HR/People Fantasy Island #Articles

Every time I say I work in People/HR I see the face, a pause, a nod, and for years I blamed them, now… I know it’s also on us, because HR has built its own little island, a place where we speak our language, celebrate our rituals, launch programs with clever names, collect certifications, and wonder why no one really gets what we do.

Outside that island, the business is busy selling, delivering, growing, surviving, and People/HR sounds distant, not wrong, just invisible until someone really needs us. Things change when we understand the business, not superficially, but really knowing how money is made, where it leaks, what breaks when people leave or burn out, and suddenly we stop talking about best practices and start talking about problems/challenges, real things that matter.

Budgets are small, ROI is unavoidable, hope and intention are not enough, which is why People/HR is often questioned, ignored, outsourced, invisible until it is needed, and sometimes that is just once a month for payroll.

LinkedIn makes it prettier than it is, Glassdoor makes it worse, reality sits in the middle, and when HR finally leaves Fantasy Island and steps into reality, the face people make when you say “I work in People/HR” slowly starts to change, and that’s when the work actually begins. In Drake words “I live for the nights that I can’t remember, with the people that I won’t forget”.