HR as Liabilities
Powerful new technologies are being adopted not only in manufacturing, clerical and retail work but also in more sophisticated professions such as law, financial services, education, and medicine. According to Forbes, technology has already taken over 90% of the jobs human used to do. Thus, as technology is destroying jobs faster than it is creating, an important question arises with this trend -If human resources are a liability to the organization? Or due to this developing technology, there could perspectives of newer jobs, making human resources as an asset? Read on the blog and get the insights of this discussion. Let’s look into how employees become liabilities to the company
Employees that don’t love their jobs
In an extensive global research conducted by Aon in 2017, it was found that only 65% of employees are satisfied with their jobs. But these statistics actually point towards the employee’s psychological investment in the company and the motivation to produce extraordinary results. Companies with below average employee satisfaction levels will see lower employee productivity and low customer satisfaction – all factors that significantly contribute to the inadequate financial performance of the company. Thus, any employees that feel discontent of their profession are bound to affect the organization’s performance. These employees start becoming liabilities to the team. Not only do they underperform, but also they can be easily persuaded to leave one company for its competitor. An employee’s dedication towards the company’s vision is the deciding factor if the employee is an asset or a liability. Total dedication can make a noticeable contribution to the company’s vision.
Employees that don’t grow with the company
Say you have a start-up that took off and emerges out to be the fast-growing company. Such high growth companies demand their employees to cope up with the ever-changing needs of the company. These challenges facilitate the development of employees if they succeed to cope up with it. If not, the company grows around them with them being in the same place. Sooner than we know, the company moves on beyond such employees and they become nothing but a burden to the company. These liabilities must be dealt with as soon as possible. Employee development not only benefits the employees themselves but also contributes to the company’s performance. The lack of versatility is also considered as a liability to the company. For example, Apple started out with Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne. They hired a few employees in the initial stages for the basic plan. But as the company grew rapidly these employees couldn’t cope up with the speed and turned out to be a liability for the company.
Employees that are working two jobs at the same time
When an employer hires someone, he expects the employee to invest their time and effort in the company as much as possible. If the employee is pursuing another job at the same time, his or her performance at both jobs takes a toll. The employee can no longer give his or her 100% to the company while still being paid the entire salary. This slack in performance soon becomes a liability. Such employees gain a reputation of being ‘job hoppers’ among the employers. Employers don’t encourage such methods as they expect total commitment from each and every one of their employees.
Thus, even though employees may be essential cogs in the machine, they also possess the potential to hamper the progress of the company. These employee liabilities are giving way for companies to resort to technology to cut down on their shortcomings.