Member Article

"HR" and The Cost of Buying Happiness

I’m the world’s one and only Head of Aspiration*

So it came as a bit of a surprise when I got an email the other day from a recruitment agency to say that they’d spoken to loads of other Head of Aspirations (sic) who said they’d benefitted from that agency’s input. Yeah right!

You know what, there are loads of things I love about both the job title, that it’s a one-off, and the work I do with the team every day, but there are a couple of potential drawbacks.

Unlike a Human Resources Manager, I have no manuals, trusted tried and tested principles or expert research to refer to. OK, a little of what I do has its basis in what you might call HR, but seriously - even the term “Human Resources” sounds about as inhuman as you can get; like what extra-terrestrials in the movies would call us before exploiting men, women and children in hard manual labour. HR is not what a HOA is all about.

On the other hand, you hear about jobs like Head of Happiness, showering their teams with random gifts and forcing them to have “fun” by almost pushing them down slides into ball pits, and I’m not sure I subscribe to that either, however well-meant I’m sure it is.

Apart from the practicalities of it all, one guy or girl’s “fun” is another’s idea of hell on earth! I’m sure a lot of us would see that as a great working environment, but it seems a bit hollow. People aren’t commodities, and neither should we be forever trying to impress by trying to make everything bigger and better. Where does it end? You offer bacon butties to your team every morning, and the agency up the road ups it to a full English. Maybe that’s more about trying to make people feel important. I want our Dreamrs to know they are important. There’s a massive difference.

OK this is where the job title comes in - I believe the best way to make sure that the individuals in a team are fulfilled at work, is to help them develop their skills as individuals, to see how they can achieve even greater things, understand why they are so important as a member of a tight knit team, share meaningfully in the success of the business, and be totally engaged with our mission and values.

Yes, that our Dreamrs enjoy a fun and creative environment is super-important to me, but it has to be an environment where people genuinely thrive, and get something meaningful in return for their amazing work, be continually aspiring to something even better, and where one size definitely does not fit all.

Lynne Makinson-Walsh is Head of Aspiration at Dreamr.

Passionate about nurturing and developing our Dreamr team, as well as inspiring the next generation of potential Dreamrs.

*Based on LinkedIn searches and lots of expert googling.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Dreamr .