Ah, the HR department. The mysterious entity lurking in the depths of every office, shrouded in bureaucracy and powered by an inexhaustible supply of vague policies and passive-aggressive emails. Officially, HR (Human Resources, for those who still believed it stood for “Helpful and Reasonable”) exists to support employees, foster workplace harmony, and ensure fair treatment.
In reality, it functions as a curious hybrid of a school headteacher, a public relations firm, and an overzealous compliance officer, carefully balancing the act of pretending to care while ensuring the company never, ever has to take responsibility for anything. Let’s take a closer look at what HR actually does—or, more precisely, what it would like you to think it does.
“We’re Here to Support You” (Unless That’s Inconvenient)
HR’s primary function, according to its own glowing self-assessment, is to support employees. This usually manifests in posters about mental health in the break room and an annual email about “work-life balance” sent at 11:47 PM by someone who hasn’t taken a lunch break since 2016.
In theory, HR is your go-to department for workplace grievances. In practice, any complaint you lodge will mysteriously disappear into a black hole, re-emerging months later as a completely different issue that is now your fault. The person who stole your lunch from the communal fridge? “Perhaps you could work on your food-labelling skills.” The manager who consistently ‘forgets’ to approve your holiday request? “Have you considered improving your communication?”
HR’s version of support is like a fire extinguisher filled with confetti—visibly present but functionally useless in an emergency.
Recruitment: A Process as Efficient as Herding Cats
When it comes to hiring, HR’s job is to take a straightforward task—finding a competent person to do a job—and turn it into an intricate labyrinth of arbitrary requirements and prolonged uncertainty.
Gone are the days of simply looking for someone who can, say, do accounting. No, the ideal candidate must also have “a passion for numbers,” be “a team player but able to work independently,” and possess “at least five years’ experience using software that has only existed for three.”
The application process itself is a delightful exercise in futility. Candidates must upload their CV and manually input every detail into a system that crashes every 20 minutes. After several rounds of interviews—one of which is inevitably called a “culture fit assessment”—the chosen candidate will be offered an entry-level salary and “the opportunity to work in a dynamic environment,” which is code for “overtime with no extra pay.”
Meanwhile, the position will remain mysteriously unfilled for another six months while HR deliberates whether they should “redefine the role” or just continue forcing existing employees to do it for free.
Conflict Resolution: Making Sure No One Gets Sued
One of HR’s favourite pastimes is pretending to mediate workplace disputes while actually ensuring nothing changes. The golden rule? The company’s interests always come first.
Toxic manager creating an unbearable work environment? HR will swiftly step in—not to address the behaviour, but to invite you to a workshop on “Resilience in the Workplace.” Being asked to work 12-hour shifts with no extra pay? HR is happy to “facilitate a dialogue” that will conclude with an inspiring talk on “Going the Extra Mile.”
When real action is needed, HR will deploy its most powerful tool: an official policy. This document, filled with phrases like “striving for inclusivity” and “valuing employee wellbeing,” will be carefully crafted to sound progressive while containing precisely zero enforceable commitments. It is the corporate equivalent of a decorative fire exit sign painted onto a wall.
Training and Development (Or How to Waste a Day in a Windowless Room)
No modern workplace is complete without mandatory training sessions, lovingly designed by HR to ensure that employees waste entire afternoons nodding along to a PowerPoint presentation that could have been condensed into a single email.
These sessions include such timeless classics as:
- The IT Security Module: A 45-minute video instructing employees not to click on emails from a Nigerian prince.
- The Anti-Harassment Workshop: Where the office’s most notorious serial interrupter will inevitably sit at the front and loudly disagree with everything.
- The Team-Building Exercise: A painful day of trust falls and personality quizzes that will have absolutely no bearing on the fact that everyone still loathes Steve from Accounts.
HR’s commitment to “continuous professional development” ensures that employees are always learning—specifically, how to suppress their will to live while someone reads out a slide titled Our Core Values.
Exit Interviews: The Art of Pretending to Care Too Late
Finally, we arrive at the exit interview, HR’s last-ditch effort to gather “honest feedback” from employees who have already given up. Here, they will listen intently, nod seriously, and take detailed notes on exactly why someone is leaving—before promptly discarding them and changing nothing.
No matter what the departing employee says, the official reason for their departure will always be recorded as “seeking new opportunities”, rather than “because this place is run like a 19th-century workhouse.”
HR will then send out a company-wide email wishing the ex-employee “the best in their future endeavours” while conveniently omitting that they left because their boss had the leadership skills of a damp sock.
HR—The Department That Keeps Itself Employed
At its core, HR exists to sustain itself. Its primary function isn’t to help employees but to ensure the company is legally covered in all circumstances while projecting an illusion of care. Its finest achievement is convincing us that it’s necessary at all.
So next time HR emails you about an “exciting opportunity for professional growth,” ask yourself: is this about your growth, or just another way to keep the machine running? And then do what everyone else does—politely nod, click “Mark as Read,” and carry on surviving.
Dwight Warner is the quintessential oddball Brit, with a weirdly American-sounding name, who has a knack for turning the mundane into the extraordinary. Hailing originally from London, now living in the sleepy depths of Lincolnshire but claiming an allegiance to the absurd, Dwight has perfected the art of finding the surreal in real life. Whether it’s a spirited rant about the philosophical implications of queueing or a deep dive into why tea tastes better in a mug older than you, his blogs blur the line between the abstract and the everyday.
With an irreverent wit and a penchant for tangents that somehow come full circle, Dwight Warner doesn’t just write; he performs on the page. His humour is both sharp and delightfully nonsensical, like Monty Python met your nosiest neighbour and they decided to co-write a diary.
Known for being gregarious, Dwight is the life of any (real or metaphorical) party, whether he’s deconstructing the existential crisis of mismatched socks or sharing his inexplicable theories about why pigeons are secretly running the economy.
A larger-than-life personality with a laugh as loud as his opinions, Dwight Warner invites readers to step into a world where everything’s slightly askew—and that’s exactly how he likes it.
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