

The State of Human Resources - spencerfry
http://spencerfry.com/the-state-of-human-resources

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DavidAdams
Stay tuned. I'm working on getting a benefits and HR startup off the ground
right now. I can't tell you how heartening it was to read this article,
because we want to solve a lot of these problems, and I'm glad to know that
there are other people who think the state of the industry is as dismal as I
think it is. If there's anyone out there who would like to be a part of a
company that's going to bring HR into the 21st century, let me know. We're in
San Francisco, and we just closed a substantial seed round. Edit: Email me at
9kjbo711fglm6sl@jetable.org

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hydralist
I am curious to hear more, is there an email I can shoot you?

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DavidAdams
9kjbo711fglm6sl@jetable.org

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hydralist
cool dude sent email from navidb (at) gmail

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RyanZAG
Really great points. This is also not just restricted to small companies
either - most large companies have HR departments with so many levels and
decades old procedures that they have literal armies of drones filling in
useless paperwork put in place by numerous HR directors over the years. Some
companies have HR departments collect dossiers on employees, including
fingerprints, history of photos, all medical conditions, all leave dates and
vacation destinations, financial history, etc. This is expensive to maintain
and nearly always useless in the extreme.

HR in general needs a major reworking.

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ktsmith
People talk about IT the same way you are talking about HR. It's not always
the case that what is put in place is unnecessary or useless. It is often the
case that those not having to deal with these processes on a regular basis
think they are unnecessary or useless.

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spencerfry
I don't think either of us are saying that they're unnecessary or useless.
We're just saying in 2013, technology can make these processes more efficient
as well as better designed.

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ommunist
Since when we started to consider calling people "human resources"? Probably
Nazi been the first.

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spencerfry
I'm not sure the origin exactly, but Googling found that the term supposedly
comes from the mid-80s: "Around the mid-80s, the term ‘human resource
management’ arrived from the USA."

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contingencies
How much of this is US-centric?

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DavidAdams
A lot of HR has to do with legal compliance, so generally HR systems are
country-specific.

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spencerfry
That's true, but the overall themes apply to most -- if not all -- countries.

