I have no answers, Kate but am very interested in what the collective wisdom of our colleagues throws up!

I have mostly but not exclusively been standalone in HRM roles and have not really had that much exposure to larger HR departments: on the few occasions when I worked as part of larger HR teams, I did not have the impression that the relevant HR leaders had more strategic responsibilities / roles than I was used to. As far as I could tell, they were mostly working on the reactive / risk avoidance / transactional / tactical level, only for larger organisations than I was used to. However, my experiences are probably not representative. Am looking forward to hearing whether I was simply unlucky not to come across a really strategic HR department with lots of interesting problems to solve or whether the type of departments I worked in are more common than we think?

In reply to Anka:

Thanks for this Anka - I think you make a really insightful observation about whether or not HR in big organisations is really any more strategic than it is in SME's. I for one am far more interested in working as part of a truly strategic team than one which is simply doing more stuff for larger workforces. Those roles are probably fairly rare. Any other views gladly received.

I, too, am yet to achieve those lofty heights. However, I was fortunate enough to get a press pass to the 2017 HRD Summit in my capacity as a blogger for HR News, where I got to rub shoulders with some of the UK's significant movers and shakers in the HR world.

The impression I was left with is that at the step beyond HR Manager, the ability to calculate holiday entitlements, to unpick a tricky payroll dispute and even to shepherd the progress of a contentious grievance case is, for the most part, irrelevant. This is why so many people (especially men) seem to step across into HR at this level from other disciplines, such as Finance or Operations: because what's required is a much broader understanding of the business and that difficult quality of "boardroom impact". Knowing you're way around the legal requirements of ERA96, EA2010, WTR or HASAW is something that can mostly be delegated.

Overlooking the elements of unconscious bias that are attendant to the concept of boardroom impact (which are many), and having spoken to a good number of men and women at C Suite level in HR and other disciplines, the deciding factor seems to be whether one can show the ability to take responsibility for big, impactful expenditures. And although the idea of "yeah, I'll spend money, no problem!" is appealing, it takes on a different cast when you realize that what you are spending is essentially big chunks of the bonuses of the people around you or of the dividends of your shareholders. And if a project can show a clear financial return, oddly, that doesn't help because that decision is a no-brainer. If, by spending £X you will definitely save £X-1, or make a return of £X+1, then the decision isn't a difficult one.

The difficult decisions for HR in the C Suite are the ones where the ROI is one that cannot be accurately forecast, so whether the senior purse-string holders release the necessary capital to fund your project is based entirely on your personal stash of credibility. So if you cash that in, *and it pays off* (or, at least, can be argued to have paid off by a persuasive influencer) and the whole process doesn't drive you off a cliff of stress and anxiety... *then* you're ready for the next step up.

Most HR folk ( whatever they call themselves) are advisers. The ones that make it to the top are influencers.

Most are administrators the best are dynamic problem solvers ( I have met HR Directors who are administrators. Some HRDs should be rebadged Chief Administration Officers - sort your car out, sort the Christmas party etc)  

Most HR folk struggle to balance empathy and the desire to do the “right thing” with a true commercial mindset. Those who get it know how and when to balance.

Most HR folk limit their knowledge and understanding to HR and are dilettantes with regards to other areas of business. Good HR people have probably worked in other areas and specialisms . .  

Many HR people are specialist advisers.    The best HR people act as true business coaches to their senior colleagues, helping to clarify thinking and share the burden.

Many HR people lack real confidence in the true value they can add and how they and they knowledge and judgement can make a difference. The ones who make it to the top know they make a difference.

Ask a HR Director how big an organisation his/hers is. Do they say it’s a £100 m revenue / £15 m profit or do they say they employ 1000 people. The answer goes a long way to tell you the answer to your question.

( all just my views of course and deliberately extreme. )

In reply to Robey:

Actually I am not sure it’s quite aboyt spending money in the way you describe. Anyone can spend money even millions.

The key rather is being trusted to spend money. It’s developing the style, judgement, impact and insight that colleagues defer to you or listen to you when spending priorities are discussed and ageeed. The spending is the easy bit - getting colleagues to spend it on “people” is the harder job.

In reply to Keith:

You make a good point Keith. The challenge can often be the unconscious bias that incumbent HR leaders make when appointing to their teams - if the leader is actually an Administrator, then their tendency will be towards recruiting other Administrators who mirror their own approach and ideas. Ironic really given HR's championing of diversity and talent-based recruitment models.

In reply to Keith:

Food for thought from Keith and Robey.
I also subscribe to the view that influencing the deciders is what takes you to those senior roles. Technical expertise will usually be secondary, except (somtimes) in large mutinationals where "experts" can reach very senior strategic positions in their speciality (often with major international or worldwide impact).
The second key to senior roles is a strong understanding of the company's business model - where it has come from, where it is going and why, and how what it does it actually makes money. Coupled with this is a vision of how the HR aspects can connect into this busines model and contribute positively to achieving the objectives. Frequently, as Keith says, HR is administrating the consequence of decisions taken by other managers. A real Busines Partner at the top level has earned the respect and credibility of their managing colleagues, not thtough technical expertise but by being able to deliver business related results.
The acquisition of the appropriate, broader management skills needed to do this can be accelerated by stepping into a line job for a few years, so I strongly recommend any HR person who has the opportunity to jump at it! It also helps you to situate the real HR role in the larger business context, so that if/when you return to HR your broader picture helps you with understandinf the bigger picture. Doing this will help you build "management cred", without which you will (probably) remain the junuior partner.
You should also learn to speak "finance" with other members of the management team. If you don't know your EBITDA from your TSR, your Working Capital Requirements or your ROCE - and what it means in your company - then you haven't got a snowball's chance in hell of winning credibility. For instance, in my current role I often challenge our senior finance team on the relevance of certain performance indicators for management bonus plans - and it is expected from me. If you haven't acquired the right to challenge then you are not a BP in my books and stepping "upstairs" will be very difficult.

In reply to Ray:

Very interesting to hear this. In SMEs, HR is often a new function and it is an uphill struggle to convince people of its value. I have had to start from scratch a few times and have identified influencing as something I need to work on.

To me it seems as though the skilled influencer part is crucial to attaining seniority, irrespective of whether the role is truly strategic or what Keith would term "administrative".

In reply to Kate:

But Kate - if the senior HR bod is really an administrator then it makes entire sense for them to recruit other administrators to fill their function as that's obviously what the business wants. A true business partner maybe wouldn't really be comfortable in a department that administers not challenges.

In reply to Anka:

Well that's why I tagged the expenditure of money alongside the requirement for influence. Although I totally agree with Ray and Keith that the establishment of that influence requires thought about and knowledge of the wider business (and, yes, ability to speak money), influence is really only as respected as the amount of financial clout it wields.

One reason (of many, I hasten to add) that I encourage senior leaders to think in terms of delegated budgets in SMEs is so that HR can snag some actual money to play with.