Putting HR in rotation: experts say rotation programs are the best way to gain a broad view of the business, yet HR often leaves itself out of the loop - Cover Story - human resource professionals should become strategic business partners

HR Magazine, March, 2003 by Robert J. Grossman

Demand a seat at the table. Become a strategic business partner. Be proactive. It's all good advice. But like a mother's reminders to take your vitamins or wear galoshes, these mantras seem to have turned off--rather than motivated--many HR professionals. It's easy to see why: It's one thing to talk about becoming a business partner; doing it is a whole other matter.

Experts say the surest way for HR professionals to become strategic business partners is to learn more about the business they serve. And actually "doing the business" is often the best way to learn it.

A prime way to "do the business" is to participate in a program that offers rotating assignments through non-HR functions. Simply put, there is no substitute for experiential learning.

Ironically, that's a mantra HR professionals seem to have bought into only for coworkers in other disciplines. For decades, HR development executives have coordinated rotation programs that have allowed their counterparts in finance, marketing and operations to gain broad business experience and move up the corporate ladder.

But, unlike their colleagues, the vast majority of HR executives who function as business partners have not participated in rotation programs themselves.

"HR should be investing in rotation programs, but they're not," says Ed Lawler, director of the Center for Effective Organizations at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles. From 1995 to 2001, Lawler monitored HR functions in 150 companies, mostly within the Fortune 1,000, to see what tools they were using to help them become strategic partners. Rotation programs were the least-used developmental tool. (See the chart "HR out of Rotation" on page 55.)

Big mistake, says Lawler. "The dearth of rotations outside of HR will continue to isolate [the profession]. It means members of HR are likely to remain a separate group and not be involved in--or deeply knowledgeable about--the business."

HR'S absence from rotation programs may be even more pronounced than Lawler's research suggests. His study focused on large companies, and experts agree that mid-size and smaller companies are even less likely to invest in rotations of any sort.

Harvey Resnick, regional director of The Hay Group in Greenwich, Conn., finds lack of HR participation in rotations to be perplexing, given HR'S overall role in executive development.

"It's akin to the shoemaker's children going barefoot," he observes. "How can you expect to become a business partner without actual experience in the business? You can't just put the book under the pillow and know what's in it."

John Sullivan, professor of management at San Francisco State University, points out that there is general agreement that rotation Programs--regardless of their form--pay dividends. "When we asked hundreds of managers what experience they had that most changed them, it wasn't in a classroom; it was handson, working alongside a great mentor at 2 a.m. and talking about the business. It could be a job rotation, a project rotation or a one-day-a-week rotation."

Although such skill-stretching assignments aren't the norm in the HR field, they haven't completely fallen by the wayside. Some employers have made a point of offering a formal rotation program or at least an informal opportunity to test the waters outside HR. And participants provide anecdotal evidence that such programs work.

Formal Programs

Formal rotation programs offer customized assignments to promising employees in an effort to give them a rounded view of the entire business. Assignments usually run for a year or more. Rotation programs vary in size and perspective. While larger companies are more likely to invest in these programs, businesses of all sizes might want to consider such programs when they see the advantages they can provide.

Here are a few programs generating positive results:

* St. John Hospital and Medical Center. Some might say that Debbie Condino has already made it to the top. Condino, however, isn't resting on her laurels.

A 20-year HR veteran, she is the director of HR at St. John Hospital and Medical Center in Detroit, and reports jointly to the president of the 5,500-employee hospital and the vice president of HR for the health system. Recently, the president added her to his executive team--and liked what he saw.

Since then, she has become one of 10 high-potential executives--and the only HR executive--chosen to participate in the system's pilot "Management Mentoring Program."

Condino's customized development plan includes rotations into cross-functional stretch assignments. In addition to HR, which has a staff of 50, she's currently running occupational health, the volunteer department and auxiliary enterprises, which includes responsibility for the hospital gift shop.

Condino's mentor is Kathy Ryan, vice president of operations/acute services at Providence Hospital in Southfield, Mich. "I believe in rotation," Ryan says. "Debbie is able to come to me in my mentoring role and present her failures and say what's she's struggling with, and I'm able to help her. You can't learn just from observing others, you have to be immersed in different assignments and learn from your failures."