Humanizing HR Policies: Toward Employee Engagement And Inclusivity

Could HR policies be worded more respectfully?

There is a huge movement towards humanizing the workplace and updating corporate values. Many human resources (HR) professionals operate in offices that claim to hold “respect for others” as a core value.

Despite the rhetoric, when you open the manuals and actually read the HR policies and directives, the reality is different. Instead of speaking respectfully to the people they are addressing, many of these rules sound like they were written by angry parents scolding naughty children. Adults hear that heavy-handed tone of voice as disrespect and instinctively tend to resist. 

That effect is called psychological reactance, and it is well documented.^[1] 

A statement like… 
 

• Overtime is prohibited without approval from a Director.

..is an unnecessarily antagonistic way of communicating that overtime will be paid only when it has been approved by a Director.  

HR policies are often full of dictatorial and confrontational statements, and that situation is not encouraging. Rules documents drafted in an overly aggressive tone of voice are evidence of a toxic organizational culture. The goal is to have our internal regulatory instruments functioning within a policy culture of trust. 

What defines a policy culture? A culture of distrust sounds something like this: “If the rule does not explicitly tell people not to burn down the building, then somebody is going to do it and claim that they did not know it was not allowed.” That viewpoint signals a defensive approach to rule-making.

Well-written policies address the 99% of people who want to follow the rules. True, if you do not explicitly tell people not to burn down the building, it is possible that some rogue employee might claim ignorance. But that employee clearly lacks judgment, a key competency of many workplace positions. That shortcoming will show up elsewhere, manifesting itself as a disciplinary, attitude, or other employee relationship problem. Those problems, while needing attention, are not solved by harsh policy wording; they are HR issues that require a solution with a different focus. 

Compare the following statements:
 

• A) ”Employees must submit vacation requests no later than seven business days in advance. Any request not submitted on time may be refused.”
• B) ”Vacation requests are eligible for approval only when submitted at least one week in advance.”

In both statements, the HR branch wants seven days to process vacation requests. So why the difference?

Looking at Statement A, it is obvious that too many people in that organization have ignored the seven-day lead period. More tellingly, what is also apparent is the underlying emotion. It is not hard, even for an outsider, to read between the lines and detect the subtle - but clearly perceptible - undertone of frustration. The people in that office are fed up with the lack of cooperation with this rule and have no bones about sharing that sentiment. 

Statement B is neutral. The requirement is still strict, yet it is expressed in a helpful, rather than reproachful, manner. 

I sympathize with the people in the office that wrote Statement A. It is understandable if you are frustrated when people are not following your rules. But is it appropriate that that frustration shows up in the policy wording, revealing those private problems to the rest of the organization? I do not think so. Worse, if your organization posts its policies on the Web in an effort to be more transparent, the entire world will learn about the low compliance level and the HR department’s frustration. That is not an image you want the world to see. 

Done properly, rules are about helping people do the right thing. You can achieve more engagement when your policies are written to sound positive and helpful rather than negative and dictatorial. 

Take this example:
 

• You must be a full-time analyst to apply for the supervisor position. 

Why “must”? Why is someone issuing an order? The hiring condition is strict, but there is no reason to sound authoritarian. There are many less aggressive ways to state the same thing, such as: 
 

• The supervisor position is open exclusively to full-time analysts.

This approach provides exactly the same information without resorting to the parent-child dynamic that is so toxic to good working relationships.^[2] 

Why is that dictatorial language there in the first place? Where did it originate?

Think back. We first learned about rules by listening to our parents and our teachers, who constantly told us how to behave: Do this. Do not do that. What we took away from those interactions growing up was the belief that rules should sound bossy. 

Bossy rules emphasize the power hierarchy: “I am telling you what to do and you will obey me.” We all lived the formative years of our lives on the receiving end of rules that we were not supposed to question. In addition, for centuries up until only recently, that dictatorial tone of voice was reinforced by a prevalent social dynamic in the office where it was not uncommon to hear bosses shouting at their employees who were helpless to stop it. Bosses spoke like that and they wrote like that, and that is just how it was.

Today, we live in a different world. Today, we strive to maintain a respectful workplace, and we promote collaboration, respect and inclusion. No one talks to their employees in that tone of voice and gets away with it now. But a lot of people still write like that.

The easiest way to avoid the parent-child dynamic in policies and directives is to stick with the present tense, for example:
 

• The office is open from 8:00 to 16:00.
• Incident reports are due 48 hours after the incident.
• Employees in discipline hearings are interviewed only in the presence of a union representative.

The present tense tells you that “it just is.” It informs you about the policy decision that was made. There is no “must,” “shall,” or “will” about it. The simple present tense can be more powerful than statements written in the imperative.

Not convinced? Perhaps, we should take a lesson from the world of legislation. The strictest rules anywhere are the criminal laws: the rules against murder, assault, arson - you know, the nasty stuff. How are those rules worded?

Here is the arson law in South Dakota:
 

• Any person who starts a fire or causes an explosion with the intent to destroy any occupied structure of another is guilty of first-degree arson. First-degree arson is a Class 2 felony.^[3] 

Look at that! It is drafted in the present tense. Here is the kidnapping law in Texas:
 

• A person commits an offense if he intentionally or knowingly abducts another person.^[4] 

A survey of the penal codes of all 50 of the United States reveals that 80% of them use some variation of the present tense.^[5] This format is not limited to the USA. Here is the prohibition on assault in the Canadian Criminal Code: 
 

• A person commits an assault when, without the consent of another person, he applies force intentionally to that other person, directly or indirectly.^[6]

Here is a sample from the United Kingdom:
 

• A person is guilty of theft if he dishonestly appropriates property belonging to another…^[7]  

It treats you like an adult. There is no finger-wagging or we-are-in-charge-and-you-will-obey attitude coming through. No parent-child dynamic. It is a simple statement of a decision.

What we have now is an absurd situation: the strictest laws for the most heinous crimes in the country are worded more respectfully than many of our HR policies.

Ponder that for a moment. We speak more nicely to criminals than to our colleagues. That is just plain wrong. 

Having trouble recruiting new people to your organization? More than any previous generation, millennials coming into the workforce today will not tolerate disrespect.^[8] It is counterproductive if the positive imagery and welcoming attitude of your recruitment service bring in people eager to apply for positions, only to have them turn away after reading your policies and concluding that you are not as modern as you claim to be.

It is time to update the language of the policies and directives in the world of HR. Let us make it clear that we are asking people for their cooperation, not their obedience.

Footnotes
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactance_(psychology)
[2] The notion of a Parent-Child dynamic comes from the science of Transactional Analysis. For a simple explanation of the Parent–Child and Adult–Adult dynamics, see Games People Play by Eric Berne, M.D.
[3] https://sdlegislature.gov/Statutes/Codified_Laws/2047653
[4] https://statutes.capitol.texas.gov/Docs/PE/pdf/PE.20.pdf
[5] https://lewiseisen.com/2021/10/15/state-penal-law-review-results/
[6] https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/section-265.html
[7] https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1968/60
[8] https://www.gallup.com/workplace/336275/things-gen-millennials-expect-workplace.aspx

Lewis Eisen is the Developer & Founder of the Perfect Policies™ (lewiseisen.com) approach to using respectful language in policy drafting, which has influenced organizations in countries around the world. His Amazon international bestseller, Rules: How to Write Rules that People Want to Follow, is now in its third edition and is also available in French. Drawing on 40 years of combined experience as a practicing lawyer, business consultant, and federal civil servant, Lewis runs workshops on policy drafting.