Do your employees trust HR?

Do your employees trust the HR Department? When employees hear that someone in HR wants to talk to them, do they get scared and suspicious? Or are employees eager to talk and open up with the HR folks at your company?

There are three key steps to establishing an HR Department worthy of trust.

1) Be professionals: Hire people with, or help current HR staff attain, relevant degrees and certifications (such as the SPHR).

2) Act professionally: Maintain confidentiality and a strict level of professional objectivity. Be consistent, reliable, timely and always follow-through. Give employees and management frank assessments, honest feedback and respectful attention. Demonstrate a high level of cordial compassion and authentic empathy.

3) Build a professional HR Team: It is difficult to earn the trust and confidence of employees or management when there is conflict and discord within the HR team itself. Internal cohesiveness is key to the credibility of any HR Department. Do some teambuilding activities and spend the time necessary to create a high level of cohesiveness. Support each other, quickly resolve and work through distracting differences. When any member of the HR team talks about the team, they should use words like “we” and “us”.

Trust can take time to establish and be lost very quickly. HR will not always be liked, but if we are true professionals, we act professionally and we work as a team, we will be able to earn and keep the trust and credibility of those in our organization, through both good times and bad times.

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