I was at my dentist last week…always fun (not really) and after gazing into my mouth he turned to me and asked: “are you an aggressive brusher?” I responded with: “I don’t know what that means”. Which got me thinking about the words we use in HR, that when used outside of HR mean, well, not much. So here is my first cut at words to leave inside the HR boardroom:
- Talent Management. This one takes the cake. No one, I mean no one, knows what the heck this means.
- HRIS. Is an acronym. Avoid avoid avoid. Spell it out for people.
- Intervention. So we get this, but most others think you are going to gather their family members in a circle and confront them about their drinking habit.
- Systems thinking. This one is right up there with talent management. I get what this means, you get what this means. No one else does. Business people use words like alignment and integration.
- Strategic HR. Just stop using this one. We should all be doing work that is aligned and driving our businesses forward. If you’re not, then outsource yourself or change.
- OD guru name dropping (think Senge, Buckingham, Lencioni, Kotter). Start incorporating Buffett, Drucker and Welch so folks can relate to you.
Peoplestuff 