact same thing and in reality be making contributions towards very different realities. In this case, continued exploitation or collective liberation.
If you’ve ever had the pleasure of working in an organization that had a human resources department, you know that they perform a critical role in the functioning of an organization; deciding and designing how people are brought into an organization, shaping the initial perception of the company’s culture, determining how and when people are paid and receive benefits, and much more. But that’s the human resources department. What are human resources?
Merriam-Webster's dictionary defines human resources synonymously with ‘personnel’ and defines personnel as a body of persons usually employed. In my own understanding, human resources is a concept created by the combination of two words: ‘human’ and ‘resources’. Human meaning you, me, us. Resources meaning support or supplies. When combined, they can be open to interpretation. The question that I challenge you to ask yourself and your larger organization is whether the combination of these words means that people are a resource in an organization’s larger purpose, mission, goal or that organizations/ organization leaders are responsible for providing the supplies and support necessary to people who work within them… or something else.
My own definition for what human resources should mean rests definitively on the side of supplies and supports being provided to people within organizations. Humans being a type of resource is and has been a source of exploitation for several decades in the post-industrial world and centuries prior. So many company leaders believe HR to mean that people are simply a resource in an organization’s larger purpose, mission, or goal and like any other resource, easily replaceable. That definition is not and never was acceptable. There is a difference between acknowledging the plethora of resources that people uniquely hold as individuals versus seeing them, their bodies, and their labor as resources. The latter way of viewing people made slavery possible in the past and, let’s be clear; it makes slavery possible still today. I offer a truth: people have assets; people bring assets; but people are not assets. People are people. We owe ourselves and the many people harmed, brutalized, and killed over so many years in the name of ‘work’ to never forget it. We are not the equivalent of our labor and we should never again negotiate our humanity.
As you’re reading this, I’d like for you to pause right here and think about what’s coming up for you. What tensions do you have? Where do you feel them in your body? What apprehensions do you have to these words, if any? Where do you think they stem from? What resonates with you? Why? Hold those thoughts, analyze them, write them down if you’d like. Be honest about the narratives you’re unpacking in your mind. Breathe. Be kind to your mind, acknowledging the things you’ve learned willingly and unwillingly. Make a commitment to hold yourself accountable as you read on.
For somewhere between 70-100 years, the term ‘human resources’ and similar terms have mainly been used to describe people as resources, in the way that allowed companies to justify disregard for people’s (especially black people’s, indigenous people’s, and people of color’s) humanity. As companies and institutions created departments to manage human resources, many failed to reevaluate the philosophies and assumptions that drove the development of this work (or felt no need to because oppression can appear to be incredibly effective and efficient). I am not immune. I’m 100% sure I’ve contributed to the maintenance of those assumptions in more ways than one. I’ve learned, however, how human resource management can be synonymous with justifying practices rooted in racism and oppression. Creating barriers to rest, ingraining messages of worth being tied to titles, instilling and capitalizing on fear of not being enough, these are things that human resource departments are often tasked to do but with more appealing framing like leave policy compliance, compensation reviews, and performance reviews. There is nothing wrong with having people who care about the latter list of HR activities, and it is in fact important for organizations to think about these things, but we must also ask what underlying beliefs are driving the work.
Are leave policies designed to deter people from resting, forcing them to create entire strategies in order to access rest or can leave policies honor rest as a basic right trusting that people want to contribute to things they care about? Are performance reviews a safety mechanism for removing employees deemed to be lazy and a faux accountability system or can conversations about accountability happen in real time with to allow emergent structures? Can performance reviews be reimagined to hold open and honest conversation about where people are able to contribute their energy and what did and didn’t work out in previous seasons? These are just a few examples but there are countless ways HR work can be more deeply anti-racist and create cultures of liberation. Go deeper. Question the assumptions of recruitment frameworks, why only certain demographics of people are being hired for specific work, whether the structure of employee benefits are equitable, how unspoken power dynamics play a role in formal and informal decision-making. Things may seem to function as they are, but do they uphold ideals rooted in racist archetypes of workers? Ask out loud. Be willing to be wrong or have been wrong. Engage in uncomfortable discovery.
I’d like to provide an offering to close, an offering of practice and a framework for future human resource work, culture work, or whatever you deem people work to be: Practice care and provision and start with structural questioning. In making these decisions ask “Who is this protecting and who is this providing more resources to? Conversely, who isn’t this protecting and who is receiving less or no resources? Why? Who is part of the conversation? Who isn’t? Why?” The ultimate goal of culture work, HR work, and liberation work within an organization should be to protect people from exploitation and provide resources for a better human existence. There are no guarantees that this will be easy. In fact, I can guarantee there will be challenges, but what is possible when we attempt can be imperfectly but significantly better.
