In a recent survey carried out by Veredus, almost 70% of organisations surveyed said they now have HR board representation, with 80% stating that having an HR board seat was critical to the success of an organisation.
In contrast however, only 3% of CEOs surveyed came from an HR background, with only 20% of those HRDs surveyed even aspiring to reach the top job. Why do you think this is? It would seem HR is recognised as having an important function on the board, so why aren’t there more CEOs from an HR background and why do so few actually aim to reach CEO level?
I agree there will be issues around skills … or perhaps more accurately a perceived issues around skills, resulting in a lack of opportunity. Despite HR being seen a critical to business success, they are rarely seen as core to the business, but as a support organisation. Support organisations despite their importance are often perceived as less challenging so to not provide the breadth and depth of challenge which is felt necessary to achieve the top job.
I would interested to know what the success record is for HRDs who went on to be CEO, and what path(s) they took to get there.
I believe there are two types of people in the HR function. Firstly, those who consider themselves business people who happen to be in HR, and secondly, HR people who happen to be in business. The former tends to look at the issues that the business faces and then what HR tools/strategies they can employ to help. The latter has an HR product and is looking for a business to fit it into.
As an HR Director who then went into General Management as COO and then MD of FTSE 150 Organisations I believe I belong to the former. I was fortunate in my early years to work for blue chip companies ABF, Cadbury’s, Diageo where HR was expected to be a business partner.
Having met considerable HR Directors in my time I’m afraid that less than half would qualify as business partners and theefore will never make the transition to General Management.
I fully endorse the views of John Riding and Jonathan Flowers. My experience of senior managers in the private sector (I have some knowledge of the public sector) is that as managers progress through their careers they do not loose their ‘task skills’ knowledge i.e. being and engineer or an architect etc. however they do not often have a qualification in HR or finance. For CEO positiones over £150,000 one may believe that an Oxford or Harvard MBA with an ACA to be ‘minimum standards, along with a mature ,successful track record. Is it not possible to attract such an applicant?
I believe the problem is probably historic as much as anything else. HRD’s are not well-known for having finance/property/business experience and are therefore probably not even expected to apply.
HR has come a long way and I suspect that many HRD’s in plc’s and large corporations are probably qualified to do the job of a CEO but perhaps job satisfaction in HR is high? The CEO step might be perceived as creating a rod for your own back. Many CEO’s have also started and run businesses themselves and not so for HR managers/directors, perhaps?
Perhaps the way forward is for HR people to gain an MBA if they seek the CEO route?
In an article for publication shortly we identify three possible ares that may help to explain this, and this may be helpful as a structure for this debate:
There are issues of SKILL gap. Are there certain skills that CEO positions require that HRDs haven’t developed?
There are issues of WILL. As the survey says, on;y 20% of HRDs aspire to be a CEO - is that a high or low number - and what’s driving it, contentment or fear?
And there are issues of OPPORTUNITY. Are there feasible paths from HRD to CEO, if that’s too big a jump for one go. Are there sufficient role models?