EZ37 Solutions Opinion Page

USING H.R. CONSULTANTS FOR PROFITABILITY IN YOUR BUSINESS

Consultant

A person who provides expert and professional advice in specific area of personal or/and organizational issues and challenges.

Human Resource Management

The process of hiring and developing employees such that they become more valuable to the organization.

Human Resource Management Consulting

Human Resources Management Consulting involves advising organizations on how to get more value out of their staff.

Examples of consultants in our every day personal lives:
A motor-mechanic is the consultant to call when your car breaks down, and when you have health challenges you consult your doctor, and you also consult your stock-broker on issues of financial investments.

Examples of consultants in the corporate world

So also, for a healthy functioning of a company you may sometimes need the services of external consultants. For example; for finance issues you consult an auditor, for computer/I.T. issues you consult an information technology professional and for staff management issues you consult a Human Resource Management expert.

Using a Human Resource Management Consultant

Making the right people management decision is very essential to your business; you have to routinely make personnel decisions like;

· Who do you hire?

· How many should you hire?

· How to engage those hired profitably, legally, and ethically?

· How much should you pay them?

· To what degree do other non-staff related decisions and policies affect the staff of your company?

· How do you motivate your Staff?

· How do you administer staff performance rewards and sanctions? and

· How do you disengage your staff when you no longer need their services?

All these decisions aren't easy to make, but there are H.R. Consultants who can offer informed advice on such matters. It may be more pragmatic to engage an external H.R. firm to handle such matters.

Especially with most Small and Medium Scale Enterprises (SMEs), the need for H.R. consultant services has not been fully appreciated even though they need it the most.

The problem lies in the fact that most entrepreneurs prefer to settle for ‘friendly advice’ rather than ‘professional advice’. Below is a table showing the difference between a friendly advice and a professional advice.

FRIENDLY ADVICE	H.R. CONSULTANT’S ADVICE
Their advice is more often than not based on their own experience.	They recognizes that every situation is peculiar, and so approaches to problems should factor in these peculiarities
Offer a limited view point to a solution	They make recommendations to client based on varied possible alternatives
They use intuition as their major tool for diagnosing the problem	They rely on information and data and they utilize different tools to acquire these information and take diagnosis
Their source of information is limited	They further consult other professionals in their network and community of practice in handling your problem

Choosing a H.R. Consultant

It’s like visiting a new barber, you will never know what to get until he has finished the job. Since consulting service is a highly intangible product, most employers are faced with the challenge of judging quality before the service so they can make a choice between consultants.

Below are ways to choose the best consultant for the Job.

Review your capability: What expertise is the H.R. consultant bringing to you that you need but lack internally?
Recheck your options: Would it be better to develop this expertise internally rather than seek it externally?

IF YOUR answer to the two QUESTIONS above is yes, then;