One of the simplest ways to start doing amazing things is learning to say no.
As HR professionals, I think we’re taught to say yes to everything. And after a while, you find yourself doing a lot of administrative work and things designed to make managers’ lives easier.
That’s not the path to HR rockstardom.
Start saying no. Not to everything. Some stuff just needs to get done.
But say no to the things that add no value. Things that managers should be doing themselves, because that’s what being a manager is. Things that should be outsourced or delegated elsewhere.
Free yourself to do work that matters. Say no.
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Good point…..and sometimes we get asked to do something that crosses managerial / ethical boundaries. Start practising now and when the hard stuff hits your desk it’ll be easier to say “No” in a polite and respectful way.
Couldn’t agree more – pretty much applies to everything in life – but particularly to HR – because if you say Yes to all of the non-value stuff, you are seen as a non-value cost center. Just had this discussion with my Undergrad HR students – they are performing HR Audits as projects and nearly all of them came back after the first round saying that all of the HR people are overworked and the orgs need to hire more HR – I suggested that perhaps HR wasn’t focusing on the most important stuff and taking on work that Managers could/should be doing.
@Karen – Great comment. It’ll be a lot easier to say no to the big, important stuff if you practice on smaller, less important things now.
@Aimee – Thanks for sharing a real-world example, and I’m glad you finally stopped by and commented! =)