HR Everyday

Back a few years ago I worked in the banking industry. I enjoyed the environment, enjoyed the people I worked with and enjoyed the challenges that the fast-paced merger and acquisition environment posed. I credit much of what I learned about HR to these years, not just from a compliance standpoint (as we were constantly being audited, compliance ruled) but also I feel like I saw and experienced a lot of different situations. I became an expert in payroll, 401k and benefit plan conversions (or consolidations depending on the situation) throughout the 5 acquisitions during my tenure.

In one of the acquisitions, the bank I was working for was being purchased by another bank. This new bank was moving the corporate office, and therefore the HR function, to their offices about 50 miles away from where I was working. It was an interesting situation because they were a smaller bank with fewer employees than we were. Because of this, they relied heavily on the bank they were purchasing for much of the tactical support during the process.

I had no intention of staying with the company, as the commute was impossible. Before the merger was finalized, I had another job offer. Suddenly everyone was worried. How would they deal with the payroll consolidation of the two companies? At the time I wasn’t even in the payroll department and suddenly everyone was scrambling. Before I could accept the other offer, my current manager came back to me with a raise to match my job offer and a retention bonus equal to 6 months pay if I stayed at the company until the end of the year to lead the payroll conversion project.

I accepted. Later I discovered that I was receiving the highest retention bonus of ANY employee in the company, including the current Payroll Administrator. I felt like I was getting away with something. Did they really need ME that badly? Was I the only one who could work on this project? Yes, I had proven myself to be effective in this arena, but was I the most valuable employee at the company?

So it didn’t make sense, and I credit my manager at the time for positioning me with senior management and convincing them of my value.  Sometimes I wonder if these things aren’t necessarily based in reality but in perception. They perceived that I was the only one who could do this, either that or it was worth 6 months of my salary so that they wouldn’t have to deal with it. Either way, whether or not I deserved it, the offer was there and I wouldn’t have given it back no matter who protested.

I guess there is a small part of me that feels bad for the AIG employees currently returning their retention bonuses. They can certainly be blamed for a lot, but not necessarily the perception from AIG managment that their continued presence at the company was worth $165 million.

A lot has been said recently in the news about the Jon Stewart v. Jim Cramer bout broadcast on Comedy Central Thursday night. I watched the show, I’ve always been a fan of Jon Stewart’s ability to make me laugh about things that I don’t really think are funny. The current economic debacle is a great example.

I won’t say too much about it, if you haven’t seen it, watch it. I was surprised at how Cramer came into the conversation with his tail between his legs. And Stewart never let him off the hook, expressing the rage that all us normal folk feel right now. It was awkward and a little painful because clearly this whole thing isn’t Jim Cramer’s fault. And whatever responsiblity he or the financial media may or may not have in all of this might be fun to speculate about, but clearly that’s all we can do. And maybe we did all share responsibilty because hell, he was just telling us what we wanted to hear anyway, and we ate it up with a silver spoon we took a HELOC out to buy.

I digress. The part that stuck with me was when Stewart said that “you” (meaning I imagine all the evil corporate fat cats we all love to hate) funded “your” adventure with “our” 401(k)s. And this is where I thought about me, the Human Resources Professional, the one who sends the emails out and passes out the bar graphs, the one who encourages her employees every quarter to increase their 401(k) percentages. Do I have some responsibility in this? I came into the HR game just as defined pension plans began their long death, so I don’t completely understand them, but according to Wikipedia they aren’t dependent on investment returns. Were we, all of us HR folk, drinking the 401(k) kool-aid when we should have been investigating more stable plans to insure our employees futures? I don’t know. I know that I’m simplifying the argument as well (not even taking into consideration the CFO we have to deal with that doesn’t even want to give us a 401(k) match). I know I worry about my employees, especially those who are 5-10 years away from retirement. Should I have told them to sew that extra 5% into their mattresses?