Let’s be honest – if the circumstances surrounding the BBC pay row had happened at any major private company (outside of the banking sector), very few journalists would bother reporting it.
The practice of offering “sweeteners” or incentives to move on well-paid senior executives in big corporations is hardly new, innovative or front page news.
Does this make the practice right? No.
But the major reason why former BBC HR director Lucy Adams is public enemy number one is a perception that taxpayers who fund the BBC have a right to be outraged by age-old remuneration practices that reward those in power exponentially more than the rest of us. It’s a perception I partly agree with, and I’ll explain the reasons below.
The problem is NOT, as has been promoted by one journalist in the right wing press, that HR is dead and a poor career choice for women.
But there is certainly some truth in HR having an image/credibility problem and the prolonged battle to be relevant – issues that have being doing the rounds well before the BBC scandal broke.
Golden goodbyes
I personally find the practice of offering “sweeteners”, or hush money, abhorrent.
Why should fat cats receive a penny more than they are entitled because their organisation no longer wants them there? It would be lovely if we could all benefit in this way when we are pushed out.
But the problem here is a remuneration culture that over-rewards top brass. And let’s remember, the BBC is not alone.
Around this time last year, it was revealed the Royal Bank of Scotland awarded its new head of retail Ross McEwan a £3.2 million “golden hello” to convince him to join the state-controlled bank.
That’s £1.2 million more than all of the redundancy sweeteners BBC senior executives received between 2009 and 2012.
I don’t recall the RBS HR director standing before the Public Affairs Committee trying to justify this “golden hello”, which in my books is another waste of taxpayer money.
HR’s conundrum
Even Louisa Peacock of the Daily Telegraph agrees that HR (and Adams) is in a difficult position:
“In Adams' case, her remit was near-on impossible. She either had to reduce the BBC headcount by persuading managers to leave – hence awarding pay offs – or she would miss her targets and be criticised by bosses. Either way she's between a rock and a hard place,” Peacock wrote, before continuing her tirade on the rest of the HR profession.
I have never worked at the BBC or under Lucy Adams, therefore I cannot comment on whether she is a good HRD or popular among her peers.
But the broader HR issue is where does the function fit into the remuneration puzzle? Should HR solely wield the power to determine what is a fair pay or severance package? And how can HR influence a better corporate culture?
I doubt HR will ever solely hold the reins on pay and reward, but I do believe it can stand firmer on preventing pay offs and other unfair practices. Whether this is in the public or private sector is a moot point, because it is the practice that needs eradicating, not where it is applied.
On Peacock’s other main points:
If business leaders had thought HR was a “pointless department”, would they not have gotten rid of the function years ago? And you only need to pick up a copy of HR magazine (pardon the shameless promotion) to see examples of how HR can improve the bottom line.
Some of Peacock’s other claims, such as HR is a poor career choice for women and ridden with ‘jargon and thought leadership’, are designed to provoke an angry reaction, which seems to have worked.
Everyone knows women have as little (if not less) chance of rising to the top in finance or other functions, and I have never reported on a business that doesn’t indulge in cringe-worthy jargon.
Instead of anger, the HR profession would be better served by learning from the Lucy Adams case and working out how it can influence better remuneration outcomes in the future, particularly when HR professionals are “caught between a rock and a hard place”.
