Gradually and without any technical criteria, the personnel and HR areas in the public sector were pitifully dismantled in their structure and functions, arguing a series of inconsistent arguments.
Legal considerations were used as a pretext that were improperly used, incorporating reprehensible technical guidelines of a misunderstood rationalization, which were welcomed by those who with an extremely simplistic approach and with a merely reductionist vision understood the reform or modernization of the state as a problem exclusively of structure and costs..
In many cases, they did not even bother to support the proposal of "miniaturization" of these areas, they simply displaced them to an organizationally inferior, disadvantageous and inconsequential position, subtracting their functions and restricting it to become a base of little strategic utility and therefore distanced from the mission and institutional vision.
The fate of the personnel or HR areas, unfortunately was subject to what was decided or recommended by a commission made up often of personnel with no experience in public matters, unaware of the strategic role of human potential, and what is even more serious under command and supervision of professionals who were highly "powerful" - but neophytes and lacking adequate academic training - established inconsistent and contradictory guidelines and guidelines, resulting in proposals riddled with exaggerated functional and organizational restrictions. damaging many areas, being the most affected those of personnel and HR.
There were also those who, with the powers attributed to them for restructuring and administrative reform, modified the organizational architectures, having as their only element the organizational chart that they manipulated, playing with their lines and lockers, mixing functions and areas, and cutting or merging structural units without any technical criteria.
With an exclusively economic approach they came to formalize an absurd flat organizational structure without going through the phases and technical conditions necessary to successfully arrive at this interesting structural design model, generating disorder among hierarchical levels and confusion between the nomenclature of structural positions and functional.
These were the ones that caused the most damage to any attempt at authentic reform of the state apparatus, since from their markedly reductionist perspective they considered their work accomplished when they dismembered and suppressed structural units, eliminating areas and jobs without measuring or noting the tremendously damaging effects on society. and for the organization that was structurally unbalanced, causing panic and anxiety to the workers who, unexpectedly and without any technical justification, were separated from their positions, qualifying them as "surpluses" or subjecting them to processes whose already formalized rules modified extemporaneously with the sole purpose of dismissal,causing with such irregularities and other administrative nonsense the sinking of the morale of the state employees who for such facts could never accept all the talk about the importance of human capital or that they are the most valuable asset of the company, when the truth is that they were treated as the easiest to disregard assets.
This gloomy panorama still has many defenders, despite the fact that the modern version in the field of organizational behavior throws up empirical evidence - continuous and growing - about the decisive role played by the human factor and the irrefutable need therefore to count in State companies and institutions with specialized areas in charge of university professionals with adequate academic training and accredited experience in the field of labor relations and development of human potential.
Despite this incontrovertible evidence, they turned the personnel and HR organs into inconsequential units, distancing them from their true strategic role and undermining their real organizational level, assigning them administrative and procedural functions without any added value and whose Chief, Director or Manager - by profession and experience that has little or nothing to do with the position - was devoted to the simple supervision of mostly routine work.
Currently, the personnel or HR organs, instead of being key units in the organization in direct relation to the highest levels of decision, are - in many cases - hierarchically subordinate to the administrative directorates or managements, despite the fact that in many cases the director The administration manager very subtly tries not to take responsibility for the administration of human resources and prefers to keep visible distances from the issues related to the Directorate of People and labor issues (unions, strikes, work stoppages and collective bargaining agreements).This attitude is natural because for lacking the essential university training in the fields of Management and Development of Human Potential included in modern and authentic Industrial Relations, they do not know the strategies and technical processes of personnel, to which the scarce command of labor laws is added. and almost no experience in dealing and negotiating with union unions. Such shortcomings result in them - sometimes unwittingly - often interfering with the professional management of these important disciplines.
The Personnel Areas become an irrelevant and ignored unit of simple administrative procedures; registration, attendance control and payroll manager when their functions have a heavy logistics orientation and high bureaucratic burden. This situation generally occurs when it loses its hierarchical level depending on groups that have different responsibilities and therefore do not appreciate the importance and singular importance of the personnel or HR areas for institutional and government purposes. that by assuming its true strategic role, it proposes, cautions and makes institutional policies more flexible, articulating and making labor relations and the development of human potential compatible with the mission and organizational vision.
With these references, it is natural that its structural location suffered a serious deterioration, since only the operational - routine work without relevance was expected from the personnel or HR organ and not the outstanding or notable contribution of impact that adds value and contributes through development. integral human resource to create strategies and increase the performance and productivity of state organizations.
