I run a monthly HR Forum for prac­ti­tion­ers from the over 1,100 Cham­ber mem­ber busi­nesses I work with. Each month, I facil­i­tate the dis­cus­sion of a topic we sit around the board­room table to dis­cuss from our own per­spec­tives. The result is idea exchange and best prac­tices shar­ing. I have never posted about it before but this year I am going to use each meet­ing as a topic post.

Yes­ter­day, at our first monthly forum of the year, the topic was increas­ing HR’s value propo­si­tion. My find­ings were that the role of each of these prac­ti­tion­ers, while shar­ing fun­da­men­tal sim­i­lar­i­ties, had pal­pa­ble and unique dif­fer­ences in regard to orga­ni­za­tional lead­er­ship, the abil­ity to influ­ence and par­tic­i­pa­tion in strate­gic ini­tia­tives. I walked away clearly con­vinced that it was the individual’s own per­cep­tion of what their role was and what they were will­ing to (or dri­ven to) or not to become involved with or lead. I say this because when I asked ques­tions like “Why aren’t you involved at that level?” some responded, “that’s not my area” or “I have enough to do”. Oth­ers said they hadn’t thought of it before but were going back to the office with new strate­gies in mind.

The indi­vid­ual career objec­tives of a prac­ti­tioner directly impact the orga­ni­za­tion sig­nif­i­cantly. Those who choose to lead and mold their role and career can achieve amaz­ing things. Those who choose to con­tinue work­ing with a siloed approach and are not look­ing for the chal­lenge and account­abil­ity of an orga­ni­za­tional lead­er­ship role will con­tinue on as they always have. I believe even­tu­ally busi­ness and indus­try will neces­si­tate the evo­lu­tion of the role of the prac­ti­tioner. In the future, per­haps those that pre­fer a more admin­is­tra­tive func­tion will choose to be employed with com­pa­nies out­sourced to per­form those admin­is­tra­tive functions.

What will you do to stretch and grow your role this year, or are you sat­is­fied to leave well enough alone?