New HR: Understanding HR's customers – works council

This is the final part of the HR’s customers analysis. Last but not least the works council/ unions in general.
Ulrich himself has in his basic model not really touched this customer. His model does not actively cater for works council/ unions. This is understandable as he is US based and most of his research which he used as basis for his model is in non unionized environments. However, in many countries (ok, mostly in Europe) HR work is impossible without active involvement of the works council. In many countries HR measures can actually not get implemented without consultation or even acceptance of the works council or union. This power makes works councils/ unions a big player and big customer for HR.
This does, however, not mean that HR in these countries is treating the works council as a customer. In many companies that I have seen, the works council is seen as political opponent or worse, as enemy. Ok, this is not only because of the HR department, but often due to the general company politics and the works council/ union which thinks that its only reason for existence is to oppose anything that they can – and calling it “defending employee interests…”.
The topic of works councils/ unions is a very interesting one – from both sides. The history of unions and works councils is long and has a big tradition – however, I recommend they change their view of the world and their reason for existence or they will go down (as you can already see in Germany where unionization is decreasing) or bring down the company they work against (not for). But this is a topic I will touch in a separate blog.
Today I would like to emphasize on the importance of works council inclusion in day-to-day HR work. As I have laid out above, works councils/ unions are very powerful in some countries/ industries and the HR department actually has to work “with them”. However, even if this is not the case HR should consider involving them in the HR work for various reasons: May it because of the closeness of works councils/ unions to the employees and therefore a) help in better understanding the actual needs of employees but also b) help in promoting HR measures through an additional channel. Or may it to utilize them as additional input and support in designing and implementing new initiatives to ease the official review and sign off of such initiatives.
It might not often seem that way, but I believe that works councils/ unions actually do have important and valuable input for HR, its processes and initiatives. HR just needs to tap into this territory and utilize it – and this not only “as required”, but proactive and inclusive.
Assessment of HR’s current state, gap assessments, HR strategy formulation should always include a 360 degree feedback and input – so far I have only seen HR, the business and the top management being involved. Why not the works council/ union?
Of course I know that this seems almost crazy given the current state of cooperation between HR and the union/ works council, but someone needs to take the first step – and there is nothing to loose.
After this first step from HR, the works council/ union of course has to take the second step, which is also a big change from today for most of the companies that I have seen. This requires a very different view and understanding of “reason for existence”. I will talk about this more in my next post.
But just think about the potential – a new source of input, a new cooperation partner, less fighting and tactical manoeuvring.