This situation has caused even the requirements of experience and academic training of those who apply for the positions of Personnel Management or HR Management to be reduced, finding themselves directing these improvised or outdated professionals from the strangest and most varied specialties, who due to supine ignorance and without any observation they docilely accept the "recommendations" of those "advisers" (?) who mistakenly or due to private interests irresponsibly advise the "miniaturization" and "devaluation" of the personnel or human resources bodies, discarding their strategic nature and stripping or restricting their functions, giving them minor responsibilities mainly linked to controls, records, files,celebration and social events programs as well as simple administrative procedures; this is - among others - the preparation of forms; Coordination with ESSALUD and granting of social benefits.
In this disadvantageous and unfortunate situation are many of the personnel bodies in the Public Sector, whose Chief or Director, instead of dedicating himself to strategically promoting HR and facing with anticipation and adequately labor relations, strives to carry out with "efficiency and effectiveness »Administrative and routine tasks that, obviously, do not constitute a real contribution or added value for institutional purposes.
We can conclude, then, how unfair and unfavorable it is for private or public organizations to "miniaturize" and "devalue" the areas of personnel or HR, which, constituted as "business partners", have the primary responsibility of contributing to improving performance through knowledge management, the development of human potential, organizational culture, training, the adequate maintenance of labor relations, the alignment of performance management with organizational strategic planning, etc., developing policies that allow the involvement of people with their work and with the organization, increasing their level of self-esteem, dignity and performance.
Those responsible for these areas must accredit high experience and due academic qualification in Organizational Development; Personnel management; Management by Competences; Labor Relations etc. They must be trained to reinforce and sustain the leading role of the dependencies that they direct. They must take into account that the strategic value of all the work of the HR areas will be evaluated in terms of impact on the development of human potential, on the improvement of the quality of the service or product produced and on the economic and operational results of the organization; They must ensure that the HR tactics are perfectly adjusted to the goals and objectives set, aligning their main activities with the Institutional Strategic Plan.
Otherwise, it would be obvious and technically reasonable that the personnel or HR areas are located at a low organizational level, with second-order functions and responsibilities and high administrative content. Under these conditions, there would be no objection to these areas being dependent on and subordinate to the administration units.
The Institute for the Development of Human Resources (IDREH) has been created with very good judgment, inspired by the correct and firm position of the Peruvian representative at the III Ibero-American Meeting of Ministers of Health, held in Havana-Cuba, in October 2001 where our representative emphatically expressed that "the formation of resources is key to the reform processes and that it is necessary to have a defined Human Resources Policy in which the value of people is exalted and protected on a daily basis…"
Work in power of the Congress of the Republic five (5) Bills (*) that already have the approving vote of the Council of Ministers. These Projects finally recognize the notorious importance in the Public Sector of the Office of Human Resources, enriching their field of action, assigning them by law management functions, granting them powers and powers, as well as the corresponding and obvious autonomy to deal technically and professionally with all related matters. with the talent and development of people.
The Human Resources Offices will form part of the Personnel Administration System and the Public Employment Management System at the national level, together with the Superior Council of Public Employment (COSEP) and the Court of Public Employment.
Their main mission - of the Human Resources Offices - will be to train highly competitive servers, imbued with the spirit of service of a state worker, incentivized according to their contribution or performance and remunerated according to the characteristics or profiles of each occupational group and position. of work.
Among its most important functions expressly stated in the Draft "Law of the Administrative Career of the Public Servant" are the processes related to the planning of human resources; admission, evaluation and career performance; public career completion; formulation of strategies and prospective analysis for the improvement of human resources; professional development; training; performance evaluation; job classification; elaboration of social welfare programs and incentives etc.
Likewise, the Human Resources Offices according to the Draft "Public Employment Management Law" must implement the following management instruments:
1. Institutional Human Resources Management Plan;
2. HR Management Agreements;
3. Personnel Assignment Chart;
4. Organization and Functions Manual;
5. Competency Profiles Manual;
6. Incentive Programs etc.
There will be a new vision of the public servant (…) “no longer as an organizational resource, a servile object or a mere passive subject of the process, but fundamentally as an active subject and provocateur of decisions, entrepreneur of actions, creator of innovation within organizations, as a proactive agent endowed with his own vision and above all intelligence: the greatest, the most advanced and sophisticated human ability ”Dr.Idalberto Chiavenato
(*)
1. Law of Administrative Career of the Public Servant
2. Law of the Officials and Employees of Trust
3. Law of Management of the Public Employment
4. Law of the System of Remunerations of the Public Employment
5. Law of Incompatibilities and Responsibilities of the Personnel of the Public Employment
